Illumination with Alpine HU?
 

I just installed my Alpine 7995 Head Unit and it has an illumination lead.

I connected the lead directly to the blue and white wire that goes into the back of the factory harness. I have checked, double checked and triple checked, and the head unit is set up properly to dim when the headlights are turned on but it isn't working.

Any ideas/suggestions? I did a search and that's how I found out about the blue and white wire that doesn't have a wire on the harness, but haven't been able to find any solutions for people whose head unit just isn't dimming like it's supposed to.

Thanks!

How's that H/U working for you? I'm getting it soon.

I LOVE the head unit. It sounds great, the way the menus work is great, and the build of it feels very well put together, much better then the Kenwood Excelon I had before. Although the 7995 does not offer the color choices, the buttons are blue all the time and they are BRIGHT!

just to clarify for others.

I have not cut the factory harness off, I am using a wiring harness. The after market harness I got did not include a lead for illumination/dimming. The wire coming out the back of the Alpine is orange. From searching on this forum and looking at pin outs I came to the conclusion that it was the blue/white wire for illumination/dimming but could I be wrong?

Thanks.

I solved the problem.

The wiring harness doesn't have an illumination or dimmer lead.

The blue and white wire is the illumination wire in the Protege5.

with the alpine head unit, it doesn't dim when you turn the headlights on, you actually have to turn the dimmer dial down and adjust the dash lights to be a little bit dimmer. After you do that the Alpine head unit dims itself. It doesn't adjust with the dash, it's just bright or dim. (although dim is still pretty bright, the ceiling of the car is all blue at night) I am super happy with it :D

A first version of a page with pictures is up here, I'll try and take some night time pictures and get more details up soon: http://www.surfergeek.net/protege5

WARNING: [rant]

I am SO sick of decks that do not dim with the dash lights!

What happened to the "good ol' days" (like 5 years ago!) when you could install your deck, and when you adjusted the brightness of the car's gauges, the deck dimmed along with it?

I don't know about the rest of you, but I HATE the glare of a bright dash at night - I have my stuff dimmed waaaaayyyy down all the time. I still can't understand the attraction to indiglos - too frigging bright no matter how dim they get. Anyway, the only bright spot on my dash is my Kenwood HU - the display dims down (pre-set level) *okay*, but it has this annoying blue button that I MUST turn off or break or dim somehow - drives me nuts.

So - anyone know why we can't seem to get adjustable dimming decks anymore? I mean - the ones that adjust along with the car lights? Is the world so into the "bling bling" that we need uber-bright decks so others can see them thru our 5% limo tint at night?? Frigging sucks.

[/rant]

~HH

JRODHOTROD I too am getting ready to install an Alpine 7995 but theres only one problem its my first time...:D how do I do this can you please tell me step by step the process of installing it???

THANKS:D

For the record: I did not do the install myself.

I have installed car stereos on several occasions, but this time I got a pretty good deal from my dealer and just didn't have a whole weekend to dedicate to dyanamat, amps, speakers, and then still have to take the car to the dealer for the alarm so I had them just go ahead and do everything. And they did a great job.

That said, it should be pretty much the same as any other head unit install. Since the 7995 does not have an amp in it you'll have to wire up your amps to it using RCAs but other then that, it's all a standard install. For more details on stereo installs in the Protege5 do some searches on the forum and check out this page: http://www.astolfo.com/p5/p5.asp

Best of luck to you.

Aren't all amps conected to aftermarket H/Us by using RCAs?

yes, almost all good amps will be connected to good aftermarket head units through RCAs

say I don't have an amp and I buy the alpine 7995 will I have to buy an amp in order to use it or no?? since it don't have its own amp!!!

Yes, You will need to buy at least a 4 channel amp if you get the 7995. if you want to use a subwoofer as well, you'll either have to get a seperate amp for the sub or buy one 5 channel amp.