Android Head Unit by CA-FI- Review of Company

[Chris from Washington]

Well writing this is a let down.
As a lot of you know, I've been restoring the Camaro and redoing the system is one of my projects.

What I've been really wanting is a Double Din unit, running Android. I thought this would be a great touch to the restoration of the car, giving it a very modern update. When I began my search, I didn't find much but then I found a company called CA-FI.

I found some reviews of their 1 gen unit, some were positive but there were also a lot of bugs in the unit. Some of the drawback were it was still running they Fryo version of Android, had a pretty lousy touch screen and was underpowered hardware wise.

They then released another model about a year ago, this one was a little better. It now had a capacitive screen, a little better specs and was now running Gingerbread (Jelly bean was just coming out at this time).

So I along with others started asking them about OS updates to these units, and what type of support would they get. Sometimes on their forum they would reply back that these are not "phones" or an "android refrigerator" and they don't need to have updates. I didn't believe this was an acceptable answer since these units cost about $1,000! Fyro is over 3 years old now, and Gingerbread isn't much better and app developers are going to no longer support these versions soon. Which would make these units worthless!

I also noticed that other customers who already purchased these units was asking about why they was showing as 'not compatible' with many apps in the market. (CA-FI had not addressed this the last time I was able to check)

Instead of helping out a potential customer, what did they do? They banned me from their forum!
Yes, they decided it was better to just not have me ask questions about their units and kick me out of their forum.

So I'm typing this to warn potential buyers, that there is almost 0 support on their official forum. They have stated that have no plans on firmware updates to these units because (they are not a phone, or refrigerator).

It's really too bad, I was looking forward to buying on of these and writing a review of the actual product (Plus I really want a true double din android unit in the car). But looks like I just get to review the company itself.

Good Luck to anyone who decides to buy one.
Hopefully they get some better customer support and forum moderators.

Chris


-----

Update: They have now banned me from their Facebook page, and deleted any comments I had. There was another customer asking about OS updates, and I replied telling them the experience I had on their forum and the answers others have gotten back. That was deleted along with a post I started asking why I was banned from their forum for asking these questions. (Oh and they still didn't answer the other guy who was asking the same question. They just deleted my response and left him hanging. Hopefully he saw my response before they deleted it) Again stating to them that I was serious about purchasing one, but not going to spend that much money on something that is already outdated. Their response: Banned from their facebook page.

Anyone who sees this, know that you will most likely never get a firmware update to your units. You will be stuck with whatever version it ships with (bugs and all). You do not have root access either, so no way to experiment with roms either.

[Ryan from Ohio]

Sounds like you got lucky and didnt buy that crap.

[Chris from Washington]

Sounds like you got lucky and didnt buy that crap.

Ya got very lucky.
One of the guys who bought the first gen of these units has a very long thread on MP3Car.com and he eventually sold his and bought a Pioneer Appradio2.
There is an app you can buy for your phone, that will basically allow you to control your phone through the Appradio unit. I've been watching some videos of it, and it's great! Whatever is displayed on your phone displays on the headunit, you can control every app, feature that you normally would on the phone. It's perfect for what I want! Best Part, it's way cheaper than those Chinese units running 4 year old software.

So that's the route I'm going to go now.

[chorritos]

Hi Cris, I just saw the message you sent me in April. Thanks for your comments.
Well, seeing that selling a product and without soprte outdated, I contacted them again and was told that the update would come at six months, six months, I went back to get in touch with them, and that got in touch with me, I no longer worked there, I again said that the update would come at six months again.
I did not see clear and did not buy it.
Thanks for all, greetings.
Esteban

[Chris from Washington]

Hi Esteban,
Glad you saw my message, and really glad you didn't waste money on one of their units.

This fall, I think I'm going to get one of those Pioneer appradio's and then use the ARLibrator app that allows you to mirror your phone on the deck. They are much cheaper compared to those CAFI units too.

[chorritos]

I have long been looking at this pioneer, seems very economical for large possibilities you have, I do not think so.

I'm also looking at the parrot asteroid smart, looks very good, but I think it is quite limited.

No, there is so much new product android ...

Is this you know?


Chinese is no mark, vero and runs with 4.1, need to see the screen quality.

[Chris from Washington]

I have long been looking at this pioneer, seems very economical for large possibilities you have, I do not think so.

I'm also looking at the parrot asteroid smart, looks very good, but I think it is quite limited.

No, there is so much new product android ...

Is this you know?


Chinese is no mark, vero and runs with 4.1, need to see the screen quality.

I think the Pioneer units will be a good choice for me. I think using it with the ARLibrator app will be that I always have a unit that is on the most updated version of Android. Well I guess whatever my phone is on, the unit will mirror it on the screen and I can control everything on my phone through the unit. So contacts, apps etc are always in sync. I also don't have to worry about trying to get data on it, since it will just go through my phone which has unlimited.

There are some cons to the Pioneer units, that bug me. One is that it only has 2 sets of Preouts for some reason, no sub out. That's disappointing.
The other is the preouts are only 2V. I'm not really sure why Pioneer decided to really cheap out on that aspect of the units, whenever everything else seems to be pretty nice.

[bitterpoadeahd]

Up cho bac-- bia heineken gia tri 1 thuong hieu

[latoya0511]

It sucks that you had such a bad experience with it.