Off Road Navigation Part 3
Just a few years ago, Kenwood navigation systems were the least popular option. Recently, however, Kenwood has made some strategic partnerships with leaders in the navigation and electronic integration community that set their new options apart from the crowd. Kenwood’s current feature unit is the DNX-8120. This nav unit sports a full 6.95” touchscreen display, integrated Garmin Navigation, integrated Parrot Bluetooth, and a very customizable interface.
The 8120 supports the standard multimedia formats, DVD & MP3. It also includes support for AAC (unprotected), WMA, DivX, VCD, and even JPEG formats. You can also add satellite radio, HD radio, and of course an iPod to the sytem. The standard iPod interface works great, displaying song, title, artist, and album art. Like most car audio systems, it does lock your iPod when in use as a safety feature. There is no built in hard drive for music storage on the 8120, so you’ll need to bring your CD’s or iPod with you to access your music. You do have access to an SD card slot and USB inputs, so you can bring your media with you on cards or USB keys as well. The DVD playback was excellent, but you have to be parked in order for movies to play properly.
As I mentioned Kenwood has partnered with one of the most popular GPS companies for their navigation: Garmin. The Garmin system in the 8120 is virtually identical to anyone who’s ever used a Nuvi device. The system is intuitive and simple to use once you learn it. It took less than a minute to find the nearest Shell station and plan our route. Once our route was in the system, we were unable to move the map around, we could only zoom in and out. The system supports standard 2D view as well as 3D ‘birds eye’ view. The 3D view is very helpful when navigating in large cities as it helps to give ‘depth’ to your route. The system is completely customizable as well. You can add custom POI’s, change the icon (even to an FJ Cruiser), and our favorite feature: you can add TOPO maps to this system.
This, to us, is the number one feature on this unit. You can purchase any of the Topo maps series from Garmin and load them right into your 8120 (the 5120 and 7120 support this as well). Since I own a Garmin handheld, I spent about 3 months creating a very detailed set of custom Topo maps for Colorad. I was able to successfully load these maps into the 8120 using the SD card slot as well. When you enable the Topo maps, you may lose the auto-routing features, and your POI’s may not be visible. Those are small compromises that we’re more than willing to live with to have in-dash, 7” screen Topo maps when we need them. The great thing is, you pop the card out of the unit when you hit the pavement and you’re standard navigation system operates perfectly.
The Kenwood supports voice prompted navigation, but not voice commands. In our opionion, most voice command systems (we even tested an ’08 Acura) are not reliable enough for everyday use. I’m sure future units will include voice commands, but we’re in no hurry to use it. The voice prompts in the navigation system are very similar to standard Garmin units. They work well and get you where you need to go.
The menu system in the 8120 is very detailed. It will take more than a few days to get used to it, but once you have it setup as you want, you won’t have to use it much. We really like the fact that the 8120 is fully customizable. You can set your own color scheme, change background photos, and even change your startup logo (to the FJC Magazine logo, of course). You can adjust virtually every setting you can think of, and unless you go all out on upgrading your stock FJ speakers, you may not notice a huge difference in the EQ functions. Still, it’s good to know that if or when we upgrade all of our components, we’ll be able to tweak everything.
Just as with adding custom topo maps, updating the 8120 couldn’t be easier. You purchase an SD card from Garmin specifically for your unit, pop the card in, and go through a quick update procedure. We couldn’t test the update time since the unit is so new, but if it’s like most other Garmin units, it shouldn’t take more than 20 or 30 minutes. Garmin usually published updates for their nav units about once per year, so you’ll always have the option to update your nav to the latest version.
The DNX-8120’s fully customizable interferface, integrated Bluetooth, wide variety of media formats, and great navigation system make this about the best choice for FJ owners that enjoy back country driving. There is no other in-dash unit that has such great features all in one package. The 8120 does a great job at everything it does, probably due to partnerships with industry leaders. There were very few minor issues that we found with this unit, and hopefully we’ll have an install article in a future issue of FJC Magazine.
If the 8120 is a little out of your price range, we’ve heard of Topo maps working on both the 7120 and the 5120 which are older models but are less expensive.
Photos:
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No matter which navigation option you choose, always remember to Stay the Trail, Tread Lightly, and take paper maps as a backup. We sincerely hope that this Off Road Navigation series has enlighted you and helped you decide what’s right for you.
We would like to thank Car Toys of South Colorado Springs for all their help in creating this article. Their efforts were key in helping us learn of all the different options and their product demonstrations were top notch. Contact them if you need any assistance in Colorado or elsewhere.