# 2004 Honda Accord - Alpine IDA-X001 Head Unit Install



## mdbayler (Apr 8, 2008)

I just finished installing a head unit in a friend's 2004 Honda Accord. His wife drives the car and he decided to get her something through which she could listen to music from her iPod. He asked me for a recommendation and after a little research we agreed to go with the Alpine IDA-X001 head unit.










His wife doesn't listen to CDs, so he was good with the fact that the X001 doesn't include a CD player. We looked at the two installation options for the 2004 Accord - 1) place an aftermarket head unit in the storage pocket and leave the unused factory unit in car, and 2) replace the factory unit with an integrated dash kit that includes climate controls. Due to safety concerns and the fact that an XM receiver was already residing in the storage pocket, we decided to go with the integrated dash kit. We also picked up the Alpine KCE-422i full-speed iPod cable to connect her iPod to the X001.










Here is a picture of the dash when the car rolled into my garage. It has the stock head unit along with a Delphi Roady2 XM receiver. The XM receiver was powered by a power port in the center console and the power and antenna wires were run along the top of the console into the storage pocket.










A few days before he brought the car over I started working on preparing the dash kit and wiring harness for the install. The wiring harness was pretty straightforward. The Metra wire colors matched up well with the Alpine wires and the only oddity was the illumination wire that also had to be attached to the dash kit. 

I tried to use the DIN cage to install the head unit into the dash kit, but it was difficult to mount solidly into the dash kit and placed the head unit too far back in the opening. I placed the ISO mounting plates on the side of the head unit in a location where they sat flush with the sides of the unit. This resulted in the head unit sticking out about 1/4" too far. I took the Dremel tool to the ISO mounts and trimmed off some of the plastic to allow the head unit to sit flush with the front of the dash kit.










Goldilocks would be proud. The ISO mounts fit "just right" on the sides of the head unit.










After we pulled the dash apart and made sure that the head unit was going to work in the existing opening, it was time to do something with the mess of wires. Since the storage compartment had already been removed from the dash, I drilled a hole in the back corner that allowed me to run the iPod cable, XM antenna wire, and XM power wire into the pocket. I spliced a power plug into the existing plug in the ashtray and hid the power converter behind the storage pocket. The XM antenna was run along the back seat and door sills and then into the console and out the back of the pocket. This resulted in a storage pocket that held the XM receiver and iPod with no exposed wires.










The X001 integrated really well with the stock aesthetics of the Accord. Operation of the head unit is pretty intuitive except for the fact that Alpine screwed up the user interface. Once you go into the Search mode and find what you want, you can't select it by pushing the button in the middle of the jog dial; you have to push a button off to the left of the dial. I don't know if there is a way for them to fix this through a firmware upgrade, but the current interface is a little clumsy.










Here's a picture of the finished installation. The XM receiver and iPod are conveniently hidden in the storage compartment and the resulting install is very clean.










Now all I need to do is find another friend that is willing to let me play with their car. I've finished a competition install in my 2005 Ford Ranger, so hopefully I can get some of those pictures and a write-up posted soon.


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## ///M Kevin (May 8, 2008)

I have the same deck in my S2000. Great looking unit.


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## Thumper26 (Sep 23, 2005)

nice, i'm using the same deck.

you want to use the ipod cable that plugs into the usb cable included with the deck, though. that way you get the album art. it still charges the ipod, and i think it's just as fast as the full speed cable.


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## mdbayler (Apr 8, 2008)

The manual says that the USB cable will only work with 5th generation iPods. Sadly, she has a 2nd or 3rd generation iPod. 

Have you had success with the USB cable and earlier iPods?


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## Thumper26 (Sep 23, 2005)

ah, didn't know you had an older ipod.

i have a 5.5 gen, so mine works fine.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Just a little suggestion here, I'd bolt down the head units rear to the cars frame like stated in the manual with a metal strap or close ended wire rope. You can't trust that ABS housing to keep the head unit from fly around and hitting someone in the event of an accident. Especially important since its for someone else.


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## DynAudio888 (Aug 22, 2008)

I have some questions I havent been able to answer so I signed up just to post this here.

I just put the same unit in my 2003 accord, its exactly the same setup and I used the same dash kit, my problem however is the buttons on the bottom for defroster, AC, etc. all those buttons are messed up. 

They are hard to press and sometimes stay pressed until I push and pull the dash kit around. It is very frustrating and I'm not sure what to do, do you have this problem with yours? Or anyone else who has and what you've done to fix it? 

The dash kit itself "seems" of decent quality but the part where the buttons are just sucks, I don't think I can even keep it in there because it will press buttons on its own, I think it's just poor quality setup, the rest of it seems fine though.

Are there any similar kits out there does anyone know that will allow me to put that radio in that area? I saw several that mount it lower in the storage compartment but I didnt want that.


Sorry for the long message but I am pretty lost as to what to do and I saw this post about having the same install. I'd appreciate any help anyone could give me.

Thanks


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## matm (Oct 21, 2008)

That's pretty impressive dude.

I'm looking at doing this shortly myself.


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## JayinMI (Oct 18, 2008)

We had a customer who bought a similar kit for his Accord. Probably the same one, but not 100% sure. Then he drove to Florida. He had a bunch of problems, and had to reprogram the kit a few times.
I didn't do the original install, I just remember hearing about how pissed the guy was. Seemed to be a bad dash kit.

Jay


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## mdbayler (Apr 8, 2008)

I just checked with my friend to see how his wife is doing with the system. He indicated that they have not experienced any issues with the buttons or dials on the dash kit. It all seems to be working fine. She claims that the AC is not quite what it used to be before the installation, but my friend thinks that is mostly in her head.

If you are having problems with the buttons on the dash kit I would recommend calling Metra and see if they can provide you with a new dash kit. This is a pretty expensive dash kit and you deserve to get something that works right.


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## ErinH (Feb 14, 2007)

harvest? you live about 45 minutes from me.


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## matm (Oct 21, 2008)

mdbayler said:


> If you are having problems with the buttons on the dash kit I would recommend calling Metra and see if they can provide you with a new dash kit. This is a pretty expensive dash kit and you deserve to get something that works right.


Yeah, I fully agree.

So mdbayler, when you had the kit it seemed to be of decent quality? You reckon it was up to the same quality levels as the original dash piece?


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## mdbayler (Apr 8, 2008)

As far as the controls, they seemed to be of good quality. I didn't mess with them much when I installed it other than to see that the buttons caused the proper function to be actived on the climate control system. My friend indicates that they have had no issues with the controls. They have seen no tendency for buttons to stick or other issues.

The one thing that I wish was a little better quality on the kit was the front surface. I think you can see in the pictures that it looks very much like textured ABS. It would have been nice if it better matched the texture (smooth) and color (dark gray) of the factory piece, but the difference is not really that noticeable.


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## fipu (Dec 24, 2008)

Hi, please help me a little bit if you can.

I have a HONDA ACCORD 2005 and it has an original CD player just as you have changed on this car. I am interested in 2 things:

1. how do you get the original cd player out of the dashboard? (some pictures would be nice !)
2. do you think that the original cd has a line out? I would't change the original headunit beacuse I have commands for volume on the steering wheel and I would like to connect the headunit to an amplifier with a subwoofer.

Thanks in advance,
Best regards,
Razvan


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## mdbayler (Apr 8, 2008)

fipu said:


> Hi, please help me a little bit if you can.
> 
> I have a HONDA ACCORD 2005 and it has an original CD player just as you have changed on this car. I am interested in 2 things:
> 
> ...


1. Check out the instructions on the Metra site for the dash kit that goes with this car. It's a pretty complicate process to get out the CD player as you have to pull out most of the center stack from the dash. Here's a link to the instructions from Metra.

Metra Electronics Corp. - 99-7864 Instructions

2. I didn't really look at the back of the CD player, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't have RCA type outputs. You could probably install a line level converter to take the speaker outputs and convert those to RCAs. I know that one of my friends did this with his Acura and does well with his sound quality.

If you are interested in using an aftermarket receiver but retaining the steering wheel controls you can usually get interface kits from PAC or PEI that send the steering wheel commands to aftermarket radios.


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## ChrisB (Jul 3, 2008)

I looked into one of those kits before my 2007 Accord EX was totaled and the main problem with that kit stemmed from the way dual climate controls were dealt with. It was not uncommon to have to stop the car, turn it off, then restart the vehicle to get the AC controls to start responding again. I was just going to retain the stock HU and install the aftermarket HU in the bottom storage compartment hole. Sadly, a drunk driver crossing the center line changed all that for me


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## Paul1217 (Aug 12, 2007)

the controls are programed for a 2 door not a four (just guessing that the car is a 4door). there is a way to reprogem the controls for the 4 door. call metra and they will tell you how to do it. i had to do it for a customer 4 months ago. i think that you have to hold down the a/c button for a while to reprogram it. give them a call, it worked great!


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## fipu (Dec 24, 2008)

Thank you very much, the information is very usefull!!!


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## bernardo (Jan 31, 2008)

and so far this metra kit, is still working? im trying to choose between the metra and the scosche... 

what do you guys think?


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## trojan fan (Nov 4, 2007)

bernardo said:


> and so far this metra kit, is still working? im trying to choose between the metra and the scosche...
> 
> what do you guys think?



FYI..do not buy that kit, it's junk....put it in the lower storage area


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## bernardo (Jan 31, 2008)

well thanks a lot I will do that


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