Archive for April, 2014

Getting the 1998 Porsche Boxster Ready for a 15K Mile Trip – Part 2

Tuesday, April 22nd, 2014

ThermosI said in my last post that I would next write about Music, Bluetooth and Hands-free Microphones – which I will.  But first, I wanted to update the coffee cup.  While I do love the Chantel, I recently tried the Thermos 16-Ounce Stainless Steel Travel Tumbler and I am thinking I like it a little bit better than the Chantel, primarily because it fits more snuggly in the cup holder and, more importantly, holds one more ounce than the Chantel.  If you are a coffee-holic like I am, that one ounce can be very important!

2914_800_351Okay, on to Music!  We have two choices, as I see it.  Either have some really good tunes or spend three months talking to each other.  Hmmmm.  Tough choice, eh?  So, we upgraded the radio in the Boxster to a new Kenwood Excelon KDC-X997, which also provides us with the Hands-free capability we need in order to stay legal in most states.  I have to say, this radio is leaps and bounds above what we had before.  It has more bells and whistles than I can figure out (I will need to spend more time with it) but the best feature is the ability to plug a USB memory stick into the front USB port and listen to your own music.  No more CD’s or DVD’s necessary!  And when you are into conserving space, which we clearly will need to do, five or six 16GB memory sticks is the way to go! We thought we’d load up each stick with a type of music – rock, country, classical, bluegrass, latin, swing, and so on.

We loaded Media Monkey on our notebooks and we are in the process of categorizing and rating our music (we have a rather extensive library).  Once we have that task completed, we can load up the memory sticks.

Now we have a great radio, Bluetooth, and music, but it is not quite there.  After much “discussion” (which means he argues the benefits and she argues the cost), we have agreed that the factory speakers just don’t provide the sound we want.  We did our research and we have planned a mini-roadtrip to Roseville, CA to visit Rod at Car Audio Innovations and listen to speakers and figure out just what we will be upgrading to.  So, while I didn’t plan on writing a “Getting the 1998 Porsche Boxster Ready for a 15K Mile Trip – Part 3”, that will be the next installment – where I will describe what we chose and why (with pictures).  Stay tuned  . . .