We knew it was coming but it's now official: JVCKENWOOD has debuted 7 new car head units under its JVC and Kenwood brands with support for Wireless Android Auto. This means no more fussing with the USB cable and plugging your phone in every time you get in the car: the Auto interface will work wirelessly. This will be great for short trips, but you're still better off charging your phone during long drives, especially if you're using GPS for navigation, lest the battery die prematurely.

Under the JVC brand, you'll find two new Wireless Android Auto units: the $600 KW-M845BW and the $700 KW-V940BW, both of which have 6.8" resistive touch displays but they do seem to differ only by the inclusion of a CD slot in the latter.

As for Kenwood, there are 5 new models with Wireless Android Auto: the DMX905S, DNX875SDNX995S, DDX9705S, and DDX9905S, which differ by screen size, rear cam support, and a few other changes here and there. I'll leave you to dive into the spec sheets to discover those.

There's no word on pricing and availability for any of these models, so I guess we'll all have to wait to know more. I'm crossing fingers for some decently priced unit so I can import it and try to make it work in Lebanon.

UPDATE: 2018/01/10 8:05am PST BY

Our own David has been checking these out at CES 2018 and here are a couple of relevant tweets from him explaining how everything works and how well it does.

UPDATE: 2018/01/11 1:48am PST BY

Through another press release (added at the bottom of this post), Kenwood has released pricing info for three of its new Wireless Android Auto units. The high-end DNX995S will have an MSRP of $1,500.00 (DVD, GPS), the DDX9905S will be cheaper at $1,100 (DVD but no GPS), and the DMX905S will be the cheapest at an MSRP of $850.00 (no DVD, no GPS, but slightly larger screen).

There's no pricing regarding the DNX875S, but given that the display is lower-res than the DNX995S, it should be cheaper than that one. The same is true for the DDX9705S, which has a lower-res display than the DDX9905S and no MSRP announced yet. 

Thanks: Erie

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