The Parrot Asteroid – The Next Generation of In Car Entertainment
From the makers of the much acclaimed Parrot AR Drone, a quadricopter for the iPhone, comes a new product for your car. They have designed an Android powered in car entertainment system supporting maps and attractions, voice calling, weather, and other applications in addition to providing radio and music playback.
The device fits into the head-unit of a standard 1-DIN car, and features a 3.2 inch LCD as well as tactile buttons and a jog dial to control the various features of the device. Many of the Asteroid’s features can also be controlled via voice input. It is able to connect to the Internet via your smart phone or a separate 3G dongle, and the device can also connect to an external GPS to provide its location based services. With the help of the Fuel for Less app, the Asteroid can display the nearest petrol pump, and can also display the prices of the various fuels offered. The device has another app called iCoyote which can warn users of upcoming speed and red light cameras as well as traffic jams and accidents.
For music playback, the device integrates with iPod, iPhone, USB or SD card sources, analog players, bluetooth stereo, and FM and Internet radio and is equipped with a built-in amplifier and sub-woofer. For digital sources, all music can be accessed by voice with the ‘vocal music search’ that responds to the names of artist or albums in users’ music libraries.
The Asteroid will be available from October 2011 and will retail for around $200.
