Savvas replied:

There is a thread dated 30 June 2002, started by rojac00 going through the same topic. Have a look. There's heaps of replies.

ExplorOz Team - David replied:

Andrew,There is the other thread however, I just returned back after our trip and just before we left I installed a new cheapish Kenwood CD 6 stacker and basic head unit. I installed the stacker in the center box between the driver and passenger seats. We drove from Perth to Birdsville and back on some very corrigated surfaces and the system only bumped once maybe twice when we hit something big and unexpected.Overall I am very very happy with a unit that including speakers and everything cost about $7-800. I installed it, that also saves a couple of hundred.I think the CD player copes better than we do sometimes in car, we have been able to hear it going when the entire vehicle is shacking itself around us.All the best David

Gordon replied:

Andrew, before you buy a CD player check out getting an MP3 / CD player. We got one for our trip from Bris to Kimberley and it worked great. We did about half our trip on dirt. We took 3 MP3 discs with each disc holding up to 10 normal CD's. We also took a few normal CD's which all fitted into a 12 CD wallet. The player cost me $500 fitted. It took up half the space of the OEM Landcruiser radio cassette player. In the remaining space they fitted a plastic shelf / pocket in which I store the CD wallet.

If you have a computer and a CD Burner you can legally (i) record your own MP3 format discs from your own audio CD collection and (ii) download a whole lot of free music from the internet. I don't have a burner but got the supplier to include 30 of my CD's recorded onto 3 MP3 discs.

On our trip we found that it is not really practical to listen to music on really corrugated roads. The noise level even in the Cruiser is often so great that the last thing you want is to crank up the music to full blast.

On the highway and smoother dirt roads it meant we could drive all day without changing a CD.

6 weeks ago I hadn't even heard of an MP3 / CD Player and now I'm a convert. To find out more search the net for "MP3" and a whole new world will be revealed. Good luck.