Going back to 9500i from V1

We'll, its official. I've just ordered a new car(BMW 135i) and my new detector for my car will be the new blue 9500i. My V1 has been claimed by my wife.

I bought a 9500i when they were first released. I returned the unit for a new V1 (I've had V1's before). I have found I missed the features on the 9500i, I also found I like its KA band range better than my V1. (Yes, I know the V1 is suppose to be the best in the KA band..but not what I found)

Don't get me wrong, the V1 is great. However, I have found it annoying after using a 9500i. I also found that anytime my 9500i would alert to a KA band hit, I would soon visually spot a highway patrol car. My V1 has had a few issues where it would hit a KA band, then J it out.

I've been follwoing the updates to the 9500i and it sounds like a very solid detector now.

Now, any recommendations..... BLUE VS RED??? Pro's/con's... I've personally never had a blue led detector and think the change will enhance the overall detector.(just something new and different).

I found blue to glare quite a bit - this was both good and bad....

Bad in that under reduced ambient-light conditions it was distracting (I have the detector mounted just to the left of my inside RVM, so that it's easily within my peripheral vision) - but this was with my x50, which was not capable of autodimming.

As such, I don't really know how the 9500i would play-out in this respect.

The good, IMveryHO, was that when an alert happened, it would really, really grab my attention - especially at night.

With my 9500i, I elected to go with a red display.

This did solve the night-time glare issue (I've got my detector set to "MED" brightness - mounted as high as I have the detector, the autodim compensation gets kinda screwed-up from the detector's proximity to the headliner and tint-band/matrix), but I do find myself missing the visual attention-getting alert of the blue x50.

Overall, daytime visibility, even with bright ambient conditions, I've found to not be a problem - and this is again at "only" the "MED" brightness setting.

I have a red 9500i but want a blue one, mainly because blue is less common, and less obvious when other people look into my car. The other reason I want blue is it will match my instrument cluster and accent lighting of my TL.
http://www.acura.tl/images/acura-tl-interior.jpg

Congratulations on going back to the 9500I, it’s truly an awesome RD!

My favorite thing about the 9500I is it seems to only alert you if it’s a real threat.

Those V1 fanatics are going to love reading this post, everyone duck for cover!

Blue LEDs are the latest and greatest from what they offer and tells everyone you opted to spend $50 more for it just so you can be that much cooler of a crowd pleaser.

If they were both the same price I would have probably opted for the blue just to have a more modern look to it, but for a $50 difference in price between the 2 for something that does the same exact job I couldn't justify the price increase in my mind so I went with the red. If money was no object to me I'd of still not been able to justify the increased price and would have went with the red and then just gave the $50 to a good cause like a charity, a homeless person, orphan children, or a stripper at the club.

The auto dim feature seems to work very well, I have this on my TV and my Laptops and disabled it because it always makes my screen too dim, I leave it on with my detector though because it actually works pretty good. Not sure about the detectors, but I can relate to what TSi+WRX said about the blue being distracting and too bright. I have a Red LED on my HD DVD player that turns blue when it's powered on, red when off. The blue LED on it is so bright and distracting it annoys me and I ended up covering the LED with a piece of electrical tape. This looks like sheet, but it was more annoying to have that bright blue LED shining in my face while trying to watch a movie so I live with it.

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Originally Posted by Esoterica

Those V1 fanatics are going to love reading this post, everyone duck for cover!

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May he enjoy his intelligent radar detector.

:D

I prefer RED, as I rely on sound alerts and only look at the detector for secondary confirmation or after automute has been on for a while. There is a reason the military use red and green at night, it allows you to use more of your sight to see other things (I do not know how to explain it... something about cones and rods). Anyhow, I like to see as much outside of my car as possible. Even my dash is very dim, people ask me if its broke when they get in my car.

Nice car by the way, you are going to blow peoples minds if you gas it from the stop light. You will destroy mustangs and the like. Can you post pictures when you get it with (I hope) a custom/hardwire mount?

Stg3Srt4,
I have the blue display. I ilke it because it is easier on my eyes. I also wear glasses. For some reason, the blue is easier for my eyes to focus on than the red display is. Also, blue is b******!!

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Originally Posted by 9500ier

Nice car by the way, you are going to blow peoples minds if you gas it from the stop light. You will destroy mustangs and the like. Can you post pictures when you get it with (I hope) a custom/hardwire mount?

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I'll be getting the Dinan Tune for the car which will put it in the mid 4 second 0-60 time :lol: Car is not built yet, mid feb, expecd delivery late march, sometime in April. When I get the car I will post my custom/hardwire install for the 9500i (Blue).

As for the V1 comment, I know the V1 is the BEST. My wife is also the BEST!!! Every man knows the secret to making your wife happy is to giver her a V1. She gets a V1, I get a 9500i.... Everyone's Happy!!!

:D

Both are great detectors and we probably shouldn't be fighting about them but spending our time hounding all those Cobra and RMR users on the road!

Regarding J-outs, have you tried turning off POP on your V1? Both are great detectors to have and fit different purposes, it'd be nice if both were working to your satisfaction :)

Once a zombie always a zombie. At this time there are no known cures, you'll be back in no time.

:twisted:

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Originally Posted by thestaton

Once a zombie always a zombie. At this time there are no known cures, you'll be back in no time.

:twisted:

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X2

*is almost a zombie* :twisted: :twisted:

The back lights on the speedometer, instrument panel, and water fall lighting are all red. I would go with red as it would most certainly match the interior of your car at night. I have an M5 and I run either my X50 or 9500i in red in that car. I then run the blue X50 or 9500i in my Escalade, which has blue back lighting.

Another solution would be to strip your whole interior and replace the red LED's for blue :D

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Originally Posted by 9500ier

There is a reason the military use red and green at night, it allows you to use more of your sight to see other things (I do not know how to explain it... something about cones and rods). Anyhow, I like to see as much outside of my car as possible.

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the simple reason for this is that blue light is very hard for the human eye to focus on, it scatters easily (hence the blue sky) and for many people can be painfully bright (the blue LED lightbars on cruisers around here are especially irritating to my eyes, they literally hurt my eyes to look at them)

Red light does not affect dark adaptation/night adaption, hence why the millitary and pilots use red when they want to preserve night vision, tests have proven that any light levels above 1 lumen that are not red can negatively impact night vision

Red; does not affect night vision, easiest on the eyes
Green; the Human eye is most sensitive to green light, so less is needed for equivalent brightness, bright green will damage dark adaptation
Blue; the *worst* color for preserving dark adaptation, as it scatters so easily and is hard to focus on, it looks the coolest though

I also keep my dash lights as low as possible, as my Saturn Ion doesn't have the most effective headlight reflectors, and I need to make the most use out of the light the headlights do produce (and I'm using GE Nighthawk bulbs to boot), a blue LED detector would be a major distraction to me

as always, YMMV

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Originally Posted by MacTech

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Originally Posted by 9500ier

There is a reason the military use red and green at night, it allows you to use more of your sight to see other things (I do not know how to explain it... something about cones and rods). Anyhow, I like to see as much outside of my car as possible.

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the simple reason for this is that blue light is very hard for the human eye to focus on, it scatters easily (hence the blue sky) and for many people can be painfully bright (the blue LED lightbars on cruisers around here are especially irritating to my eyes, they literally hurt my eyes to look at them)

Red light does not affect dark adaptation/night adaption, hence why the millitary and pilots use red when they want to preserve night vision, tests have proven that any light levels above 1 lumen that are not red can negatively impact night vision

Red; does not affect night vision, easiest on the eyes
Green; the Human eye is most sensitive to green light, so less is needed for equivalent brightness, bright green will damage dark adaptation
Blue; the *worst* color for preserving dark adaptation, as it scatters so easily and is hard to focus on, it looks the coolest though

I also keep my dash lights as low as possible, as my Saturn Ion doesn't have the most effective headlight reflectors, and I need to make the most use out of the light the headlights do produce (and I'm using GE Nighthawk bulbs to boot), a blue LED detector would be a major distraction to me

as always, YMMV

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You beat me to it. Blue is a very harsh color on the human eye. Ever notice how difficult it is to clearly see and focus on the blue bulbs on Xmas lights?

Congrats on a wise choice, can't be bothered with slamming on the brakes for unknown falses all day long can we :). I always wanted try the 9500i w/ gps, but I don't know how to give up my x50, I just love it too much :). (And I have no extra money :roll: )

yes the v1 out of the box is quite annoying but it can be tweaked....in many more way than the 9500i, not counting the gps of course which is the ultimate. short of that, the v1 can be made to be quite pleasant in "L" mode. coupled with the arrows and the better sensitivity....lol

V1 works great for me, then again I live in the boonies :)

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Originally Posted by kensteele

yes the v1 out of the box is quite annoying but it can be tweaked....in many more way than the 9500i, not counting the gps of course which is the ultimate. short of that, the v1 can be made to be quite pleasant in "L" mode. coupled with the arrows and the better sensitivity....lol

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It's still chatty as hell even with muting k for 30 and 4 led's. I would prefer to be able to permanently mute k at 4 led's or at least make it 1 minute. The arrows sure are fun though :lol:

So you say when it goes off you soon see the LEO? I want it to take as long as possible to see him so I have more time to slow down. I'm not praying that I can see him sooner. Doesn't make sense to me, but hey I'm not the one paying for it so have fun with the new detector.

I just sold my V1 with custom color display on eBay in favor of my 9500i. I thought I would never see the day when I would part ways with my V1, especially after all the time I spent tweaking it to make it quiet. It is a great detector, with amazing range, however I just got tired of hitting the mute button over and over.
The 9500 is much quieter, and when it does go off, the automute kicks in just in time. I am sure the pundits will say that the range is worse, etc. etc, for me it just came down to a little piece and quiet :)

New to high-end radar detectors, if I had more disposable income (or spousal permission), I would get a V1 with only Ka and laser on, and use the 9500i for X and K only. Most of my encounters are Ka now, and the arrows would be fun, though, not necessarily would make a difference for my driving. Also if I get a rear laser hit, it would be cool to get location confirmation. Or would there be interference still running both detectors with different bands activated?

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Originally Posted by lacning74

Or would there be interference still running both detectors with different bands activated?

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Yes there would be, you would need to turn one off while using the other.

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Originally Posted by CJR238

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Originally Posted by lacning74

Or would there be interference still running both detectors with different bands activated?

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Yes there would be, you would need to turn one off while using the other.

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Thanks again for the clarification. You're helped convince me to get the my detector in the first place. A V1 would be fun to try out in the country or desert, though, my 9500i is oh so quiet in the city and hasn't let me down yet. :)

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Originally Posted by lacning74

Or would there be interference still running both detectors with different bands activated?

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There are several of us that have tried or use a windshield mounted RD along with a remote mounted RD. This is the setup I am currently using until the 9500ci is released:
http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?t=34029
ErickonPhoenix has lots of videos on Youtube using his V1 SR7 w/shifters setup.

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Originally Posted by lacning74

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Originally Posted by CJR238

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Originally Posted by lacning74

Or would there be interference still running both detectors with different bands activated?

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Yes there would be, you would need to turn one off while using the other.

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Thanks again for the clarification. You're helped convince me to get the my detector in the first place. A V1 would be fun to try out in the country or desert, though, my 9500i is oh so quiet in the city and hasn't let me down yet. :)

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I’m glad I and (we) could help. :wink: I will at some point get a spectre proof V1 (if ever available)and installing a SPST center off position toggle switch. This will allow me to have both and switch accordingly (9500I all time V1 for long highway trips through VA).

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Originally Posted by Virion

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Originally Posted by kensteele

yes the v1 out of the box is quite annoying but it can be tweaked....in many more way than the 9500i, not counting the gps of course which is the ultimate. short of that, the v1 can be made to be quite pleasant in "L" mode. coupled with the arrows and the better sensitivity....lol

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It's still chatty as hell even with muting k for 30 and 4 led's. I would prefer to be able to permanently mute k at 4 led's or at least make it 1 minute. The arrows sure are fun though :lol:

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Mute rear K band and it will be 3-4x quieter using small L for better situational awareness.

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Originally Posted by MacTech

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Originally Posted by 9500ier

There is a reason the military use red and green at night, it allows you to use more of your sight to see other things (I do not know how to explain it... something about cones and rods). Anyhow, I like to see as much outside of my car as possible.

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the simple reason for this is that blue light is very hard for the human eye to focus on, it scatters easily (hence the blue sky) and for many people can be painfully bright (the blue LED lightbars on cruisers around here are especially irritating to my eyes, they literally hurt my eyes to look at them)

Red light does not affect dark adaptation/night adaption, hence why the millitary and pilots use red when they want to preserve night vision, tests have proven that any light levels above 1 lumen that are not red can negatively impact night vision

Red; does not affect night vision, easiest on the eyes
Green; the Human eye is most sensitive to green light, so less is needed for equivalent brightness, bright green will damage dark adaptation
Blue; the *worst* color for preserving dark adaptation, as it scatters so easily and is hard to focus on, it looks the coolest though

I also keep my dash lights as low as possible, as my Saturn Ion doesn't have the most effective headlight reflectors, and I need to make the most use out of the light the headlights do produce (and I'm using GE Nighthawk bulbs to boot), a blue LED detector would be a major distraction to me

as always, YMMV

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If anyone wants a more physiological explanation: the cones in your eye (which, incidentally, are outnumbered 20 to 1, at roughly 120m rods vs. 6m cones) are specialized so as to best transduce a given wavelength, where the three in question are blue, green, and red - around 430nm, 530nm, and 560nm; they're often named S(hort), M(edium), and L(ong) in reference to the wavelength.

A large part of the thinking behind the use of red lighting at night is because if you have a decidedly red light - we're talking like 650-750nm here, running right up to the limit of the visible light we see (which is, of course, red) - then you'll also be outside of the spectral sensitivity of rods, which ends around 640nm. Keeping them unsaturated, at least by your light-emitting equipment, is a good thing from a night vision point of view, seeing as how you have your rods to thank for night vision in the first place.

Oh, and blue light appearing intense in dark backgrounds is called the Purkinje effect (no relation to the cardiac fibers bearing the same name, although he was in fact the same namesake there). What I just said is basically why; dark adaptation tends to shift overall peak wavelength down towards the blue end. So while cones are responsible for much of daytime detail vision, they're nigh-useless under low light, but rods are most effective around blue-green wavelengths and ARE useful in low light.

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Originally Posted by Azonehits

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Originally Posted by Virion

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Originally Posted by kensteele

yes the v1 out of the box is quite annoying but it can be tweaked....in many more way than the 9500i, not counting the gps of course which is the ultimate. short of that, the v1 can be made to be quite pleasant in "L" mode. coupled with the arrows and the better sensitivity....lol

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It's still chatty as hell even with muting k for 30 and 4 led's. I would prefer to be able to permanently mute k at 4 led's or at least make it 1 minute. The arrows sure are fun though :lol:

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Mute rear K band and it will be 3-4x quieter using small L for better situational awareness.

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I know, but that makes my wonderful arrows useless :wink: It doesn't matter at the moment since I cannot use my V1 without a chance of getting pulled over. Until Mike makes an undetectable RD, I'm sticking with my STi and quite possibly the 9500ci.

Update: OK guys, I'm almost out of Kuwait (Deployed USAF) and I'm getting ready to order my new 9500i. I'm still on the fence between RED or Blue, so I think I might try this approach-

I'll order the BLUE and give it a testdrive, if I don't like it I'll send it back and get the RED. I'm also planning on doing a comparison between my V1 and the 9500i towards the end of this month. I'll let you know what I find.

Also, on a side note: The arrows on the V1 I found to be overrated. The bottom line, if I'm picking up a radar band, I'm going to slow down, regardless if my arrow is in front or behind me. Trust me, I use to be hard core about the V1 (I still have an original V1 built way back when)..but I guess its time for something new and BLUE :lol:

You might want to reconsider the Red display, "djrams80" has had two separate blue display detectors with the same problem of the left side of the display not lighting up. He has a video in the video forum here of this. The same problem does not happen on the Red display 9500i's that anyone has reported, just seems to be exclusive to the blue. Even if yours doesn't do it out of the box, or does and you get it repaired, this would be a concern to me that its going to do it again down the road. Escort told him this was a software issue, not sure I believe that or not myself, but clearly it is an issue thats been known to happen.

Another poster indicated he had both and could see a difference in how the displays were manufactured/designed, he had this problem as well, so at this point it would look as though this could be a common concern.

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Originally Posted by Stg3SRT4

Update: OK guys, I'm almost out of Kuwait (Deployed USAF) and I'm getting ready to order my new 9500i. I'm still on the fence between RED or Blue, so I think I might try this approach-

I'll order the BLUE and give it a testdrive, if I don't like it I'll send it back and get the RED. I'm also planning on doing a comparison between my V1 and the 9500i towards the end of this month. I'll let you know what I find.

Also, on a side note: The arrows on the V1 I found to be overrated. The bottom line, if I'm picking up a radar band, I'm going to slow down, regardless if my arrow is in front or behind me. Trust me, I use to be hard core about the V1 (I still have an original V1 built way back when)..but I guess its time for something new and BLUE :lol:

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I have only had the V1 for 2 weeks, so not a complete Zombie yet. So I won't get too much into the arrow thing with you. But yea, I was torn between the 9500i and V1. I look forward to you comparing the two! For real! I can't wait! So much so that when I have the money, I'm going to buy the Blue 9500i and do some comparisons myself, but to get that kind of extra cash to blow, I'll need to wait a year. Hmmmm the V1 and 9500i on my windscreen running through a three way switch allowing me to run one or the other... Can't Freaking Wait!

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Originally Posted by Esoterica

You might want to reconsider the Red display, "djrams80" has had two separate blue display detectors with the same problem of the left side of the display not lighting up. He has a video in the video forum here of this. The same problem does not happen on the Red display 9500i's that anyone has reported, just seems to be exclusive to the blue. Even if yours doesn't do it out of the box, or does and you get it repaired, this would be a concern to me that its going to do it again down the road. Escort told him this was a software issue, not sure I believe that or not myself, but clearly it is an issue thats been known to happen.

Another poster indicated he had both and could see a difference in how the displays were manufactured/designed, he had this problem as well, so at this point it would look as though this could be a common concern.

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Thanks, just watched the video.........Hmmm.......not sure if BLUE is the winner. I'm thinking RED again

Ok, BLUE is the winner. My new BLUE Escort has been ordered and will be waiting for me when I return this Sat. I'll post some pics and a review when I return. Thanks for all the inputs.....

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Originally Posted by Stg3SRT4

Ok, BLUE is the winner. My new BLUE Escort has been ordered and will be waiting for me when I return this Sat. I'll post some pics and a review when I return. Thanks for all the inputs.....

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My 9500i blue seems fine after the "software update". You might want to call them and make sure your unit has this before they ship it.