Theft Protection Car Audio

Theft Protection Car Audio
Detachable faces are the most common theft prevention scheme in head units today. There are two flavors, fully detachable and partially detachable. With a fully detachable face all the controls on the front come off leaving behind a blank panel, whereas a partially detachable face leaves some features on the head unit but the head unit is still useless without the face. Fully detachable faces are larger and bulkier to carry around than partially detachable ones but leave nothing behind to be seen. Another option is Eclipse's ESN system. With these head units when you first apply power to them you must supply a CD which the unit remembers as the "reference" CD. Thereafter if the unit ever loses power you must insert the "reference" CD before it will work again. Only you know what the "reference CD" is so the head unit is useless to a thief. Eclipse also tracks the units they repair. More than once a stolen head unit was returned to them for service because it was not working. Upon verifying the head unit was stolen they can apprehend the thief as the person who returned the stolen head unit for service. I still wouldn't count on the thief to know that Eclipse does this though so I stick with a conventional fully detachable face. A new twist from Kenwood flips the face around when you turn off the power so the thief can't see the head unit. I think it would work even better if the face then went back into the head unit, giving the appearance that the unit is a detachable face head unit with its face removed.