PCMCIA slot. good job mercedes!!!

[raverx3m]

while searching for a compatible flashcard reader for the new SDHC card i just bought. i remembered an article about mercedes working with harmann/something, to finally manufacture factory stereo that will be up to date.
so after searching for for few... days... weeks... it seems to me that mercedes kinda FeD. up just a lil bit on the "up to date" part
because while their new 2008 and 2009 models were shipping with PCMCIA slot the actual PCMCIA cards became extinct. and only support sd cards and its extremely hard to find an adapter that reads sdhc and actually works ih the car.

i dont need a flash card because theres nothing else i can use it in.
all my gear uses SDHC format cards or micro SDHC

and ipod is great but im not gonna convert my whole music collection of few 100s gigs of flac/mp3 into itunes so i can only listen to it on ipod.


i know theres gonna be people to always disagree. and say IPOD IS GREAT
IPHONE IS GREAT. just use 4, 4gb SD cards instead of one 16gb SDHC
ok yea let me buy a "SD case" so i can store all my 4 gb sd cards in it

i dont understand how do aftermarket companies stay years ahead of OEM manufacturers especially when alot of OEM gear is made by same aftermarket companies.

examples would be pioneer,alpine,kenwood,clarion make great aftermarket gear and then in a 2006 model car you see a cd player that doesnt play mp3

in 2004-2005 mercedes(and other companies) finally made an mp3 capable radio... when everyone was using ipod and not cds.
in 2008 mercedes finally made an ipod plug and pcmcia slot when both of those are also outdated and people prefer to use a USB thimb drive instead of ipod...
i wonder when mercedes and others gonna make a usb capable factory radio.