
I’ I -
ing a custom rack so our collection of
8-track tapes was handy to the car ste-
reo we’d installed on our wooden sloop
in the early 1970s. Having tunes at sea
and in remote anchorages was sweet,
but the cartridges tended to fail in a
snarl of Mylar, the player itself slowly
succumbed to salt air, and eventually
even the format went extinct. Cassettes
held up better, and CDs better still, but
neither remotely compares to today’s
digital storage devices as an ecient
medium for enriching your cruising
with music, audio books, podcasts,
and even videos. You can step aboard
with months of entertainment in one
pocket, a backup in the other, and the
original material safely tucked away at
home. And now there’s a choice of ste-
reos designed not only to manage and
play your onboard library well but also
to hold up in a marine environment.
Fusion Audio, a relatively new
company based in New Zealand, ar-
guably spearheaded the advent of tru-
ly modern marine stereos a few years
ago, with the introduction of its MS
IP500. It was built to IPx5 waterproof
standards, had large controls and a
big display that were easy to use and
see even while under way in a fresh
breeze, and it supported up to four
zones of speakers and rugged single-
cable remotes. Plus it had sailboat-
friendly power-ecient Class D am-
plication; I’ve measured less than 10
watts of drain in normal use and only
12 when pumping bottom-heavy reg-
gae through four Fusion 5- and 9-inch
waterproof speakers.
But the highlight of Fusion’s original
design was the ability to slip almost any
model of Apple iPod or iPhone into a
built-in dock where it remained safe
and charged while you could quickly
search and play by artists and albums
using the Fusion’s controls. And note
Onboard Entertainment:
The Digital Files Converge
Marine entertainment systems can accommodate pretty near any content
you care to cart—or stream—aboard.
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