[fragdude]

My iPod is essentially an appendage. I take it almost everywhere I go, so I had to figure out a way to play it through my car's stereo. I wanted the best quality possible and the ability to charge the iPod at the same time, thus the only option was using the dock connector.

Most of the dock connectors I've seen run $40+ and Becker North America will be releasing one soon (they are waiting on parts from germany and are currently a month late) for $64. I didn't want to spend more than $20...

I bought this:
http://www.crutchfield.com/App/Product/Item/Main.aspx?i=023IPODCBL&search=blaupunkt+ipod&tp=120&tab=review

Its for a blaupunkt unit, but after looking at the schematics I decided that its close enough and its priced well. After speaking to an employee at Becker, I found that it is possible to charge your iPod with this cable as well (at least theoretically, I haven't tried yet). Here is how:

First, you should disconnect the Red, Blue and glossy Black wires. If you don't do this and you connect your iPod you will fry the battery (happened to me). It should look something like this:



I used scotch tape because thats all I could find at that moment. Now if you don't care about charging your iPod you can go ahead and plug this into the unit and you are good to go.
After examining the Becker cable and speaking with the employee I was able to locate the Permanent +12v pin and the Ground (-) pin on the back of the radio (its not listed in the manual unfortunately.



Pin 9 is perm. positive and 8 is ground. For the Blaupunkt cable Blue is perm positive and Black is Bus Ground (which I guess is the appropriate ground pin seeing how this cable is made to charge an iPod and that is the only Ground pin left available). If you hook the wires up to those pins the iPod should constantly charge. I haven't tried this yet because I haven't come up with a good enough way IMO to insulate the wires from each other.

Hope this helps people that want iPod playback and charging capability for $20.