I just wanted to state that most (or all) OEM stereos are going to be made by large manufacturers, in large numbers, for the auto industry. I'm not sure when they started or if they stopped, but at one point Alpine was making the stereos for Honda. My 96 Civic DX had a decent radio (no CD or tape, just radio), but it obviously wasn't worth much in the long run. My 97 Prelude had a decent OEM CD player, but still didn't do much for me (or many others).

It is still a personal preference. I've had Sony, JVC, Blaupunkt, a RIO Car MP3 player, and Pioneer hardware in the past a present, and I wouldn't necessarily go with any of those just for the name, but I do trust them because of that (well, I've had trouble with Sony products in general). I currently have a Pioneer Premier head unit and love it... but sooner or later I'm bound to get either tired of it or see something out there that will BEG me to buy it, and I probably will!!!