the glidetouch makes searching through your ipod a hassle. there are two ways to scroll. one is gliding your finger across the entire strip multiple times. if done just right it will skip ahead 15 songs. can be done, but takes a while to get used to. i found if i go the opposite direction first and then reverse directions quickly it'll produce this response. the other is holding your finger over either end of the strip and waiting till it autoscrolls. this is probably the easiest way until you come up with your own technique.
the problem with both of these is that you need to have the right amount pressure to activate the sensor without pressing the strip to choose the item that is currently highlighted. not too bad when parked, but while driving if you hit a bump and accidentally pressed the strip you have to start from the beginning. the manual mentions a quicksearch option but it was taken out when the unit was put into production. so you always start at the beginning of your ipod when searching.
another thing to note is that the deck does not remember the mix setting for the ipod if you turn the car off. so you'll have to tell it to go into mix mode again everytime you start the car. to perform searches you have to disable mix mode.
depending on how many songs you have on your ipod it can be faster to unplug it from the harness, play the song on the ipod, and plug it back into the harness. the deck continues play on whatever was being played last on the ipod.
with the new 9857 it's pointless to spin the wheel as fast as you can to search through your ipod. if you rotate the knob too fast it doesn't register all of the rotations. just an observation on my friend's deck. the percentage search helps avoid the tedious rotating of the knob everytime you search. just push one of the preset buttons and it'll jump ahead a certain distance depending on what button was pressed.
