Well, that's not always true--it is possible to get a warranty, it depends on where you buy the unit. I bought my Alpine 9815 off of eBay from a seller that chose to offer a warranty identical to Alpine's. If anything happens to the unit, I have the same amount of time as the "official" warranty to get it fixed or replaced...it's just that the seller takes care of it, not Crutchfield or Alpine. Hopefully there will be no need for the warranty though, as I hear very good things about Alpine's reliability.
Ikesound offers their own 1 year warranty & good prices on just about everything. Beware, a local person over here ordered from etronics & the unit was bad.