Ebay Navigation/Multimedia System

[Jon]

Well I just received my new stereo that I purchased from dig options on ebay. I will go through the installation of the unit here and write up my thoughts on ease of installation and the operation of the unit as I go. I purchased it as I needed both a reverse camera and a navigation unit and didn't want to spend big dollars on a brand name. This particular unit has had good reviews elsewhere and it is an australian seller with a 12 month warranty so thought I would give it a shot. Firstly I opened up the package and this is what comes with it.

In no particular order in the box contains the gps dongle thing, a reverse camera and cable, a heap of different av leads, 3 different sets of power cables with various plugs to suit different vehicles, an ipod cable, stylus pen, remote control, sdcard installed inside the stereo, the stereo itself, and a couple of manuals written in chinglish. So quite a bit of gear when you pull it all out.

 

[Jon]

This is the unit itself, it is a fixed screen which is what I wanted as I thought it would cope better with corrugations. But because of this the screen is slightly smaller than most others on ebay but still plenty big enough in my opinion. The buttons give an audible clicking sound when pushed and feel like they are good quality, as does the volume control knob when turned. The whole thing actually looks pretty well made and is quite heavy. The mini sd card and usb port is behind a rubber cover in the bottom left of the unit.

 

[ants_oz]

Hi Jon,

If you are able to provide a link to the store on eBay that would be great. I'd be interested i seeing what they have available.

 

[rescue]

I'll be interested to see how it goes as in the past, from my experience ,the product from this seller was poor quality and too deep to fit in the D40 dash (the GPS antenna socket hits on the cross member). I do know he has attracted the attention of VMS which means his product will run VMS software without a problem.

 

[Jon]

Hi Jon,

If you are able to provide a link to the store on eBay that would be great. I'd be interested i seeing what they have available.

No problem.

eBay Seller: dig options: Cars, Bikes, Boats items on eBay Australia

Note that there is a model available not listed on the ebay store which is identical to the VMS in every way except doesn't have vms printed on it for about $1400. Including functions like tyre pressure monitor, volt meter etc. This is just the standard model.

 

[Jon]

I'll be interested to see how it goes as in the past, from my experience ,the product from this seller was poor quality and too deep to fit in the D40 dash (the GPS antenna socket hits on the cross member). I do know he has attracted the attention of VMS which means his product will run VMS software without a problem.

Have you tried installing one of these in your D40 then? If so did you get rid of it because of the GPS socket? I read a shitload about this particular model and generally everyone has been happy with the value of it and the service provided when problems have come about seem pretty good. There is a huge thread on pradopoint that I read from start to finish and most of the problems encountered on that site were from the person installing it. Things like not hooking up the correct wires in the correct places. However I do remember someone mentioning the gps cable hit something behind the dash. There were pictures of the connector in question and to fix the problem they put in a right angle adaptor. I have just had a look and mine is already at a right angle so they may have rectified the problem. I will see how it all goes together and make up my mind then. I did notice a few people have had problems getting a TV signal but I have no interest in getting a TV antenna and digital box just to watch the crap on TV in my car. As for the VMS software not sure about that as he offers another unit identical to the VMS for a bit more coin. The basic model (the one I have) will run any software that will run on WINCE 5.0 which means oziexplorer, tom tom, igo8 etc. I believe it comes preloaded with igo8.

 

[Eug]

sounds interesting, keep us posted!

 

[rescue]

The right angle connector will not solve the problem as the rear of the connector of his NI09X1 model hits the tubular cross member. It did fit in the X-Trail OK but after 3 reversing cameras blew up I got a refund. Of the 2 units I bough (1 for each vehicle) 1 arrived with a cracked screen so the quality control is non existent. If the unit is running IGO8 then you'll be wanting the Australian voice file from me....

Can't see any other style units on his site at the moment but I do know VMS had him in their sights......

 

[Jon]

What do you mean VMS had him in their sights? VMS clone is not listed I guess they don't want to advertise it. I don't blame VMS for having issues with someone selling the same bit of kit for half the price, if you think they came out of a different factory you are kidding yourself, I saw a few pics of both units and you can't tell them apart. Not too worried about the camera, if it breaks I'll buy a better one. I'm just about to pull the old stereo out now. Thanks for the offer on the voice file I'll see how I go but I'll probably just use Tom Tom as I'm more familiar with it.

 

[Jon]

For anyone interested in the VMS clone here is some info.

MY V240 bit by bit - Page 3 - Australian 4WD Action Online Forums - the 4WD, 4x4 and offroad truck community. Get the latest tips, news, reviews, images and video clips.

 

[Jon]

Ok well I got the multimedia system installed in the car today and it was a quite straightforward process, everything is working as it should so happy days there. I'll go through a step by step on what I have done to install it which might help others when purchasing a similar unit as there is a few little things that might catch you out. Here we go.

Firstly I pulled the dashboard fascia off, to do this just remove the 2 screws above the a/c controls, remove the ash trays and carefully prise it away from the dashboard with a small flat tip screwdriver. Then I removed the old stereo which is held in by 4 phillips head screws. Unplug the old stereo and find the power cable adaptor that is included in the new unit which matches the original cable and plug it in.

I forgot to take a picture but in the new adaptor cable there is a second white connector which is for the rear speakers. There is no plug for it inside the navara dash, I believe Nissan has skimped out on this part of the loom but I am going to see if it can be purchased as I think there is at least some section of the loom going from the front a pillar to the rear speaker cavity. I have no speakers in the back at the moment so didn't worry about it. You could just cut the plug and solder the speaker wires into the correct places if you have rear speakers.

 

[Jon]

Then I plugged in the gps cable, ipod cable, and the bunch of a/v leads which go into a socket in the back. Apart from the white nissan plug there is a couple of wires which are separate from the loom coming out of the back. One of them is a pink wire which says brake or something like that on it. I worked out that it was supposed to go to the handbrake so the dvd player can only be used when the handbrake is applied. I just earthed it by splicing into the black wire in the loom as you can see here in the red circle. So now you can use the dvd player whenever you want. Yes I know its illegal to watch a movie and drive, its for the passenger.

 

[Jon]

The next loose wire on the back of the unit is a brown one, can't remember what it says but it needs to be extended and go to the positive of your reverse light. There is probably a wire behind the dash that could be tapped into but I figure I need to run cable to the back of the car for the reverse camera anyway so I just soldered some 3mm red wire here about 7 metres long, here is a pic of the connection. You can also see here the camera cable is plugged in aswell in the blue circle. The a/v lead that you need to plug into is called CCD AV IN. I then proceeded to push these two wires through the firewall and cable tied to the underside of the vehicle all the way down to the rear tail light.

 

[Jon]

This is a picture of my taillight sitting on the tail gate. Here you can see in the red circle that there is now 2 extra wires that have been spliced into the positive of the reverse light. 1 is the extended brown wire and the other is a positive wire which comes from the camera itself to power it up. In the blue circle you can see the negative wire that has been spliced in which is also from the camera. This is probably the trickiest bit of the whole install. I couldn't figure out the bodgy instructions but it all kind of made sense when I layed it all out on the ground.

 

[Jon]

Thats all the wiring done. Now I had to have a look at mounting the unit. Again I forgot to take a photo but the brackets supplied did need a little bit of modifying. All that I did was compare both the old stereo and the new stereo mounts and redrilled some holes in the new bracket in the correct position so that they matched the old ones. Not the best explanation but its pretty easy to do and common sense really. Once this was done it bolted straight in with no clearance problems at all. You can also see on this pic the wire sitting on top of the unit, this is the gps cable which is just tucked up ontop of the unit and on top of a bit of sound insulation in the dashboard.

 

[Jon]

Just another pic of the unit bolted in.

Then I clipped the fascia back on. All good but the new unit is a couple of mm smaller than the old one and there is a small gap at the bottom. I am going to probably fill this space by taping a small amount of black foam tape to the bottom of the stereo. For now it looks pretty good.

 

[Jon]

Time to test it all. This is the first screen you are greeted with when you turn the unit on.

This is the radio part of it.

The main menu

 

[Jon]

The navigation startup screen. This is preloaded onto the sd card but you can install whatever navigation system you prefer onto the card that runs on Win CE5.0 Its worth mentioning that it only took a couple of seconds to lock onto the location for the first startup.

 

[Jon]

A DVD running on it.

The bluetooth screen for making and receiving phone calls. Haven't tested this bit yet.

The Ipod interface, I don't even own one but it looks pretty basic.

 

[Jon]

Thats pretty much all I've got at the moment. I am still working on the reverse camera as I am making a bracket that comes off the number plate and I haven't finished it yet. I did test the camera and it works perfectly. Its worth mentioning that I took all these photos with the plastic film still on the unit as I had grotty hands so there is a fair bit of glare coming off the screen. The pictures don't do it any justice, the image is very crisp and the definition is excellent. The navigator can run at the same time as listening to music and it just cuts in with the voice whenever a turn is coming up. So far I'm very happy with the result and I think it is great value for money compared to the equivalent units around the place. I have no affiliations with the ebay seller whatsoever I just wanted to share this with everyone and hopefully help a few others if they have problems installing it. A lot of people had problems installing this unit when I researched it on PradoPoint but I can't for the life of me understand why it was so hard to wire up. Must be a Toyota thing?