I think the systems expects the CD changer to be there. The GW500 replaced the CD changer and the MR12Volt will replace the GW500. That might be the source of your error. Maybe one of the other folks following this thread here can confirm if that is the case. Your approach sounds reasoned to me. Will keep tracking in case I can help.

 

I've done more troubleshooting and I'm convinced that it is the old FO connector. I'm getting 12.5v at the Mr12Volt. Removed the Mr12Volt, disassembled my newly created plug and reinstalled the GW500 using the old school splice boxes. Success, PCM back to normal and GW500 works as it should. So the good news is I didn't do any damage and I can go right back to square one. Bad news is that I'm pretty sure that the white plastic FO connector/terminal is the wrong shape and won't work in the modern plugs. If you look in the attached (hard to see b/c of flash), you can see it is a different size/shape and doesn't even fit properly in the splice box. A previous owner must have replaced the FO cable with a slightly different connector/terminal. So I'm think these are my options: (1) live with the GW500 and my 30 pin to lightning adaptor; (2) find a FO connector that replicates what is on the GW500 and use that to create the loop; or (3) try to replace the length of FO cable with the wrong connector.

Ideally I'd do Option 2, but I'm having no luck finding the necessary connector. How difficult/expensive is option 3? I'm pretty sure the messed up cable is the link running from the Amp to where the CDC used to be. So a short run?

Weird shaped connector is the white one. Clear plastic one seems to be the same as the others.

 

I tried to have this installed by my local Porsche Tech with no success. I bought on Amazon and I am trying to return it. Cost me 3-4 hours of labor. I am just going to live with the basic radio and use my earbuds when needed. I have PCM 2.1 basic radio with no CD Changer. I do not want to replace the entire head unit with after market so what the heck I'll stay old school

 

So if you just have the basic (PCM 1) with CD player (not changer) you cannot install a blue tooth capability via Mr12volt/LA power blue tooth or Mobridge, etc? Guess I'll just have to burn a bunch of CDs....until the new PCM for the 997 comes out

 

I have received my Mr12Volt unit and was thinking the same.
I was planning to connect it to the switched 12V wire (green/red)
But the manual states the importance of connecting the Mr12Volt to the constant 12 Volt power.

What is wisdom? Does the Mr12Volt unit switch off power after the optical signal turns off? (and doesn't drain the battery)

 

check near top of thread, I believe Bruce had a series of posts on the topic. The tl;dr is that you can tap into the constant power. It appears that might drain the battery unless you lock your car, which avoids the issue.

I tapped into constant power and just lock the car when I park it in the garage and no issues yet after a couple of weeks. I do keep my car on a battery tender so most likely wouldn’t see the issue anyway.

 

Thanks I will try and find the posts you’re talking about.
Is a bit weird though, constant power will not switch off after you lock the car.
I have drained the battery myself by keeping a bluetooth dongle in the cigarette lighter overnight.

 

To follow up, I finally got my Mr12Volt installed and (mostly) working. I actually went with Rennkit's BTR3 version, as opposed to the Amazon or eBay versions. I'm glad I did so, as explained later.

For future reference, the oddly shaped connector described in the post above was a problem and the FO loop could not be completed using that different style connector. I ended up with Option 3 from my post above: replacing that length of FO cable (which was fortunately pretty short) with a piece of FO cable that I scavenged from a extra FO loop I bought off Amazon. Once that was done, I was able to loop the CDC connection and the PCM would play the radio with no error messages.

I then went about trying to install the BTR3 in the cabin directly behind the PCM. I was having no luck and had the same issue as described by nsurg. BTR3 was getting 12.5 volts on my voltmeter, but I was getting the "no amp found" message again. I reached out to @RennKit-Dave for troubleshooting advice and he was happy to help. I bought from RennKit specifically in case I needed live support, and I'm glad I did. Dave sent me a new FO 3-way loop in the hopes that it would solve my problem the way it solved nsurg's. So huge props to Dave for his after sales support. Unfortunately, I still had the "no amp found" message with the new FO loop. Before contacting Dave again and trying to swap out the BTR3 unit, I tried installing it in my frunk. Success! Unit powered right up and works (mostly) as expected. While I would have preferred a cabin install so I wouldn't have to wire the microphone through the firewall, now that I've run the mic I actually prefer the frunk for the ease of swapping out the MicroSD card.

I'm still having one small issue: as some others have reported, my BT phone calls only play through one speaker on the right hand side of the car. I can't find anywhere in this thread that anyone has be able to solve this issue. Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

I am not sure whether or not that is by design to reduce feedback/echo on the mic that is on driver's side. This hasn't really bothered me but I payed a bit of attention as I was making calls yesterday. It seemed like, in my case, it was a bit of an intermittent issue. First call it was on passenger speaker only and then after turning car off and back on again it seemed like it was on both speakers. In practice, my experience is that it is not an inconvenience at all. I can hear the calls perfectly and there is little to no benefit to having phone calls in stereo. I do have a background in audio and acoustics (long-time ago, first job out of college) and you can make an argument that having a stereo source for voice can degrade the ability to understand speech. For me the benefits of the unit far outweigh this minor potential issue, but as they say, YMMV.

 

I think I read above the hypothesis that the the car potentially goes into a low power mode when it is Iocked and that apparently mitigates the battery drain issue. I've had the unit installed for a couple of weeks and have not had issues with it. I will however take a portable battery jump kit w/ me when I go on my next prolonged trip just in case. . .

 

okay, i've pretty much spent all day on trying to install and have given up. Need help from the experts. I read this whole thread trying to see what my issue could be.

I have PCM 2.1 with no BOSE & NO CD changer but I do have a single disc CD on my unit from what I understand. The reason I say that is because when I open the frunk, I don't see the CD changer that everyone is talking about. That being said I did find a 2 CD slots in my dashboard which I was able to eject and remove the previous owners CD (does that mean I have a cd changer?)

Either way, maybe the issue is not related but I followed these exact steps:
I unplugged the fiber optic cable from back of PCM. I plugged in the optic cable supplied by Mr12Volt. One end into PCM, the other end into Mr12Volt, and there is a 3rd plug that splits off that your oem optic cable will plug into (the one that runs to amplifier).

I have powered the unit using the 12 volt wires near the footwell and made sure to crimp them hard and i'm getting 12 volts of power.

I put the car in accessory mode, turned on the car, but get no lights that power the unit on and even though some people have said the lights dont come on that fast, I tried searching for carkit on my iphone and dont find the device.

what do you think is my issue? When i click the phone button on my car it says phone is not available so i'm assuming i dont need to disable that since i dont have it?)

It does seem like my car is programmed for a cd changer because when I press the CD button once, i get no CD and then when i press it the second time i get no cd changer.

Any help will be highly appreciated since i've spent way too much time on this.

 

I’m preparing for my own install and as far as I can tell, you need to have the car coded to recognize the CD changer if it wasn’t included from the factory.

I went ahead and completed that step at a recent trip to the dealer for basic maintenance. They didn’t have any issues turning on that channel so PCM would look for a signal from the CD changer.

 

Is there any way to check if the car was already coded for it? Right now when I press the CD button twice, it says "No CD changer" which makes me assume that it was already coded to detect a CD changer and it is just not detecting one.

 

Don't you have a slot to put one cd in to play? You most likely have a CD player, but not a multidisc CD changer. I don't understand how you can't tell whether you have a CD player? Thats what I have but on my 997.1, no Bose, CD plyer, but no CD changer. (and no blue tooth currently)

 

Not sure. FWIW mine said that before coding.