eeyang92

Hey all,

I recently picked up a 987.1 CS and have been loving the experience so far. One thing I missed sorely was CarPlay, and after some googling, I found this thread a few weeks ago and all of the comments were definitely a huge help! I ordered the top of the line unit (128GB 8 core qualcomm /w carplay, MOST adapter and backup camera /w the appropriate mounting bracket).

For me, the installation was fairly straight forward (I have the BOSE system), including the splicing for the MOST adapter. I do have the latest unit from owTownsin @myw mentioned a few comments above. If I had known there was going to be a silver version eventually, I may have waited But, I already bought some KR2 silver spray paint so hopefully the color matches well.

There was one snag, and that was the reverse camera - I spent two days after work debugging various areas. First, I supplied 12V directly to the pink wire and confirmed that the HU was indeed switching to the reverse view. I then moved to the tail light area to see if the connections were good - I was measuring 12V on the blue-black wire when the car was put in reverse, so I would have expected the reverse camera to be powered at this point (red wire spliced into the blue-black and the black wire spliced into brown). However, when I plugged the yellow camera plug directly into AV1/2 (with the car in reverse), I still could not see any image when attempting to view manually via the AVin app that came preinstalled - at this point I was wondering if the camera was faulty. So this left one area that I had not checked yet, and that was my splice from the red wire coming out of the yellow camera plug into the pink wire. It turns out that my crimp here was bad, and no matter how many times I tried, I could not get a good connection. I finally resorted to soldering the red wire onto the back of the pink barrel plug and I at last had a functioning backup camera. I'm not actually sure why the camera wasn't powered without a good connection from the red wire to the pink wire (perhaps the AVin app was not working), but at this point I was happy to leave it alone.

That being said, so far, my impressions are positive:

• CarPlay connects when the unit boots 100% of the time so far.
• The built in DSP/equalizer app works well, and I was able to tune the sound to my liking.
• The unit is able to receive headlight data (I'm guessing via the CANBUS) and will switch to night mode, which dims the screen as well.
  • One issue is that if I turn my headlights on before the unit boots, then it will not switch to night mode (I need to quickly flick the lights off then on again), which makes sense if it's reading the CANBUS trigger
• I spend most of my time in CarPlay, so I can't really comment on the other functionalities like USB and GPS (which I really have no use for).
• The radio seems to works well, but I haven't really used that since I have Spotify.
• I do seem to have a bit of alternator whine, but I'm not sure if it's actually that or my Numeric cables - it's faint enough that if I don't pay attention to it, I forget about it.
• The rear camera mode is responsive, with only a second delay after putting it into reverse.
• The volume **** is great
  • Interestingly, I followed the advice of the comments here and had set my CDR24 volume to extremely loud (no idea where the max is, I could only tolerate so much). However, on the Android unit, I can only go up to "5" before the music becomes too loud. I believe the max is 100. I'm not sure if I had set my CDR24 volume a bit lower I'd have more fine control over the volume. I may try the fader trick someone mentioned here to lower the volume by half so I get more granular control (perhaps up to 10 being too loud). But I have 0 distortion as it is, so I think setting the CDR24 to very loud is the right call, and then adjust after in the Android HU
• The buttons are RGB backlit - they came green as standard, although I changed it to match the OEM button colors as best I could, but I'm not able to get a perfect match. I think it's just because these buttons are so much brighter than the OEM ones.

Thanks to this thread, I also 3D printed 2 support brackets to support the rear of the unit. The unit is now solidly mounted and locked in placed with the 7mm screw on the passenger side. I also set the unit to turn off after 1 hour - this does lead to longer boots times, but I did see noticeable battery drain overnight when I did not do this.

So to summarize, overall I am very happy with the added CarPlay and reverse camera functionality. All of the other features are really the icing on the cake. I think I will eventually get an OBD2 app like Torque so I can see the engine parameters in real time (especially oil temp).
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ljpviper

Where are u getting aux power from. I belive its the white wire. Thank

CWNE

Bumping this thread with the 997 PCM classic now showing up on the Porsche website and available for pre-order at some dealers.

Big sad that it doesn't have wireless android auto and if the photos are of the actual product a front facing USB plug for connecting your phone. I truly hope these are all simply wrong. I can't imagine paying $1500 for an android head unit without wireless android auto. It's a deal breaker for me ESPECIALLY if you have to plug in on the face of the unit with a cord .

See link here if you haven't already:

https://content.eu.porsche.com/prod/...25882F00267F2C

I mean really???

myw

there will be other options my friend!

CWNE

Thank god! Just joined the facebook group to follow your process as well so if you're admin there thanks for the quick admittance!

myw

i will get back to working on this project - it has been stalled due to color matching issues re the .1 faceplate.

and there are some bugs that may/may not be resolved with the current android 12 OS that it runs on.

sgtm7

I can't imagine using Android Auto on a head unit that operates on the Android OS. You can install any Android app you want directly to the head unit. To me, that is equivalent to wanting to mirror a streaming channel from my cell phone to my smart TV.

onnastick

Just because it might run Android as the OS platform, doesn't always mean you have full access to do all Android like things, such as installing apps.

myw

if it is running on native android OS, which all non-branded android systems are... then you do indeed have 100% full access to install apps - it took me a while to fully understand how it all worked, I was just using carPlay for the first year.

case in point, the porsche 996/997 pccm+ are branded systems that run a separate software skin on top of an android 6.0 OS. obviously everything is hidden but it is possible (as has been shown online) exactly how to get access to the root android OS on these systems.

onnastick

Yes this is understood. My point was more that some head unit manufacturers advertise their systems as based on Android, but that doesn't always mean it's "native" Android where you can install apps etc on them.

myw

correct.

All branded systems (pccm+, and i surmise pioneer, kenwood etc etc) will run android if they arent already. The branded companies can never allow due to legal safety reasons apps such as FB, IG, NETFLIX, YOUTUBE, email, etc etc. Restricting these features do make sense to me.

But things like purposely disabling something is simple + important as rear camera support (and even automated front camera support) I dont think was necessary. Certainly not for the pccm+

sgtm7

In that case, I would have to step back on my previous comment. The unit he is talking about doesn't fit with the thread topic of cheap android head units. In this case, it isn't cheap, just cheaply made. Android 6.0?!!!! You would be hard pressed to find any of the Chinese android head units with a version that old. Not to mention, you will probably have a hard time running some apps with a version that old.

myw

I'm sure they have their reasons (alot of it I suspect was to piggy back and use the 996 pccm+ hardware).

But a
- a 8" 720p screen
- aftermarket reverse cam support (altho i read oem reverse cams are supported but it likely meant for 955s)
- wireless carPlay / AA
- rear harness USB input

would have been a must, and perhaps even a slightly more modern design.

I get that it was designed to really blend in, but the unit looks a decade old imo.

With that said, the fact that the Porsche pccm+ NAV app pushes the driving info to the instrument cluster is very cool - although once carplay/AA is activated and WAZE / Google Maps is used, then that feature will no longer work lol

myw

Correct, I would be curious as to why they used android 6.0. I'm guessing for stability? Or the Porsche app/skin was developed specifically for the older OS? maybe it was to deter people from tinkering/tampering with it.

PapaC4S

Looks like the unit designed by MYW is now available.

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/32568...andl_shipto=US

MYW They said it would provide 4V RCA outputs. Can you confirm this?

Thanks