hgupta

Glad to hear a developer is joining our ranks!

The aftermarket firmware from IQ Navi is indispensible. In addition to root, it allows you to adjust the camera lines so that they are meaningful, and makes the default music player and phone useable. There are still some kinks, but I have learned to deal with them. I have tried to avoid adding too many apps to my system because it does get sluggish.

I am looking forward to hearing about your advanced options with Torque on these cars. So far Torque has just been a neat toy. I'd like to see very useful information on it.

I have also been using Tasker. I have it set to turn on waze as part of the boot up sequence so that I can still hear information about speed cameras and such. Ideally I would have it launch in the background, but I haven't figured out how to do that yet. Also, I have it switch to the radio when I approach home or work. That way there is music instantly when I get back in the car.

nodoors

I am surprised that even on the IQ Navi firmware it can get sluggish with too many apps. The hardware specs seem to be pretty decent on the unit. Does it seem memory or processor related? Instead of a hotspot I might consider ordering another 3g/4g cellphone to provide data to the unit and perhaps load a few of the apps to that phone instead... will have to see once I start playing with it.

Does IQ Navi solve the issue of being able to setup multiple phones for bluetooth? Regardless, I am definitely leaning towards the phone route if it is easy to setup a tethered USB connection for file and internet sharing.

The goal is to have to tinker with my personal cellphone a heck of a lot less when I get in the car and bring this Pig out of the stone age. It seems like these German manufacturers spend more time and effort on keeping the aftermarket from being able to modify their electrical systems than they do on actually innovating new technologies. Kind of ridiculous if you ask me.

hgupta

I agree! I rented a low-end Chevy Cruz on a work trip and was jealous of the electronics. That's just sad.


I have a LOT of apps running in the background at any given time, so the specs barely keep up. This is what boots up daily either directly or due to my widgets:

Tasker
Autolocation
Autovoice
Calendar
Contacts
Torque
Transparent Weather display
Pushbullet (to receive notifications from my phone)
Heads Up notification (so I can see the notifications in big font before they disappear)
stock Music app
Google Now
xposed and OK Google for third party launchers (allows you to give voice commands from every screen)
One touch location
bluetooth

So yeah, I have a a lot going on from the second it boots, but I also like having all that information at my fingertips without pulling out my phone.

nodoors

Cool. That is helpful. Thank you guys for paving the way. I probably wouldn't have taken the plunge were it not for all the information you guys posted here to save others a bunch of time and hassle. I hope to add to the collective pool of information soon. It is kind of disheartening reading about all the expense/effort people have to incur with something as simple as adding a reverse camera or bluetooth to the PCM2.1. Just doesn't really seem like the spirit of a machine built for car enthusiasts with all the proprietary software nonsense needed to do something as simple as enabling a camera input. Oh well, it will all be going on ebay soon enough.

Vidyashankara

newest firmware released from IQ Navi.

https://yadi.sk/d/q-bbNcFcqZvw2

Whats new: Wifi driver and bugs.

Vidyashankara

I got the rear view camera installed and the back up lines are way out of whack. Any way to fix this?

hgupta

Most cameras (including mine) added the lines. If your camera has the option to turn of the lines, you should do that. Then you can turn the lines on in the extra options section, and adjust/calibrate them there (IQ Navi only).

nodoors

That box came faster than anything I have ever ordered from China... less than 48 hours! WOW. Got it this evening and installed it in no time.

I took a bunch of pictures during the process. After a test drive I learned that the right channel was not coming through the speakers. Hopefully it is just that one of the RCA's pulled out when I stuffed that rats nest of connectors/boxes/wires back into the dash in a bit of a hurry in the dark. Here's to hoping it is not the unit or the MOST adapter box.

A couple of notes:

good news:
-Overall I am very, very pleased with this upgrade. I will not miss anything about the PCM2.1. Glad I took this path.
-The radio seems to have much stronger reception despite only using one of the factory antennas (the black one)
-I was surprised to not find a blue GPS FAKRA connection behind my PCM2.1. -I used the provided GPS antenna. It seemed to connect okay.

not ideal:
-The bass output has definitely weakend
-The fair weather audiophile in me is slightly bummed the MOST adapter only outputs 2 channels and not 4+... Has anyone searched to see if there exists a higher quality unit than the one they ship?
-I lost the compass on the center multidisplay in the gauges... not ideal, but I don't think I will miss it too much.
-It was too bright driving around at night, but much better when I played with the brightness settings. After power cycling once it seemed to reset to the old setting, though. Does the autobrightness reset between power cycles on the IQ Navi ROM?


I am excited to root it and install more software and connect more hardware components

hgupta

I spent a while looking for other MOST adapters. I came across one on alibaba and on russian websites that does have 4 channel input, but it referred the rear channels as pseudo -faders. I did not give it a try. You can find it here

http://trioma.ru/products/most/most-amp3.0.shtml

hgupta

I recommend not rooting it at this point. The IQ Navi firmware includes root in addition to other important modifications that makes this unit perform better.

nodoors

Thanks. What method did you use to install the IQ Navi ROM?
Is there a thread on XDA covering it that I have not ran across yet?

So far I can only find Russian sites covering it (in Russian.)

I am still shopping for a good rear camera. It seems finding something with all the features I want is surprisingly tricky: waterproof, wifi, loop recording, video output, AND discrete.

hgupta

Yes there is an xda thread. You can find it here. http://forum.xda-developers.com/android-auto/android-head-units/2nd-generation-4-4-2-android-21u-ouku-t3230587?goto=newpost

Just download the firmware and put the two files on a USB drive. Then use the update firmware option in the system menu.

It's painless.

nodoors

After pulling it out and playing with it, the right channel of sound is still not playing through my system. I checked all the connections and made sure everything was tight. Then I switched the output cables of the unit into the MOST adapter and the right side is still silent. The MOST adapter is definitely culprit as I had full stereo sound from my factory system.

I emailed the sales address and we will see what they say. Hopefully they will just send me the new one and I can either toss or return the defective unit without too much effort or waiting.

hgupta

Thats frustrating! I did get a quote last night for the one I posted above that had 4 channel input. $189 shipped to the U. S.

hgupta

Thinking about installing a 360 view camera. Has anyone else tried it?

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/360-a...640037767.html