Upgrading head unit.

Edward47 · Mar 23, 2017

both have 12V when off !

deh2002 · Mar 24, 2017

Finally had a nice day to finish putting the trim pieces back in. Forgot about the wood in the shifter and threw my scraps away so I ordered a sample piece today.
Thinking of doing some fiberglass speaker pockets in the doors where the oe speakers are located.

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Ionman · Mar 26, 2017

Finally got my Ownice C500 HU. Took a total of 3 hours for wiring and position, but everything is as it should be. The instruction is a simple detailed diagram of the unit's wiring harness and possible conversion connection. Nothing more. Took a bit of connection testing, but I managed to have all wires connected properly.

The wire harness tapped directly to the digital amp, with the RCA Front-Right and Front-Left acts as a 4-channels forwarding to the digital amp. I have to play with this a bit more for proper fading. However, ALL of the 11-speakers are working. Sounds are a hell lot louder by at least 20dB. Need a bit more fine tuning to make the bass pops and deeper sounds that my wife likes in the old unit. The newer one gives her more flexibility in control over what she wants, but still not enough deep bass. Loudness is what we've gained.

The unit flushed completely with the facia. I had to cut the sides out in order to accommodate quite a bit of wiring and units. Installed the GPS receiver sight-to-sight, near the center speaker. SMH Didn't know how how about the speaker's grill had degraded, and CRACK!!! Wife didn't let me swallow that down.

We had an entire day to test the unit. Works awesome! Onboard antenna is already powered, so, I didn't connect the 12V power line to the booster. Bad mistake. 80% of the radio channels didn't come through. Took my SIM card, shoved it into the MEDIA slot, and off we go. Live map, digital feed from online radio with awesome reception, making phone calls and voice-to-text texting even dead zones, and mirror casting from the HU to the 10.5in tablet. We placed it through the gamut. Now, to install the C500 DVR unit and order the backup camera to make the vehicle a fully loaded fun vehicle again.

Just a warning. The moment the digital amps receives somekind of the HU equalizer change, there's a constant humming noise. Kill the HU equalizer, and humming goes away. I'll play with this soon to resolve it, and create a write up later for this specific unit.

Ionman · Mar 26, 2017

deh2002 said:
Finally had a nice day to finish putting the trim pieces back in. Forgot about the wood in the shifter and threw my scraps away so I ordered a sample piece today.
Thinking of doing some fiberglass speaker pockets in the doors where the oe speakers are located.

Nicely done. I may have to do that later when our trim get scratched up.

deh2002 · Mar 26, 2017

Ionman said:
Nicely done. I may have to do that later when our trim get scratched up.

I hated the look of the wood. Looks far too fake to me.
Not bad I guess for the age of our vehicles.
For other's trying to get the wires all stuffed in, I found that placing everything to the left side and down is the best way.

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Ionman · Mar 27, 2017

Edward47 said:
both have 12V when off !

Sorry Edward, got turned around all over the place with family events and a few ultra early AM hours to put the new HU together (starting at 4AM :grin2: ) , and didn't see you post.

I did a bit investigation, and you're right about the 12V for the accessory ports being on even with the key out, without a rig I've done to my port a while back to shut it down. Wife drained the hell out of the battery with her wireless phone chargers and various electronic devices of hers.

After pulling the old HU apart, and did schematic mapping of the electrical loads, a 30A fuse is diverted to radio unit (which is excessively high) in my 2004 T'Reg. My new HU has a 15A fuse, with the old one being a 10A. So, splicing is the way to go into the old wire harness.

Look careful at your new HU. Newer HU has a Yellow large 12 or 14 gauge wire for connection to the battery, which leads taps into the old Red-Orange wire. However, to be sure, look at your new HU unit for the (+) Battery and trace back from the new wire harness to the old harness. Splice it temporary, and patch it up later with electrical tape if you're not going to use it any more once you have the new CANBUS. Vampire splice/power tap is quite cheap and efficient, and a good mean to tap into the full 30A worth. However, CANBUS is regulated at 3A or less. Tapping to a full load can mean...not too good and possibly an overloading short?

In any scenario you want to move forward, when the key is removed, power to the radio gets shutdown.

Ionman · Mar 30, 2017

Done! Able to figure out all the problem to the unit, and it was quite quick.

The HU is playing superbly.
No radio drop/poor reception.
No humming or whining.
All 11 speakers are bombing nicely, and downloading an Android amplifier app, the cabin is booming like the wife likes.
Installed Google Map for live navigation, and Sygic for offline. Freaking awesome!

Now, time to hack the HU's OS for root, and adding 2 additional USB extension line to use with USB memory cards and hard drives for accessing larger storages. I've connected and old 2.5in SATA hard drives, 230GB in size, and no issue whatsoever reading the content off an NTFS partition. Kids are going to be happy watching their anime for long trips. HU mirror cast to the 10.5in tablets in the back, while they're listening to the surround sounds in the car.

deh2002 · Mar 31, 2017

Ionman said:
Done! Able to figure out all the problem to the unit, and it was quite quick.

The HU is playing superbly.
No radio drop/poor reception.
No humming or whining.
All 11 speakers are bombing nicely, and downloading an Android amplifier app, the cabin is booming like the wife likes.
Installed Google Map for live navigation, and Sygic for offline. Freaking awesome!

Now, time to hack the HU's OS for root, and adding 2 additional USB extension line to use with USB memory cards and hard drives for accessing larger storages. I've connected and old 2.5in SATA hard drives, 230GB in size, and no issue whatsoever reading the content off an NTFS partition. Kids are going to be happy watching their anime for long trips. HU mirror cast to the 10.5in tablets in the back, while they're listening to the surround sounds in the car.

That is how I took care of the buzzing issue's as well.
With the head unit I ordered I need to possibly add some felt to the sides of the hu like the stock unit has to hold it in place better. New fosgate amp coming tomorrow for my sub then I'm going to start working on the door panels to add better speaker's and tweeters. Not sure if I'll add a new 4 channel amp to run them or try using the factory amp.
With a 12" sub in a ported box it's very easy to drown out the factory speaker's.
May just replace the tweeters first and see if that picks it up a little.
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marshatherton · Mar 31, 2017

So is that two different HU's that work with the digital amplifier?

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Ionman · Mar 31, 2017

deh2002 said:
That is how I took care of the buzzing issue's as well.
With the head unit I ordered I need to possibly add some felt to the sides of the hu like the stock unit has to hold it in place better. New fosgate amp coming tomorrow for my sub then I'm going to start working on the door panels to add better speaker's and tweeters. Not sure if I'll add a new 4 channel amp to run them or try using the factory amp.
With a 12" sub in a ported box it's very easy to drown out the factory speaker's.
May just replace the tweeters first and see if that picks it up a little.

Man, you're upgrading some serious sound. Post the installation for the upgrade too.

Ionman · Mar 31, 2017

marshatherton said:
So is that two different HU's that work with the digital amplifier

Yep. So far, so good. Straight out of box, and they both work without making some odd modding. Just making sure to hook up the RCA connection properly.

Edward47 · Mar 31, 2017

Thanks Ionman.

I found the bottom rows in fuse box are switched! on right side fuse box .
The Radio turns off with engine now.
No acc. power for now. but thats ok.

Now I think I need to do the door switch thing !!!
No door chime, 2 driver door lights not working, dome light stays on,
Think it sounds like that switch box in the door.
Saw the solder connections not hold up??

marshatherton · Mar 31, 2017

Ionman said:
Yep. So far, so good. Straight out of box, and they both work without making some odd modding. Just making sure to hook up the RCA connection properly.

Looks good. Let me know what amp app you find that works.

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Ionman · Mar 31, 2017

Edward47 said:
Now I think I need to do the door switch thing !!!
No door chime, 2 driver door lights not working, dome light stays on,
Think it sounds like that switch box in the door.
Saw the solder connections not hold up??

Go easy on yourself and look for burnt out fuses on both side of the cabin (driver's and passenger's). Look at the main fuse box in the engine compartment as well. If no fuse was burnt, you might want to check the lights for crack/burnt filaments. Worst case scenario, yeah, bad soldering job...

Edward47 · Mar 31, 2017

Ionman said:
Go easy on yourself and look for burnt out fuses on both side of the cabin (driver's and passenger's). Look at the main fuse box in the engine compartment as well. If no fuse was burnt, you might want to check the lights for crack/burnt filaments. Worst case scenario, yeah, bad soldering job...

The bulbs are good. no power at the socket.
will there be a separate fuse for driver door?

Ionman · Mar 31, 2017

Edward47 said:
The bulbs are good. no power at the socket.
will there be a separate fuse for driver door?

Not quite sure for your model/trim, since they change fuses, locations, and routing practically every year. However, for my 2004 V6, it's on the passenger side, 1 fuse controls all door's lighting and warning. Even a minor fracture/crack in the fuse will cause an error or no power. My fuse for a few things don't locate where the diagram is showing. I tend to yank them all and check each one on both sides.

Edward47 · Apr 1, 2017

Ionman said:
Not quite sure for your model/trim, since they change fuses, locations, and routing practically every year. However, for my 2004 V6, it's on the passenger side, 1 fuse controls all door's lighting and warning. Even a minor fracture/crack in the fuse will cause an error or no power. My fuse for a few things don't locate where the diagram is showing. I tend to yank them all and check each one on both sides.

2005, V8, Air Susp.

Ionman · Apr 2, 2017

Edward47 said:
2005, V8, Air Susp.

Driver side fuse box, check #14. Like I suggested before, yank all the fuses and check. Same deal with the engine block fuse box.

Larry Bartowski · Apr 3, 2017

deh2002 said:
I was also told by Sam Lee from smart auto 24 that one of their head units and get everything working by using an analog to digital signal converter but it needs to be one that communicates properly with the vw digital amp.

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Do not order from smartauto24. They are out of business. Paypal did my refund. I'm using Alibaba for the same product. Just ordered. Awaiting shipment. Will post results.

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Ionman · Apr 3, 2017

Larry Bartowski said:
Do not order from smartauto24. They are out of business. Paypal did my refund. I'm using Alibaba for the same product. Just ordered. Awaiting shipment. Will post results.

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I ordered through DX.com. same as Alibaba, but less headaches. Well, somewhat the same.

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Upgrading head unit.

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