Avic F900BT - Disappointed

[Peleg]

Well, I've had this unit for 2 weeks now and to be quite honest, it is a massive disappointment.

 

First of, the fan in the back is noisy as hell. My 6 years old laptop fan is more quiet than this fan. I called Pioneer tech support and was told this is normal? huh? this is HORRIBLE.

 

Second is the whole POI issue and the fact a unit of this caliber doesn't have an internal hard drive. If I was the chief engineer of this product, I would look into what other units can do and then make this unit do the same.

 

You can't load POI into the unit, so what good is it then? As soon as you take the SD card out, it's game over the POI's are gone. This is just defeating the purpose. To give you an idea, my Garmin Nuvi 360 can save a 4400 record POI database in 2 minutes.

 

Third some of the buttons are a bit laggy.

 

Fourth, I find the Navigation hard to use. You want to do certain functions such as:

 

A. See a list of all the streets/highways you'll be traveling on.

B. See your vehicle speed.

 

You gotta go through hoops and loops, sometimes you have to click menu again and go to the main screen in order to get to what you want to do.

 

 

Fifth: the radio. For a unit that costs this much, one should be able to program the station's names. My Sony that costs $150 can do that.

 

 

I'm going to take a few days and think this over and see if I would return this unit, I'm just disappointed with it. It has a great design on the outside, the graphics are great, but it doesn't work that smoothly.

 

I would like to hear some input from others, if I'm missing something or if you can show me the light please do............right now I'm 50/50 on keeping/returning this unit.

 

My .002 cents.

[bashed1]

My input is for you to read through all the threads in this forum and implement all the suggested changes/mods/advice therein before your time is up to return this unit for a refund - only then will you know for sure if this is the unit for you or not.

[Peleg]

My input is for you to read through all the threads in this forum and implement all the suggested changes/mods/advice therein before your time is up to return this unit for a refund - only then will you know for sure if this is the unit for you or not.

 

I have done a lot of reading here.

 

Can you please point me to specific threads?

[Peleg]

Anyone out there or am I talking to myself?

 

There are so many threads and so many issues that I don't even know where to start.

[Vorian]

Anyone out there or am I talking to myself?

 

There are so many threads and so many issues that I don't even know where to start.

 

WOW!!! You post an hour earlier and then post again expecting to have a landslide of responses??? You're funny!

 

Yes... there are LOTS of threads here with LOTS of information. Either start reading ALL of them the way many of us do or make use of the search feature.

[Stephanie]

First: Make sure the unit installation does not have the fan area obstructed at the back. If the fan is blowing against a tangled knot of wiring harnesses it will be louder than normal. And then the navi will eventually overheat.

 

Second: The unit has an internal flash drive. No moving parts, and much faster seek time than a hard drive. Ok downside is you need to use 'testmode' to get at it, but I'm confident that user POIs can be put onto the internal drive. Just, not the way Pioneer expects it to happen.

 

Third: Some people have reported that replacing the keybeeps with a short silent wav file has improved the button response time.

 

Fourth: A) if you can get to a list of streets/highways you'll be using through the various menus, then a 'shortcut' button can be hacked onto the map page, if you so desire. It would require some time to determine what is required, but it's not impossible.

 

you can display the speed without any hacks at all - use the navi settings, to customise the displayed info in the lower left corner. Current speed is one of the built in options. If you want a dedicated speed readout, that is another thing that can be easily hacked into the display. Or -- going out on a limb -- if you want an accurate, lag-free way to figure out your vehicle speed, odds are that the vehicle has such a readout somewhere. Consult your car's user guide. (Sorry, couldn't resist that -- the GPS speed reading is laggy and not always accurate because it is inferred and achieved with maths, rather than just measuring wheel rotations.)

 

Fifth: Well, I can't contest this, really. My $50 budget AM/FM/CD player let me save names for radio stations. All I can do is point out that Pioneer calls this an in-dash navigation system. Not an in-dash nav/audio/video system. I reckon, it's a navigation system that also happens to have some av functions.

 

Anyhow, only you can decide if you like it or hate it. For me, the hackability of the thing outweighs the handful of complaints I have. I'd rather have what I have now, than something that looked like it did 'out of the box' but booted in 5 seconds and let me save radio station names.

 

Cheers!

 

 

Cheers!

[Peleg]

First: Make sure the unit installation does not have the fan area obstructed at the back. If the fan is blowing against a tangled knot of wiring harnesses it will be louder than normal. And then the navi will eventually overheat.

 

Second: The unit has an internal flash drive. No moving parts, and much faster seek time than a hard drive. Ok downside is you need to use 'testmode' to get at it, but I'm confident that user POIs can be put onto the internal drive. Just, not the way Pioneer expects it to happen.

 

Third: Some people have reported that replacing the keybeeps with a short silent wav file has improved the button response time.

 

Fourth: A) if you can get to a list of streets/highways you'll be using through the various menus, then a 'shortcut' button can be hacked onto the map page, if you so desire. It would require some time to determine what is required, but it's not impossible.

 

you can display the speed without any hacks at all - use the navi settings, to customise the displayed info in the lower left corner. Current speed is one of the built in options. If you want a dedicated speed readout, that is another thing that can be easily hacked into the display. Or -- going out on a limb -- if you want an accurate, lag-free way to figure out your vehicle speed, odds are that the vehicle has such a readout somewhere. Consult your car's user guide. (Sorry, couldn't resist that -- the GPS speed reading is laggy and not always accurate because it is inferred and achieved with maths, rather than just measuring wheel rotations.)

 

Fifth: Well, I can't contest this, really. My $50 budget AM/FM/CD player let me save names for radio stations. All I can do is point out that Pioneer calls this an in-dash navigation system. Not an in-dash nav/audio/video system. I reckon, it's a navigation system that also happens to have some av functions.

 

Anyhow, only you can decide if you like it or hate it. For me, the hackability of the thing outweighs the handful of complaints I have. I'd rather have what I have now, than something that looked like it did 'out of the box' but booted in 5 seconds and let me save radio station names.

 

Cheers!

 

 

Cheers!

 

Let's do this.

 

Here is what I'm trying to accomplish, let me know if there's a way to do this.

 

I want to save the POI entries (all of them, and at the same time) to the unit or whichever storage on there can handle it. Then when I drive towards any of the location, the unit should alert me.

 

Is this possible?

[CatchMeIfYouCan631]

We tried that with speed traps, and as of date it's not possible.

[Peleg]

Ok, so what can you do with POI's and this unit? It looks totally useless to me to have POI's on the SD card..........it doesn't serve any purpose.

[CatchMeIfYouCan631]

Ok, so what can you do with POI's and this unit? It looks totally useless to me to have POI's on the SD card..........it doesn't serve any purpose.

 

_shrug_ personally I'd have a huge list of speed traps but unfortunately there are none on the list for my area so I don't use it.

[crna1]

wheres the hack for a dedicated speed readout?

thanks

[Redfire427]

This is a great unit if you have no expectations of having it work properly. You are dis-satisfied with the functions it has and how they work, just wait until these functions no longer work, or, the whole unit stops working. That will be what will make up your mind. It's too late for me to do anything about returning mine, but I can tell you that Pioneer will never see another dime of my money again.