Can I permanently set my radio presets (ie. thru testmode)?

[brook042]

Background: My car was broken into and my F90BT was stolen. Because of this, I now remove the new unit everytime my car sits over night (Im fortunate its easy to do in my car, only takes about 30 seconds).

 

When I remove it, my radio presets are erased so I am curious if you can permanently program them? For example, boot into test mode and rewrite some code or move some files around like other hacks we have all done.

[ill.die.trying]

no one has hacked the audio part of the unit yet

[brook042]

Understandable.... thank you.

[ewickj]

i dont have a answer for your question but i have an idea that might help you

 

on the back of my 700 there is a hole with threads i found a screw that fits sames as on the sides

and put a cable clamp in there hooked 5/16 air craft cable to it then after the unit is fully instaled

 

i pulled the other end tight and conected it someplace that you cant see with out looking very hard

even going thru the fire wall will work then

 

now if someone trys to remove the unit it wont move at all

you cant get to the cable on the back

and if you hide it good enough they cant get to the other end

 

you also cant cut it with just wire cutters you will need bolt cutters which not many people will have

this will stop people from stealing your unit

cant say they wont damage it but cant help that

[Bman69]

also you should use special screws that most people dont have the tools to remove easily.... anti theft screws

 

[etnpnys]

Sorry to hear about the theft, dude, but wow... these are some great suggestions that have come from the mishap!

[Wrathernaut]

Buy a small 12 volt power tool battery, and wire it in parallel with the constant-power power wires on the stereo.

[etnpnys]

Buy a small 12 volt power tool battery, and wire it in parallel with the constant-power power wires on the stereo.

...and keep it strapped to the AVIC? What are you suggesting?

[makeys]

Can we get back on topic. one of the problems i also have when I apply a new data.zip file is that all of my FM radio presets are lost, but my XM presets are kept. why the difference? there must be some file that hold these values right?

[FourG]

Can we get back on topic. one of the problems i also have when I apply a new data.zip file is that all of my FM radio presets are lost, but my XM presets are kept. why the difference? there must be some file that hold these values right?

 

Not necessarily. The XM accessory box may have its own non-volatile storage that it keeps its presets in, and the Navi might send a command over the IP Bus to "store this frequency to preset slot #4", etc. The AM/FM radio in the F-series looks to be a little module that hangs off the AV board rather than the IP Bus, so they may have skimped on the cost by saying "we'll store the pre-set frequencies in a DB in the Navi memory", which of course gets wiped when you hit the Reset button or remove power from the head unit.

[etnpnys]

Can we get back on topic.

lmao - If the suggestion is about how to retain his RADIO PRESETS, how on earth is that 'off topic'??

 

To answer your question: you're doing something wrong. My presets were retained after I modded the DATA.zip file.

[Wrathernaut]

Buy a small 12 volt power tool battery, and wire it in parallel with the constant-power power wires on the stereo.

...and keep it strapped to the AVIC? What are you suggesting?

 

Yes.

 

[to factory harness]--- (constant +12v) ---- [battery +] --- [Head unit]

[to factory harness]--- (ground) ------------- [battery -] --- [Head unit]

[to factory harness]--- (switched +12v) ---------------------- [Head unit] <-- Not used, just for clarification.

 

I don't know how small of a 12v battery you can get, but you can always use 10 NiCad (not Li-Ion or NiMH) rechargeable AAA's wired in series. You can wire and secure each battery wherever there's room

Just string them:

 

[battery - on previous diagram]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[- +]---[battery + on previous diagram]

[DJDisturbed]

But you would also need a charging system wired in a way to recharge the batts while its plugged in, doing this wrong could cause ALOT more issue b/c of the batts not charging right and exploding, plus (unless you know how to isololate the battts from the main power supply coming in from the car) you would have to run the unit off those batts all the time, even when its in the car. Its not just as easy as strapping a 12 volt batt system to the unit and leaving it hooked up all the time. Also you would have to have a batt system capable of supporting the "pull" of the unit (i doubt that a series of rechargable "AA' batts would be able to do this correctly, maybe D size batts, but that would be a huge thing to try to move around and hide behind the dash of most vehicles and still be easy to take out)

[Wrathernaut]

The 12.8-ish volts DC from the charging system will be fine for charging the mini-battery. If you were using lithium ion or nickel metal hydride, you'd need something more, but nickel cadmium will be fine.

 

The main power feed for the stereo comes from the switched power, not the small constant power line. You cannot run the stereo from the constant power line, so the draw be negligible.

 

If you're worried about it constantly hooked up, you can just keep the 12v power tool battery separate from your vehicle's charging system. Put in a couple quick connects to the constant power and ground where I said to wire the battery in and with the vehicle off, plug the connects from the power tool battery before you disconnect from the vehicle's power source.

 

The power tool battery should last quite some time this way, as the draw from the stereo would be minimal. Just pop it on the charger when the stereo's in the car every couple of weeks to keep the battery fresh, and you'll be good to go. This may be preferable as more and more power tool batteries go away from nickel cadmium.

[ewickj]

Can we get back on topic.

 

just because we havent come up with a way to set the presets from testmode

doesn't mean we arn't helping

finding a way to not have to remove the radio helps keep the presets too

 

 

 

anyways as for the battery idea that could work if you got small car battery motocycle battery you could wire in a plug to the back of the radio so you could plug the battery in then disconnect it from the car

if you got a small bag you could store them in it while your home

and would make for easy transport to and from the car

and when you are driveing around you could wire a plug to your car so you could plug the battery in to charge

this way its safe to charge

and you dont have to tape it or connect it to the radio

also it would give you enough power so if you went on vacation or something you could store it for awhile