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Fun with the w4500nex


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In the event that my unit gets repaired by pioneer I will fill everyone in after I make a backup myself :) But please still reach out and provide a factory img of the 4500nex if you can and save us all from the RMA process!!!

Edited by sofmeright
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  • 1 month later...
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  • 4 months later...

Pioneer AVH-W4500NEX - Boot screen loop: So I was having the same issues as many other people have mentioned with the boot screen looping.  After a lot of research and reading several posts I have finally brought my 4500 back to life.  As a recap I did the following:

  1. Pulled entire stereo out of car and took a part to get to the the SD card behind the front cover.  You don't need to do that.  After a little bit of back and forth I did figure out if you can get a screw driver under the bottom of the screen you can pop the release and pull the screen out.  From there I was able to use a pair of pliers and pull on the tray (don't pull too hard, if it is unlocked it should begin to slide out otherwise it may be locked.  It may take a couple of times powering the system on and off to get the mechanical lock to release).  If you can pull the tray out then remove the screws on each side of the tray, this will allow you to pop the front plastic off and undo the cable on the back.  
  2. Once I had the cover off I went ahead and cut the slot in the plastic to allow me access directly to the SD card without having to remove the cover.  In my case I knew I would be trying a few things to get it working so it was well worth the effort.
  3. Next I purchased a couple of SD HC1 (16 GB) cards from amazon (Micro Center brand).  I had also used a 32GB card which worked.
  4. Downloaded the AVIC.zip from https://mega.nz/file/SdJCgKCJ#13zrFlogMCWNohCvuFsDFcC1uniHgufVZJxZlQPHUag
  5. Installed win32imagerhttps://win32diskimager.org/.  For some reason couldn't get it to work on all computers, would click run and nothing would happen after install.
  6. Extract AVIC.img file from zip and use win32disk imager to write to SD Card.  Windows will no longer recoginize the card after you do this.  Don't worry it is just in an android format that windows doesn't recognize.  If you have a 4400nex you can just install the card in your stereo and it should work.  If you have a 4500 continue on reading.
  7. Now here is where it gets more complicate for the 4500.  To get the touchscreen to work you will need to modify the files that you wrote to the card.  But, as I mentioned Windows won't be able to read the card so you will need either a linux machine or install a virtual machine on your windows pc.  Let's assume you need a vm machine.  
  8. Download virtualbox from oracle https://www.virtualbox.org/.  If you want a good tutorial on virtual machines I would recommend Network Chuck on youtube. 
  9. Download linux (is used kali).  https://www.kali.org/
  10. Install virtualbox and then import kali linux once you have virtualbox running.  Login for kali once it is imported is user: kali, pwd: kali
  11. Once you are logged in you will see a device menu option at the top, make sure the SD card is in the card reader and click devices, connect to the card reader that should hopefully be listed.  Give it a minute or so to recognize and connect to the card.
  12. Open the file explorer on the Kali desktop and you should see the SD card broken out by a couple of partitions.  Find the partition with the etc folder and open that.  Right click on the sysd.config file and choose open terminal at this location.
  13. on the command line type sudo vim sysd.config
  14. VIM is a notepad/editor.  I tried using the GUI editors but they wouldn't allow me to save the file.  I found vim would.  Now scroll down till you find the section for the 8500.  In there change the setting from "capacitator" to "resistence".  In VIM you type "I" to begin editing, ESC to stop editing and x: to save and exit.
  15. Once that is done you should be able to insert the SD card into your 4500 and everything will work.  At least it did for me.
  16. On a side note I would recommend putting a CD into your stereo if you took the time to cut the SD slot in.  If for some reason you aren't able to get the touchscreen to work you can press and hold eject button down and the screen will slide down and out of your way to get to the card slot.  If you don't have the CD I wasn't able to get to the slot without popping the cover plate off and prying like mentioned earlier.

Good luck and hope this helps.

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I appreciate Potterg’s detailed information on how to get this thing taken care of but I cannot seem to get the file sysd.conf to edit and save because it is read only. I’m not an expert in Linux but I can follow directions and no matter what I do, force a save, change the file to not read only, etc. I just cannot edit the file and save it. I can edit it, just not save it.  I am just at a loss. 

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Update:

I forgot that I had an old Acer laptop that I had Linux Mint 17.3 installed on it. I broke it out, did the updates, installed VIM on it. Fortunately I had an old Kingston usb sd card reader that I had to find. Plugged it into the Acer, put the sd card in it. BAM, all the sections showed up on the desktop. I found the sysd.conf file, opened it with VIM, edited the file and :w, and on the screen it said something to effect of “file written”. I about crapped myself, after at least a dozen attempts using Kali on a virtual machine and getting no where, trying anything could think of or find online. Now after while I will head out to my truck and see if it works. 

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Update #2 - Final Update

Follow up, the sd card worked but defaulted to a 8400, it worked but it loaded real slow, couldn’t adjust the clock, etc. Few things not quite right.

So, it started over. 
I purchased a couple of SD HC1 (16 GB) cards from amazon (Micro Center brand).

Installed win32imager

https://win32diskimager.org/.


Extracted AVIC.img file from zip and used win32disk imager to write to SD Card.

Moved to my Linux Mint machine, used VIM to add the w4500 config info to the sysd.conf file, removed all the other info so it had to pick that info. 
So far it seems to work fine with minimal testing. The Wi-Fi connection seems a little squirrelly, but not sure. 

I just want to thank everyone who did what they did and put all that info on this website. I would have never fixed this without all that help. 

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Does anyone have a 4500 image I can get?  My 4500 no longer will remember my iPhone and so my wireless CarPlay will not work except to re-set it up every time I turn in my car. And now it isn’t storing settings and I get the Sirius XM your favorite bands are updated message. Even when I turn it off in settings it comes back upon turning the car on again. 

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  • 5 months later...

@Potterg

@slackwaredragon

Question for you. I have created a replacement SD card for my AVH-W4500 and all works except for the integration of my Maestro RR. I have programmed the Maestro RR with the correct serial number from my AVH-W4500 but no matter what I have tried the Maestro RR continues to state I have provided it with the wrong serial number. 

 

Listed below is what I have done so far:

 

 

I was able to download the AVIC4500only.img file from this old link (https://mega.nz/folder/AI9RxZjZ#jAXMB8e-8tPlBF5s5VUvBQ) before it was removed. I have since posted this file to the following Google Drive location.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FhhDuE2QdXU0mvF_G7n_8hURPUZ0Jb7R/view?usp=sharing

I was able to paste the image to a new SD card and install it into my AVH-W4500NEX and it worked like a charm. 

I used a Sandisk Extreme SDHC UHS-I/U3 16GB SD card (~$15CAD from Amazon), used "balenaEtcher" on my MAC MINI M1 to get the image flashed onto the SD card, and followed the following Youtube video to take the head unit apart and reassemble it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cHp6jxD5R8

The firmware is showing as version 1.02 with this image (my old firmware was listed as 1.00). After the SD card replacement/ firmware upgrade I confirmed that the serial number that shows up in the System Information screen of my AVH-W4500NEX still matches the serial number that is on the sticker on the bottom of the unit.

Apple CarPlay (both USB and Wifi) works fine.

The only thing that I still cannot get to work is the Maestro RR. I continually get the double red flashing light on the Maestro RR even after I have successfully re-flashed the Maestro RR (multiple times), and have factory reset the AVH-W4500NEX.

I reached out to Auto Motive Data Solutions (ADS) tech support and got the following response:

have seen this is a few times now and while you were able to swap the SD card that is only one part of the fixing your original issue, the other step requires Pioneer sync the embedded information from that SD card to the radio. The only way I have seen this done successfully is by sending the unit into Pioneer Warranty or an authorized Pioneer service center to complete this side.  Once done you should be able to pull the new serial number on the radio flash the RR.

 

Justin Ferroni   I   Maestro Technical Support

Automotive Data Solutions Inc.

8400 rue Bougainville Montreal, Quebec  H4P 2G1 Canada

T    514.807.2888

TF   866.427.2999

 

I have also discovered that when I copied the above image file to a USB drive I can read some of the files on it as I have installed extFS for Mac on my Mac Mini M1. I was wondering if I should copy the above image to a new SD card and then see if I can make the required modifications before I install the SD card into my AVH-W4500NEX. I did notice that there are dome DB files in the DataManager folder that I could edit. The screen shots below show the DataManager folder I was able to access along with the Other Info.db file where I found the device MAC address. 

Any insight you could provide would be appreciated.

 

655764860_ScreenShot2022-06-29at12_40_27PM.thumb.png.5d20e552d654d785913d0a15327d0a5c.png684032365_ScreenShot2022-06-29at12_40_54PM.thumb.png.da78ea737c1958912598c9d6f8358f18.png

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you can find interesting BD files under ./data/
it is even possible to find out the personal data of the previous owner. whose card was the donor.

you can find out all entries in the phone book if it has been synchronized with the radio.
you can also find out which USB drives the owner installed and their file names

 

on 4400 you can run an image from 4500 and that would work MRR + WebLink
even upgradeable to AVIC version
although you know how to do it.

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  • 2 weeks later...

@Jeff Brown Buy the official replacement SD card from PacParts.com (Pioneer QXX3352), see https://www.pacparts.com/model.cfm?model_id=AVHW4500NEX&mfg=Pioneer&back=0&action=list_part. $95 + s&h.

BEFORE YOU INSTALL the new SD card, clone it to an image on your hard drive and back that image up for safekeeping. As you hopefully already know, the SD card will be locked after you install it, and no one here knows the SD card lock/unlock password yet.

I just did this with my own 4500 (with a slight twist). I cloned the QXX3352 SD card, and then put it back in the packaging to keep it pristine, then wrote to my own on-hand SD card and installed THAT SD card in my 4500. Seems to work perfectly so far.

If you want to share that image after you have backed it up, feel free to do so at your own risk (e.g. DMCA takedown notices).

edit: I outlined how I created my image file in the linked thread.

 

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3 hours ago, fry said:

@Jeff Brown Buy the official replacement SD card from PacParts.com (Pioneer QXX3352), see https://www.pacparts.com/model.cfm?model_id=AVHW4500NEX&mfg=Pioneer&back=0&action=list_part. $95 + s&h.

BEFORE YOU INSTALL the new SD card, clone it to an image on your hard drive and back that image up for safekeeping. As you hopefully already know, the SD card will be locked after you install it, and no one here knows the SD card lock/unlock password yet.

I just did this with my own 4500 (with a slight twist). I cloned the QXX3352 SD card, and then put it back in the packaging to keep it pristine, then wrote to my own on-hand SD card and installed THAT SD card in my 4500. Seems to work perfectly so far.

If you want to share that image after you have backed it up, feel free to do so at your own risk (e.g. DMCA takedown notices).

edit: I outlined how I created my image file in the linked thread.
 

 

Exactly what I did. @fry glad that it worked for you also. 

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