Reboot Loop

From AVIC Wiki

Some owners have reported that their unit seems to enter into a reboot loop randomly. Usually this happens while on the map screen.

Symptom

The unit constantly reboots when it is turned on. The startup graphic is shown, and a change in brightness may be seen, but before the unit can get into a usable state, the screen goes blank and the startup screen is shown again. It may boot properly once in awhile, but most of the time the unit just stays stuck in a loop.

Customers who call Pioneer and report that they have bypassed the parking brake are informed by Pioneer that this is causing the reboot issue. However, users have removed the bypass with no result, and it is believed this is a generic response by Pioneer.

Solution

This solution seems to work for those who are stuck in a reboot loop with an occasional boot that works properly. There are other reports of units rebooting once in a while, but this seems to be due to a different problem.

The hard part is getting the unit to boot into Testmode. If the unit is stuck in a reboot loop, it will also refuse to boot into testmode. Since most of the time the unit will boot occasionally, you can insert the SD card with the testmode files and let it sit for awhile with the key set to ACC or such, and eventually the unit will boot properly and enter testmode. Make sure you don't drain your battery, and don't leave a vehicle unattended with keys in it!

Once your unit has booted into testmode (hopefully this won't take too long) You need to remove four (4) offending files from the system. User vegaslaptop on the forum found that these files can become corrupted, and make the unit reboot when it tries to read them. It appears one or more might contain settings data, so you may need to re-setup a few audio options after you do this.

Enter Explorer on the unit and open My Flash Disk. In the main directory you will see four files, called gpspara0.bin, gpspara1.bin, gpspara2.bin and gpspara3.bin

You can select these one at a time and cut/paste them, but selecting them all is easier.

   * Change the view to "Details" (View menu -> Details) and then tap the first file in the list (gpspara0.bin)
   * In the lower right hand corner, Tap the keyboard icon (on the far right) then tap "Keyboard". A small keyboard will appear.
   * Tap the shift key, then tap the last file (gpspara3.bin).
   * Tap Edit -> Cut.
   * Navigate back to your SD card, and tap Edit -> Paste. 

Now you have done two things; the files are backed up onto your SD card, and have been removed from the unit so that it will not try to read the corrupted files. These files will be recreated when the system boots, and it seems some people have had issues with them popping back up if they are moved one at a time.

After this, turn the unit off by turning the ignition off, remove the testmode SD card, and boot the unit back up.

In some instances, audio settings have been found to be reset, so be sure to check your audio setup after the unit boots back up.

Related Links

   * Unit keeps rebooting (Forum Topic)