ADMIN EDIT: Pioneer is not recalling the units, but will provide a software update as soon as possible.

After reading through all the owner issues on this forum, and other forums as well, I still decided that I could live with those annoyances and I wanted one.

I called around a few shops here in Miami and no one had it in stock, i started calling shops that were a little farther away from my home and finally found a few in stock at a shop way down south in Miami. I drove there at 12pm today and asked for the rep i had spoken to on the phone. i was told he was at lunch but if i needed help. sure, i asked about the F90BT, that i wanted one, soon after the store owner told me they were all backordered. I was a little upset now, as i had driven almost 30 miles based on what the rep told me on the phone. he apologized and let me know that even if they were in stock i shouldnt buy one. the Pioneer rep had been there just a few hours before this morning and explained that Pioneer has acknowledged problems with BT audio quality, ipod connectivity, and lockups/hangs/freezes. Pioneer had asked that all units be shipped back and that new units with either an updated firmware or hardware revision would be shipping soon.

i can understand a hardware revision needing all units to be recalled, but just a firmware update shouldnt prompt Pioneer to recall all units.

Most of our issues/annoyances, in my opinion, can be solved through software updates/tweaks. However there are owners experiencing issues that could point to hardware related causes such at BT audio not being clear(could be a problem with BT radio chipset).etc.

take this info with a grain of salt, its simply what was told to me by a store owner who, however, would have no benefit from lying to me.

do you think they would recall the f700bt as well?

Yikes, we all need to hear something official about this. Can someone contact Pioneer directly? JasonH? I need to know if I should return an order asap.

JasonH chime in?

I was hoping to see Jason post videos reproducing the problems owners are having so we can have video proof to show Pioneer.

A company like Pioneer gets inundated with calls/email of 'problems' with their products that im sure 99% of the time end up as 'user error' because people didnt RTFM.

But video that shows a problem being replicated over and over again would give Pioneer a good starting point to help owners out.

do you think they would recall the f700bt as well?

The F700 were all in stock and on display, i was told none of the other F series had been showing problems, no one had returned them, etc. so you should be safe

what about the 900bt? That's the one I ordered.

I spoke with the Navigation Department at Pioneer.

THERE IS NO RECALL.

They without a doubt admit that there are problems with the F series.

What they need US to do:

Submit in a helpful format, such as JasonH provided, the issues we are experiencing.

Submit them here: http://www.avic411.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15692

OR they said to call them directly: 800-421-1404...ask for Navigation Department. Then tell them your issueS.

What they plan to do:

They are currently working on a patch for the F series unit. They said it should be available on CD and download (so you can update through the SD card/USB).

Again, this came DIRECTLY from Pioneer.

i was told none of the other F series had been showing problems, no one had returned them, etc. so you should be safe

Ok now I think he's full of crap. Several 700 owners have reported the same problems. All these units seem to be problematic. Nevertheless I have PM'd JasonH to inquire about this.

the shop could be full of crap, i just figured why would he put me off from buying it. he shouldve been begging me to preorder or something..

the shop could be full of crap, i just figured why would he put me off from buying it. he shouldve been begging me to preorder or something..

Maybe they were just out of stock and he was just trying to sell you one of the other units that they actually had in stock or something like that...

nope, didnt push anything else... 'I' asked about the z2 he had on clearance for 1100, but he said to wait for the F90BT and gave me a card.

I spoke with the Navigation Department at Pioneer.

 

THERE IS NO RECALL.

 

They without a doubt admit that there are problems with the F series.

 

What they need US to do:

Submit in a helpful format, such as JasonH provided, the issues we are experiencing.

Submit them here: http://www.avic411.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15692

 

OR they said to call them directly: 800-421-1404...ask for Navigation Department. Then tell them your issueS.

 

What they plan to do:

They are currently working on a patch for the F series unit. They said it should be available on CD and download (so you can update through the SD card/USB).

 

Again, this came DIRECTLY from Pioneer.

Thanks for contacting them directly. As long as it's a firmware and not a hardware issue, I'm fine with keeping mine.

I spoke with the Navigation Department at Pioneer.

 

THERE IS NO RECALL.

 

They without a doubt admit that there are problems with the F series.

 

What they need US to do:

Submit in a helpful format, such as JasonH provided, the issues we are experiencing.

Submit them here: http://www.avic411.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15692

 

OR they said to call them directly: 800-421-1404...ask for Navigation Department. Then tell them your issueS.

 

What they plan to do:

They are currently working on a patch for the F series unit. They said it should be available on CD and download (so you can update through the SD card/USB).

 

Again, this came DIRECTLY from Pioneer.

Did they say when the update would be released?

No Problem.

They didn't have a release date. I'm sure it will come out faster if we provide them with detailed information about our problems.

Let's hope it comes out soon!

That shit had better be a free update, too. If I have to pay for an update for my $1000 unit because the manufacturer made some mistakes, I'm gonna be pretty salty.

Just recieved this e-mail from Al & Ed's who are giving us the discount on the F90BT.

To Our AVICF90BT Customers:

We just got out of a meeting with Pioneer. They informed us that they are aware of some of the issues that have surfaced with the AVICF90BT and are working on a solution. Unfortunately, this happens sometimes when a whole new product platform is introduced. They will not ship the new units out until they are updated. We should get a new ship date from Pioneer by Friday. We will update you as soon as we here from Pioneer.

If you recently received an AVIC90BT from us we will either send you a software update to fix the issues or exchange the unit, depending on what Pioneer finds. If we need to do an exchange, it will need to be done within 30 days of the date of purchase. Since you have time before we get close to the 30 Day mark, keep using your unit until you here from us.

If you do not want to wait for an updated unit, keep in mind that any AVIC90BT's that you may see floating around out there are the original units, not the newer, updated units, so they will have issues. Some of the dealers out there with the AVIC90BT in stock are unauthorized dealers. If you purchase from an unauthorized Pioneer dealer, you will not be able to get the updated software or an exchange unit from Pioneer if that what it takes to fix the issues.

We will be contacting you again soon.

Thank you for your patience.

Does this apply to all the units (700bt and 900bt)? Also, since people only have 30 days within purchase date to exchange it, can we assume they'll be fixing the units within this month?

I ordered an F90BT about a week ago. Today I received the same e-mail aa above regarding the status of my order.

Hmm, the Kenwood 8120 seems like a better choice everyday.

Does the voice command really as advertised (for those who got it working somewhat)?

The idea of find a song at the command of my voice sounds so enticing. At 15k, songs takes a while to find by tapping at 70 miles an hour. That alone would make it worth it.

I dont care...i want my unit already...send me the link to download the update later

I too recieved the email from Al-Eds. Its been hard to wait for the unit to come in each day and then you recieve and email that you will have to wait longer lol. Hope they get it fixed quick. Also does anyone think they might do an update to allow for voice input of routes and locations in the navigation while they are doing the updates?? That would be a great added feature, and to me it would be as easy as cataloging the names from an ipod or phone, however i guess there might be memory problems, dont know, im not a specialist lol.

I too recieved the email from Al-Eds. Its been hard to wait for the unit to come in each day and then you recieve and email that you will have to wait longer lol. Hope they get it fixed quick. Also does anyone think they might do an update to allow for voice input of routes and locations in the navigation while they are doing the updates?? That would be a great added feature, and to me it would be as easy as cataloging the names from an ipod or phone, however i guess there might be memory problems, dont know, im not a specialist lol.

If so, it won't be part of THIS update... this will most likely cover all the things that are broken or buggy, and not add new features that weren't there to begin with.

Just recieved this e-mail from Al & Ed's who are giving us the discount on the F90BT.

 

To Our AVICF90BT Customers:

 

 

 

We just got out of a meeting with Pioneer. They informed us that they are aware of some of the issues that have surfaced with the AVICF90BT and are working on a solution. Unfortunately, this happens sometimes when a whole new product platform is introduced. They will not ship the new units out until they are updated. We should get a new ship date from Pioneer by Friday. We will update you as soon as we here from Pioneer.

 

 

 

If you recently received an AVIC90BT from us we will either send you a software update to fix the issues or exchange the unit, depending on what Pioneer finds. If we need to do an exchange, it will need to be done within 30 days of the date of purchase. Since you have time before we get close to the 30 Day mark, keep using your unit until you here from us.

 

 

 

If you do not want to wait for an updated unit, keep in mind that any AVIC90BT's that you may see floating around out there are the original units, not the newer, updated units, so they will have issues. Some of the dealers out there with the AVIC90BT in stock are unauthorized dealers. If you purchase from an unauthorized Pioneer dealer, you will not be able to get the updated software or an exchange unit from Pioneer if that what it takes to fix the issues.

 

 

 

We will be contacting you again soon.

 

 

 

Thank you for your patience.

Not that I have any reason to doubt Al & Ed's, but has anyone gotten any official word from Pioneer on this?

Not sure, but I doubt Al & Ed's would send an email stating that out to all the customers who bout the F90 from them unless it was true.

Not sure, but I doubt Al & Ed's would send an email stating that out to all the customers who bout the F90 from them unless it was true.

True, this just gets me super excited because I am just about ready to order mine and I really really hope this is actually happening.

True, this just gets me super excited because I am just about ready to order mine and I really really hope this is actually happening.

You really hope what is happening? If your talking about the patch, I already posted the info about that (which came DIRECTLY from Pioneer).

Again, there is no RECALL (and there wont be unless the Hardware is the problem). Just an update which they are currently working on. They dont want to send out more units with these problems and ruin the name of the F series.

Al-Eds is supposed to have a ETA of the next shipments sometime on Friday...Lets hope that actually happens and that it's correct