Or just sell your unit and buy something "better". Problem solved.

Will you cover the 600 or so dollars I will lose by selling it?

If so then no problem!

I agree with Tacomaboy, In then end it is more the priciple than the money that counts. Pioneer definitely will think twice in the future before launching an unfinished product. And yes, no one forced me to buy it, only thing is that I didn't get the decvice I thought I was buying and I would never have bought it if I was informed of the bug and problems.

 

In the end us, customers, will gain a lot from it. At least than you can expect a product to - more or less - meet the commercials. Producers will always go one step further if we don't react. WHERE WILL IT END???

Bingo.

I would like to add a second analogy to this thread that I believe hits the nail on the head.

For all of you that believe that second best or quirky bugs are O.K. ask yourself this question.

If you bought a brand new car that cost you $45,000.00 and this Pioneer head unit was installed as a factory add on, would you still except the substandard operation of the product? I doubt it. You would be the first people in line at the service department within days of buying the car.

Want to know why most nav. systems in new cars work flawlessly? Because the car manufactures would not accept second best and in a push comes to shove situation with a supplier they would not hesitate to sue them, and/or withhold payment.

How fast would Pioneer get there act together if you were allowed to test drive the unit for 90 days before you had to actually pay for it?

As a manufacture and service company, we don’t accept second best from our suppliers. Every piece of raw material we get for a project is inspected. If it does not meet our requirements it’s sent back. Why? Because if we use it we risk failure in the finished work that could amount to millions of dollars in damages.

The issue for a lot of you that are disappointed with the product is not just the money you spent. Yes $500.00 - $750.00 for something that should work out of the box is a lot of money. It’s the fact that you have to remove the item from your dash, (time and possibly money) find a replacement, (more time and money).

Like I said earlier if this product was attached to a more expensive purchase 99% of you that currently except the product for what it is would be demanding satisfaction. The problem is your just willing to except second best.

At least than you can expect a product to - more or less - meet the commercials. Producers will always go one step further if we don't react. WHERE WILL IT END???

With all due respect, commercials never match up, and never have. When's the last time a beer commercial worked out they way it was shown? Will an alarm system really save your home? Shoes make you run faster? Perfume get you laid? I remember not long back that Cingular had a billboard that said "Fewest dropped calls." If that doesn't tell you they are in a "who sucks less" industry nothing does.

All companies exaggerate ads. You'll never get past a judge showing them a youtube video with sparks coming off the radio showing what a great night the guy had with his new F90BT and have him think you were expecting the same.

All I can say is WOW! Americans sure love to sue. I love my f90 and have encountered no problems yet. I guess I'll have to read more to find them. No one forced you to buy it. Move on with your life. Go buy another brand and you'll go through the same thing I'm sure. Some people can't be pleased.

Yup, I don't understand them either, I'm with you 100% caveman!

 

To Dianebrat:

why are you taking these threads THIS personal?? snippage

 

Dear Diane, breath in deeply, breaath out fully, count to ten slowly, relax and don't feel offended this quickly in life, you will be much happier.

Honestly dude? I'm not the one running around and crying about the unit, I enjoy it, and I'm perfectly relaxed, and I enjoy helping people here, unlike you, who just comes in and bitches about how bad it is, you're part of the problem, not the solution.

The fact that you even think a lawsuit would get you anything cracks me up..and yup, you do annoy me.. especially when in the last thread you so nicely just brushed me off since from your view, my opinions were not as valid as yours.. and yup, I pay attention when people do that.

If you bought a brand new car that cost you $45,000.00 and this Pioneer head unit was installed as a factory add on, would you still except the substandard operation of the product? I doubt it. You would be the first people in line at the service department within days of buying the car.

My wife has a Infiniti 07 FX35 Sport with factory Nav. Car had a MSRP of ~45K. We bought it used.

The rear-view camera is instant. No delay, no waiting - as fast as you can start the car and put it in reverse, you have a picture. It also has lines on the screen for distance and the width of the car, showing you exactly where the vehicle is going. This is perfect. Love it. Want it.

The bluetooth integration sucks, and you have to add contacts *verbally*, one at a time. No uploading. No onscreen. It's a giant pain in the ass. "Would you like to add a user?" Yes. "Please speak their phone number" 555-1212. "You said 555-1212, is that correct?" Yes. On and on, each contact. Also there is no onscreen dialing, no touchscreen.

The Nav is also difficult. POI's are difficult to navigate, addresses you must fully type using a controller to scroll back/forth to each letter since no touchscreen. Going from 2D to 3D takes 5-6 presses through settings. It does have north-up, and the action onscreen is smoother than the pioneer, and I think the maps look better in 2D. No traffic options though. And if you want to hack it so you can do things while driving, you just lost your warranty on a 45K car, not a $700 radio.

XM is channel up/down only, plus presets. Nothing like what we have.

Want IPOD integration? Add about $300 to the dealer. Flexibility is nothing like ours, and definitely no voice dialing.

Is the Infiniti buggy? No. No, I guess it isn't. No bugs that I've found so I can't take it back to the dealer. It just SUCKS. Minimal features, high reliability. It has nowhere near the capability of these Pioneer units. Even with the (minor) bugs, these are 1000 times better. It's not even CLOSE.

snip

If you bought a brand new car that cost you $45,000.00 and this Pioneer head unit was installed as a factory add on, would you still except the substandard operation of the product? I doubt it. You would be the first people in line at the service department within days of buying the car.

 

Want to know why most nav. systems in new cars work flawlessly? Because the car manufactures would not accept second best and in a push comes to shove situation with a supplier they would not hesitate to sue them, and/or withhold payment. snip

One model of car, one radio. Unlike Pioneer who is making one radio for over 5000 different makes, models, years, thousands of cellphones, with different bluetooth stacks. Too many variables to predict how it will react. Of course the auto manufacturer can make a product work, they have a more controlled scenario.

And then include Microsoft Windows....yikes.

Even a class action will not change anything. The only grounds that those inetrested have is that the unit does not work the way it was intended. Pioneer's grounds are They already released 2 updates to fix the bugs and a huge majority of the customers are satisfied. If this happened when it first released then you would have a much much better case but it's at a point now where only a small amount of F series owners are still unsatisfied, and Pioneer can not make every single customer happy. Also keep in mind that Pioneer is not a small family owned business that cares about their customers. They don't care. They sold many of them and sent out 2 updates to appease the vast majority. Even if a class action suit went through, they'd probably just release another update and continue to work on their new prototypes.

I am confused to some degree. I have a F900BT and it works great. The backup camera has a small delay but by the time I have my seatbelt on the camera is on. It is a computer and requires some boot time and this seems to be the root of the complaints. To expect any system to work with every Bluetooth device out there is being unrealistic.

As I said what is the problem with this unit?

Funny, while I was reading whoopidoo2's post I felt I just HAD to chime in.

I also own an Infiniti - a 2003 G35. And the ENTIRE, complete, total reason I purchased the F90 in the first place is because some f*ckstick engineer thought it would be a greeeaaat idea to put both the climate controls AND the radio electronics on the SAME circuit board. I have no idea how much they saved using that little stunt, but after about 4year, my circuit board (oh, along with a few THOUSAND other owners) simply fried out, negating the use of A.) my CD player, B.) climate controls and C.) drained my battery in about 24 hours.

Can I sue Infiniti because of this "excellent, fail-safe engineering" - uh, no. Now, out of warranty. Too bad, so sad, please leave now.

Before anyone sits there and tells me how "Want to know why most nav. systems in new cars work flawlessly? Because the car manufactures would not accept second best and in a push comes to shove situation with a supplier they would not hesitate to sue them, and/or withhold payment."

they might want to try and get a nickel out of Infiniti, because I've tried - and it ain't happening!

Thus far my $700 Pioneer unit seems like a good deal in comparison!

This is great! Comparing a factory unit with an aftermarket radio. First of all, Pioneer makes OEM radios for cars. My 2005 Ford Sportrac had a Pioneer labeled CD player in it as factory equipment. Sticker price $1500 extra. Worked great, played CDs and AM/FM. My F700 does a lot more than that for half the price. And by the way, what did the factory nav unit in that $45K car cost? I'll bet it wasn't $500-750.

Second point: I did a lot of research before I bought. Read the threads here (thanks AVIC411 and all of you who makes positive contributions to this site) about Pioneer as well as with the competition brands. Read the customer's comments at sites like Amazon and Crutchfield. I went to the brick and mortar places and played with the buttons, screen, and features. I knew what I was buying, how much I was investing, and how much value I should expect for my money. If you spent that much money without checking it out before you bought, I guess you'd also be apt to sue someone because you didn't get what you thought you should have.

wow, i just bought one yesterday.......is it an oops situation or am i ok...jeesh. If i would have read this maybe i would have just bought the z3.

wow, i just bought one yesterday.......is it an oops situation or am i ok...jeesh. If i would have read this maybe i would have just bought the z3.

You should be fine. I am reading all of this and i will buy an F90BT as soon as temperature here in PA goes above freezing. I will be doing the install myself in my G35x so i want it to be warm out, and well this will give some time for price drop.

About the law suit.

Yes i am a firm believer that we the consumer should be heard on matters as such and we have the right to sue pioneer. If they are delivering a bad product and charging so much then yeah go ahead and sue them.

However i have another points. Yes this unit is not quite to spec, but what unit have you seen on the market that has this many features.

GPS, BT, Ipod controll, Voice command, Video play back, blah blah blah. I have not done much research but such as this units you mostly see on high end cars. Again i wont go into details cuz i do not know much on other units out there but this units have lots of features and yes they will be prone to an occasional freeze. Working as a system's integrator i know for a fact that some times some things need to be paid less attention to. Yes they could have released the perfect 900BT with no bugs, but who is going to pay for all the testing? the customer. There is a point of diminishing returns. Once you build something so good that the price starts to increase so much, it will not sell as much, and well, we are in business to sell. This is the hard truth and we see it everyday. Microsoft being one of the big ones, car manufactures etc. As a customer we have the right to say, hey, i am not going to buy that unit, ill go with this other brand. AND THAT IS IT. Now this brings me to my second point.

If you want to sue Pioneer, then go right ahead. You could win, anything is possible. But watch the movie "Flash of Genius." I know that it is a movie blah blah blah, but it outlines a wonderful reality. You can win against a big company but it wont be easy. The company has billions of dollars and they even have lawyers hired full time, that will stop taking lunch break if they have to in order to break your balls. You will be going at it by yourself. It will take time, and money. Is that something you want to do? Are you willing to dedicate a good portion of your life for that? Because as soon as you start causing pioneer trouble they will say, look here is $2000.00 now shut up and they wont change a thing. If you take the money, then OK good, but they will still continue to do as they do now.

In my opinion, if you have a bad experience with them, then report them to the BAD BUSINESS BUREAU and that will be good enough. If you want to sue, then good luck.

I can not believe i registered at this forum because i wanted to talk in this post, hahah, i guess ill do research on the F90BT now.

I DID NOT INTEND TO OFFEND ANYONE AND IF I DID, I APOLOGIZE FOR THAT. I AM JUST GIVING MY OPINION ON THE MATTER.

NICE TO MEET EVERYONE

You should be fine. I am reading all of this and i will buy an F90BT as soon as temperature here in PA goes above freezing. I will be doing the install myself in my G35x so i want it to be warm out, and well this will give some time for price drop.

 

 

If you want to sue Pioneer, then go right ahead. You could win, anything is possible. But watch the movie "Flash of Genius." I know that it is a movie blah blah blah, but it outlines a wonderful reality. You can win against a big company but it wont be easy.

 

 

In my opinion, if you have a bad experience with them, then report them to the BAD BUSINESS BUREAU and that will be good enough. If you want to sue, then good luck.

 

I can not believe i registered at this forum because i wanted to talk in this post, hahah, i guess ill do research on the F90BT now.

 

I DID NOT INTEND TO OFFEND ANYONE AND IF I DID, I APOLOGIZE FOR THAT. I AM JUST GIVING MY OPINION ON THE MATTER.

 

NICE TO MEET EVERYONE

juan3268, I'm glad you joined to post, I think you'll find this is a very helpful forum filled with a ton of tips, tricks, and solutions.

You're going to enjoy the F90BT, I love my F700BT even with it's warts, it's so much better then my last JVC.

I loved your reference to Flash of Genius, it's a great movie, and a heartbreaker with how much they destroyed his life and his fight to get what he deserved, that's a case where a lawsuit WAS the right answer, and it's shame it took so long to get it resolved.

Diane

Trust me, if you had bought the Kenwood you would be disappointed in it too and wishing you'd bought the Pioneer. I have the DNX6140 in another car and like the F900 much more. And did you really beleive the commercial??? Come on, that's crazy. If I'm spending hundreds of dollars I'm not going to trust the manufacturer, I'm going to read reviews and surf forums. I did and I'm happy. Back to the Kenwood, it's a good unit too, don't get me wrong. I just prefer the Pioneer much more. It works better for my application and better with my iPod and iPhone than the Kenwood. I will say the microphone is better (in my case anyway) on the Kenwood and the matte finish blends in better (in my opinion) than the glossy finish on the Pioneer.

I'm going to have to find this commercial....Did it show the unit dispensing $100 bill or something? I've used mine enough now to feel confident that i have tried almost everything i need. Bluetooth Perfect. Gps Perfect. Contacts auto entered, sweet! Sat radio Yup! Save favorite songs handy! iPhone connect great. iPhone for music, plays better than sat. Radio. Voice commands, still learning but the ones I need I got down. What am I missing....Nothing! Got home from a roadtrip last night. I was talking on the phone. Gps was telling me where to go. And sat radio would popup anytime a saved song was coming on the radio....I'm all good. Good luck with your lawsuit. If Pioneer needs someone to testify I'm in. If it matters I have an f90.

Did it show the unit dispensing $100 bill or something?

No, just 3d Screen data flying 2 feet off the screen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1Sgdgv6Q2A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9A9MFyonmM

Now that is a feature I would pay extra for!! Until of course it distracted me while driving, which would make me crash my car, and give me yet another stupid reason to sue

No, just 3d Screen data flying 2 feet off the screen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1Sgdgv6Q2A

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9A9MFyonmM

Hi all!!

Just got a refund from my dealer today. And got a clarion MAX983HD installed. Now THAT'S a good navigation system. Startup almost instant. Much more user-friendly. Even more functionalities. And I haven't found one single bug (yet ), where I had found many the first day on my Pioneer.

Sorry to all persons that are frustrated with their Pioneer device. Thanks for your support. I sincerely hope you can find a decent arrangement with your dealer too.

To all the others that are happy, pretend to be happy or force themselves to be happy, good luck with your f-series.

And last but not least to my dear Diane. Count to ten slowly again and say: 'I should not feel offend this quickly'. I never felt offend myself, even though some people write in a rather direct way, and I never intended to offend anyone either, nor did my quality of life go down because of the purchase of the f-series, I'm just being honest with myself, try to have eye for detail and stand up for my rights, and this all while having fun. That's all.

This said, I have to say this is a great forum with lots of interesting visitors. And I have visited it with great interest every single time. Keep up the good work!!! Hope I can find a similar one for my Clarion. However I doubt it. That, I guess, is the negative side of a device that is working well...

So in a month will you be on the Clarion website wanting someone to help you sue them and saying how good the Pioneer was?

Hi all!!

 

Just got a refund from my dealer today. And got a clarion MAX983HD installed. Now THAT'S a good navigation system. Startup almost instant. Much more user-friendly. Even more functionalities. And I haven't found one single bug (yet ), where I had found many the first day on my Pioneer.

 

Sorry to all persons that are frustrated with their Pioneer device. Thanks for your support. I sincerely hope you can find a decent arrangement with your dealer too.

 

To all the others that are happy, pretend to be happy or force themselves to be happy, good luck with your f-series.

 

And last but not least to my dear Diane. Count to ten slowly again and say: 'I should not feel offend this quickly'. I never felt offend myself, even though some people write in a rather direct way, and I never intended to offend anyone either, nor did my quality of life go down because of the purchase of the f-series, I'm just being honest with myself, try to have eye for detail and stand up for my rights, and this all while having fun. That's all.

 

This said, I have to say this is a great forum with lots of interesting visitors. And I have visited it with great interest every single time. Keep up the good work!!! Hope I can find a similar one for my Clarion. However I doubt it. That, I guess, is the negative side of a device that is working well...

I miss him already. PLEASE COME BACK TO US!!!!

Hi all!!

 

Just got a refund from my dealer today. And got a clarion MAX983HD installed. Now THAT'S a good navigation system.

 

And last but not least to my dear Diane. Count to ten slowly again and say: 'I should not feel offend this quickly'. I never felt offend myself, even though some people write in a rather direct way, and I never intended to offend anyone either, nor did my quality of life go down because of the purchase of the f-series, I'm just being honest with myself, try to have eye for detail and stand up for my rights, and this all while having fun. That's all.

Enjoy the Clarion, and don't let the door hit you on the way out...

My 2008 Subaru Impreza was totaled 3 weeks ago. In it I had the factory nav system, and it was absolutely flawless. It was booted up, routing you, phone connected and playing audio in less than 10 seconds of turning on the car. Routing was accurate atleast 90% of the time, Bluetooth worked perfectly, had wonderful graphics, could set it to point in the direction you're driving or north, hacking it for nav/dvd while in motion was simple. I never tried the ipod connection and never added a backup camera to it but based on the rest of the system, I bet those would work great as well. The system was manufactured by Clarion. The only problem with the factory nav was that it was only available as a $2000 add-on to the $2500 premium package which I opted not not to get this time around.

I replaced the 2008 Impreza with a 2009 Impreza and instead of getting the $4500 premium w/ nav, I decided to install speakers, heated seats and nav myself. This was largely based on a non-premium being available that day versus waiting 2 months to order a premium in my color and options and insurance refusing to pay for my rental for longer than 3 days after the totaled verdict on my car.

I did some research between the kenwood 5120 and the pioneer 900bt. Ultimately I ended up with a 700bt for only $450 shipped as the price and options were great. I had seen several complaints prior to the 2.0 update, and was under the impression that 2.0 made it a decent system. Man was I wrong. I couldn't be any more unhappy with my purchase. This system is a total flop, and I think the only people that think it has improved are those that used it prior to 2.0 and saw the major improvements made. Fact is, 2.0 or not, this thing is crap, plain and simple.

$450 is not a lot to spend for a working nav, but this thing doesn't. I bet I would have been much happier with a $200 portable garmin. If there was a class action suit filed, I would be signing it for sure. Not to get my money back but to put the pressure on pioneer, make them loose some stock and warn future buyers.

The F-series is not the only one with flaws. Today, my mother-in-law asked me to update her z2 with the latest firmware. I played with the unit for a bit and it was just as bad as the f-series. She had nothing good to say of it either. To top it off, the system would not recognized the update on the cd-r and update. I burned 2 cds following pioneers directions to the t.

I own or have owned tons of pioneer a/v equipment (car audio systems, cd players, crt's, plasmas, a/v receivers), but after my experiences with the f700bt and z2 I will never consider another nav from them, and I will definitely be eary of any other car audio or home a/v equipment by them.

I have had my F90-BT installed for about a month and I have read many of the posts before and after I had my Navi installed.

I do think that the suggestion of a class-action lawsuit against Pioneer is a bit premature. But I also feel that ALL of us should hold their "Feet To The Fire" by giving them ALL of the feedback from our individual experiences.

It would be nice if one of us would contact upper management at the Pioneer AVIC Tech Support Department and request a one place point of contact that could be posted on AVIC411...a place where ALL of our issues would funnel to the same person/place at Pioneer with hopes that they care enough to resolve most of the key and common problems. Also offering Pioneer a place on AVIC411 to keep ALL of us informed on what they are doing to take care of these issues and thier timeline.

It's interesting to read the spectrum of consumers posting here...from the most passive that are willing to put up with the many flaws in the product to the extreme of starting a lawsuit, as well as everyone in-between.

I have been in business for over 27 years selling name brand telephone systems. My experience has been that the better, higher quality manufacturers do spend a lot of money on quality control of their products. Once in awhile even the best companies release a product that isn't quite perfected, but usually do correct the "bugs" when they are brought to their attention.

We all have to step back and realize that there is a lot of technology built into a Navi System like the AVIC Units...and these are not just Navigation Systems, but also AM-FM-Ipod-CD/DVD Players, Bluetooth and more. There's also compatibility issues that need to be accounted for.

I want to make it clear that I am not in any way defending Pioneer and I am not very happy about the imperfections and quirky-ness of my F90-BT Unit. It is very frustrating with the rediculousy slow boot-up time, the touch-pad not working perfect, the Bluetooth issues and all of the other issues that WE are experiencing.

I'm hoping WE can ALL work WITH Pioneer in making the AVIC Units the very best products of their type in the industry. Let's see if WE can work Together!!