I have a F-90BT on the way. Had a Kenwood 6140 in my hands and sent it back because this one looked and was advertised as better unit. After reading problem after problem I am thinking I made a huge mistake. Is anyone able to use this without lots of extra work? I passed up the factory Toyota nav in a new RAV4 for this system.

Just looking for some honest observations before I jump into install next week.

Thanks,

121redleg

Count me as very unhappy with the F90BT.

I am about to purchase one - what do you guys dislike about?

I think you will find that most people who are happy with whatever object/item they own will not bother to join a forum to extoll its virtues.

I also think that most people on this forum seem relatively pleased with their respective F-Series Avics (mines a 500), and the majority of what I read here involves mods and hacks that people want to incorporate to improve/personalise their units: little of what I have seen relates to owners being totally miffed with what they purchased. But in saying that, I also believe Pioneer could have done a much better job before seemingly rushing them out, but then we wouldn't be having as much fun staying up all night doing all these mods/hacks

I am very happy with mine, and waiting in hope for Pioneer to enable us to use iGO v8.3

Personally, I am not happy with the number of issues with the unit (if I wrote code like that, I'd get fired here...) but for what I want a head unit to do, of the ones currently available it was and still is the best... It's all about the trade-offs.

I am very happy with mine, in my opinion the only legitimate gripes people should have is the forced north up 2d, and the so-so bluetooth. I'm lucky and the bluetooth has been working perfectly, and I use mostly 3d for nav. Even when I'm in 2d it doesn't really bother me, but I can certainly understand why it bothers some people. Then again I didn't pay retail, if I had I think I'd be more upset with it's performance as a $1200 unit vs a $650.

All I wanted from mine is to have a decent iPod control and navigation. Both of those work just fine so I am happy.

I will never use bluetooth, SD playback, XM etc... so I got what I wanted.

Kind of along the lines of what S4 says here - it depends on what you purchased the unit for.

Again, like S4, my main needs were voice control for the iPod and Bluetooth connectivity for my phone. Both work nearly flawlessly. The fact that it also has Nav, HD radio, XM radio, DVD player, etc. is all a bonus to me.

As a former Rav4 owner, you are going to be far more disapointed with the engine in that vehicle than ANY headunit you could purchase!

Hope you don't plan on passing many people up! One of the most underpowered vehicles ever produced.

Cheers,

Kev

Count me as very happy with my F700BT

So far, not a single issue. GPS works great, IPhone control is excellent.

Tranfserred contacts, no problem

AM reception, is OK, FM is great

CD is great

Bootup time is about 20 seconds

I heard people complaining about the voice control, but so far this one has been perfect, especially on IPod. It will actually understand "play album Billboard hot 100 singles of 1998". so far, almost NO misinterpretations - bulletproof.

I have had a F90BT for around the past 2 weeks. I had it professionally installed and the unit has worked pretty good.

It seemed to have settled down after several days of use and has been working very well.

Does it have bugs, sure if you look hard enough most electronic items do have issues. This series of nav units have a above average of bugs and most of them can be fixed via software updates.

Did Pioneer rush this unit to market ? Yes, but they continue to work on issue with software updates.

The F90BT has many functions and options and unless you read the manual and play around on the various screens it can be frustrating.

But overall I would buy it again.

I am overall very happy with my F90BT and have had it about a month. Ipod controls work great, voice control works pretty good if you speak slow and clearly, and the bluetooth works great for me with a nextel i870 phone. I have installed a bunch of hacks/mods that improved it a lot though.

I had one problem sofar where the navigation stopped working after watching a movie while driving. I had to pull over and turn the car off and on to reset it. Why is there no power off button on the unit?

OK, thanks for all the input. I am excited to get the system. I guess I'll be back in a few days to start figuring out he hacks and mods! I am getting the steering wheel control and HD with it too, I wish there was a way to keep my voice button on the steering wheeel functional.

So far, not a single issue. GPS works great, IPhone control is excellent.

 

Tranfserred contacts, no problem

 

AM reception, is OK, FM is great

 

CD is great

 

Bootup time is about 20 seconds

 

I heard people complaining about the voice control, but so far this one has been perfect, especially on IPod. It will actually understand "play album Billboard hot 100 singles of 1998". so far, almost NO misinterpretations - bulletproof.

Sometimes I suspect, pioneer is contributing to this forum.

im not getting quite that accurate voice control. but i do love mine. I have an RSX w/ the bose factory in it. Pulled that out and put in the f90bt and love it. Is it slow? yes.. could there be more options? yes ... did i get exactly what i paid for and expected? YES !

I have F90BT installed in my 08 Element SC and it for the most part works, does it work great? It depends. For example the boot-up time is can be slow sometime depending on what you left it on meaning if you left on your iPod loaded with 4k+ songs on it, then you are going to wait for the system. Don't get me wrong it starts playing music in about 20 sec but the rest of the system is still loading. Sometimes I put it in reverse and the backup camera doesn't come on until I have already put it into drive, but I stress sometimes. The bluetooth works pretty good with my BB Curve and my iPhone 3G and contacts work pretty good. iPod also works pretty good as well as well as my HD radio. Right now my biggest complaint is I have hissing when playing CD's and my iPod, and yes everything is properly grounded. I even installed ground idolaters and noise filters. Of course I can't hear it when I am driving but when I am parked or at a red light I can hear. You can even hear it more when you select a different source. I took it back to the Al & Eds where I bought it and tried a different one it made more noise so I keeps this one. Other than these issues I think it is a good head unit.

I'm very happy with my unit (F700BT)! It is not perfect, but I consider it a GREAT value.

I primarily use it for:

1) Ipod control

2) Bluetooth

3) Navigation

4) everything else.... (SD, CD, etc.)

My expectations were the same as that of a new computer. (It is a Windows computer after all.)

I had both the F700BT and the F900BT and they both sucked. I switched back to my AVIC-D3

I moved to the F900 after using the D3 for more than a year. There isn't a single day that goes by that I don't miss my D3. Not that the D3 was perfect, it was far from it, but comparing the two is just a joke.

The F900 takes forever to bootup, lacks the staging features, the bluetooth absolutely sucks compared to just about every other unit or handsfree kit on the market, and is riddled with bugs. (see....always switches to Nav after a phone call for instance)

I view it as the typical windows based product. It sorta does what you want, but to get it to do anything well you have to modify it yourself. And I view firmware 2.0 as beta .9, they still have a long way to go before its ready for prime time. Too bad Pioneer doesn't see it that way.

Like many of the F series owners here, I purchased my 700 within the first month of it being released. I owned a Z1->Z3 prior.

First Impressions: The unit looks great, the iPod is much faster than the Z series, the bluetooth works great. I love the variable key colors and the GPS looks nice, but the bootup is horrible and the response time is sluggish. Also the iPod connection failed at least once a day. 4/5 Stars

After the 1.0 update: Not much of a difference, but it does work for the things I use it for, so no complaints. This is also where the hacking started, and made me love the unit. 5/5 Stars

After the 2.0 update: Noticed a better boot time, but the response time is still bad. I don't like pressing a button 3 times to get it to work. iPod no longer fails however. 4/5 Stars

Sold 700, purchased 90: Biggest mistake of my life. I bought it for the High volt preouts and msn direct (I don't care about the DVD player) and the MSN direct is horrible. Gas prices doesnt show a station within 18 miles, the 3 movie theaters I go to don't show up, 75% of the time I can't get a weather forecast, and the traffic info only gives info in the brooklyn queens area. Also I had to make a train and the GPS told me to make a left onto a right turn only road, with a divider in the middle. WTF, it took me 3 miles out of the way because it couldn't give proper instruction. I don't have any mods done so I'm using a basic F90 POS. I'll be selling it as soon as the DNX 9140 is released. 2/5 Stars.

If you are reading this and have not yet ordered the F Series, I suggest you at least wait until the 3.0 update and/or the Kenwood DNX 9140 releases. See what else is out there and read reviews until your eyes hurt.

Being that I am awaiting delivery of a 90bt. Is there a 3.0 update absolutely in the works? If you disregarded your problems with MSN direct (which I am not going to use anyhow), how would you rate this product out of 5 stars? the main reason I am staying with Pioneer is that I already have Pioneer XM peripherals and am comfortable with the Pioneer line.

Not happy at all. Unit locked again after a call this morning - it does it at least once a day. I counted 54 seconds this time.

Had mine in for about 3 days now and so far I love the thing. Only complaint I can find with it is that it won't maintain my XM presets (although it keeps the FM/AM/Navi ones) but I am guessing that is an issue I will have to deal with at some point but right now I just listen to about 3 XM stations so they are easy to just punch in. RTFM is definetly in the works for this weekend.

Bluetooth - Synched with my sch-i760 and pulled my contacts over with no issues at all. Has never dropped a call (and I spend a LOT of time on the road and on the phone)

IPOD - Couldn't tell you I don't own one.. Works fine with my zune however

MSN Direct - With one minor exception even this has worked like a champ. Was strange but yesterday it showed me the nearest gas station as being 280 miles away (although the 2nd one down was less than a mile)

Boot up time - Could be better but it isn't earth shatteringly slow

Had mine in for about 3 days now and so far I love the thing. Only complaint I can find with it is that it won't maintain my XM presets (although it keeps the FM/AM/Navi ones) but I am guessing that is an issue I will have to deal with at some point but right now I just listen to about 3 XM stations so they are easy to just punch in. RTFM is definetly in the works for this weekend.

The XM tuner needs to be connected to "constant power". However I installed my 700 last Sunday, and my '03 GTI wouldn't start this morning...first electrical problem since I bought the car. I may change to "switched" power after replacing battery.

I am very happy with my F900BT, I was brave and purchased a Refurb for 499.00 from Amazon (was upset as I noticed after I paid that a new one was 569.00 from Amazon directly) but ohh well. installed it last Saturday (took me about 4 hours give or take) installed GPS ANT on top of the unit under the air vents, MIC is above rear view, Sirius is on-top of the roof in the rear. iPhone control is hooked up, VSS is hooked up correctly. The unit works almost perfectly, (I tested the unit by driving 50 files) the only gripe I have is the VR unit. Don't get me wrong it works beautifully but there is something I am missing when dialing contacts by name such as "call Melissa Blake" it doesn't recognize it (probably because i have my phone set to a weird format) it works perfectly on all other voice commands just not dial by name. I am still trying to work this kink out.

After spending a month looking up info on different Nav/DVD head units I came to the conclusion that this is the one I really wanted at this time. All of my expectations were fully met and I am very excited about this unit. I am sure I am missing something with the dial by name VR function to work correctly. Dial by number works wonderful so the unit understands me perfectly. when I say "Call 407-222-2333" and I even say it slow or fast it understands me and dials.

I have to add that MSN Direct is a cool feature too. The road hazards/construction and traffic accidents/Jams integrate beautifully with the NAV unit. re-routing on the fly works great. MSN direct is worth the price its not expensive. will buy the 129.00 option so I dont have to pay anymore ever.

Its a shame not to use the MSN direct (if avail) it gives it that little extra to the nav.

Very happy with it.

AVIC-F900BT

2003 Honda Civic Si HB

iPhone 3G 2.00

Central Florida