Hi all. I wanted to share my experience on my 2000 mile roundtrip from Missouri to Texas with my week old F90bt. Many have expressed curiosity or apprehension on the subject of purchasing the unit. Feelings I had when deciding to buy mine, so I thought I would describe my experience to maybe help others make a decision.

I would say that patience is the key for using this unit. Many have talked about the slow, but improved boot time and it is slow. It takes about 5-10 seconds for the radio to come on at engine start. Probably 40-50 seconds more for boot to warning screen. Just guessing, but about another 30 or less to pair with my phone. Bottom line is the slow boot does not bother me. Relax and enjoy the ride. It is best to let it boot fully as the soft button and overall unit response is much better by doing so.

My only other experience with a nav unit is a cheap Tom Tom that I liked very much. The 90bt works fine as a nav unit with some deficiencies described in many other threads. The arrow seems to get confused at intersections where I stop as it kind of spins around seeking my direction. It oftens just places me on the intersecting road heading one way or the other. Samantha is quite chatty, giving turn directions ad naseum as you near the turn. That doesn't bother me much.

I did activate the trial MSN Direct for the trip as I was heading for Houston and then Ft. Worth. I live in a rural area, so would not get much use from it normally. It worked fine. I used it for movie times (Wolverine) and weather (handy) mainly. I did play with gas prices some and traffic as there was a whole lot of construction going on in Houston. The construction info was accrurate as far as I could tell and routed me around problems. The one thing I was afraid of using was the re-routing for traffic congestion as I was afraid that it would be quicker just sitting in line then taking the re-routes and maybe getting in another traffic jam. Does anyone have any experience with this? I didn't pay much attention to gas prices and they change so quickly anymore I didn't feel it real relevant.

I also found that as my speed increased so did the discrepancy between the speedometer of the vehicle and the nav unit. Which is more accurate? Curious because I tend to push my luck and try to keep less that 10mph over the limit. I do have the VSS wire hooked up. At 70mph there was a difference of a couple miles per hour and at 75-80 there was probably around 4mph difference.

I'm sure I didn't use the full capability of the unit as I am just learning to use some of the more obscure features, but everything worked fine as long as I didn't rush it. BT worked great. I'm going to really enjoy that feature. SD card worked fine, but I did notice it cutting some songs off before they ended. I know there is a thread addressing that problem, so I will be looking at it. Had a TV tuner hooked up on AV1 with the cheapest Wal-Mart antenna and it picked up 20 channels in Houston. It would not pick up when moving, however.

I don't want to get to lengthy here, so overall I would say that I am happy with the purchase so far. Would I pay $1200 for it? NO! Do I think it is worth that? NO! If you can get it at a good price and can be patient it is a serviceable unit that will enable you to have a buttload of features without spending $1k. If you have any questions I can answer, please feel free to ask as I tried to keep this short.

P.S. The hardware bypass does work as advertised. If it doesn't work for you then you have not done it properly. Re-check your wiring. Also, whenever I had slow response or semi-freeze conditions on the unit, I just pushed the hard menu or map button and it seemed to free everything up.

Thanks for the report. I'm installing mine this weekend. FWIW, I had a 2007 BMW with factory nav/audio. It took a bit of time before the music would kick in at startup on that too, so your 5-10 seconds sounds on par. I understand that iPod sources may take longer to come up on the F90BT, and also depend on whether you have it set to re-index the titles each time. The BMW nag screen stayed up until you hit OK via the control wheel. It became second-nature to press that as soon as I had buckled my belt. The unit was pretty much in nav mode at that point, no additional booting.

Hey Steve, just to clarify, by fully booted I guess I mean by the time your phone pairs with the unit. I noticed that most of the hangs I had with the unit being non-responsive was if I tried too many button pushes as the phone pairing is ongoing. Once paired up I basically had no problems and the unit does let you know when the pairing is completed. I don't know about the iPod but the SD music, if I remember right, started playing about like the radio would if it was the last source. On DVDs I believe it started as quickly with the sound, but no video of course until you go through the warnings.

One of the things I would like to see and have not seen mentioned in any threads is some type of screen saver. The screen seems kind of boring if you don't need the nav up. Some may question the need for this....and I don't see it as a need, but even the cheaper single din units have some form of screen saver.

I also found that as my speed increased so did the discrepancy between the speedometer of the vehicle and the nav unit. Which is more accurate? Curious because I tend to push my luck and try to keep less that 10mph over the limit. I do have the VSS wire hooked up. At 70mph there was a difference of a couple miles per hour and at 75-80 there was probably around 4mph difference.

Generally, GPS will have more accurate speed indicator than a built-in speedo. Factory speedometers tend to overstate speed to some degree.