We've had 2 of the Z1's in our vehicles locking up on boot lately, has anyone else had any issues with this? One is in a Ford F-350 dually deisel, the other in a GMC Sierra 2500 4x4 Duramax. Both are installed with Ducatiboy's bypass, all proper modules and harnesses were used, they have been in for about 7-8 months and worked flawlessly until recently. They do seem to freak out more often after having recorded a new disc to the hard drive, and we originally thought it might be heat, seeing as we live in sunny South Florida and it was 90+ degrees out until about 2 weeks ago (eat it, Northerners--- just kidding)because the first time it happened, it straightened out after driving with the A/C on for a half hour. Help!!!!! These are demo vehicles, and customers don't like to hear, "But yours won't do this..."

If these are just demo vehicles, try a level 4 reset. Turn on when you see the boot screen, press and hold the map button. Then reset to factory defaults. Then see if it will boot again. If it's a demo vehicle, then it doesn't matter too much about the stored info (I would guess).

Well, these are our personal vehicles, we just bring customers out to demo the Z1 in them. This reset will empty the music database? I have a lot of music in there.

Well, level 3 will not delete the music. Do the same thing: boot, see boot screen, hold map. But hit reset instead of restore to factory. It won't kill your saved songs.

Thanx, I'll give it a shot. Have you heard of this happening to anyone else? It seems like the hard drive is getting stuck on boot, the Pioneer splash screen comes up and stays there. For an hour. Or more. Sucks.

I also have a Chev Duramax and have experienced the same problem.

I believe it is heat related. Just my opinion.

The first time it happened was on a hot afternoon after the vehicle sat in the sun all day. The only thing insulating the unit from the heat of the sun through the windshield is the thin plastic dashboard. I have since been making it a habit to install a windshield shade. The second time was after a long road trip, roughly 4 hours, stopped to get fuel and the damn thing wouldn't boot. The screen felt very warm. Next morning it booted without any problems.

I have not tried the level 3 and 4 resets, but if it happens again I will give it try.

I would like to purchase a fan, maybe some sort of PC fan, and place it behind the unit in the dash and see if that will help. Does anyone have any suggestions on what type of fan? Or even if that is a good Idea?

Yes, I think I have, but I don't remember whom it happened to and what the result was. I think a level 4 reset cleared it up. But I don't remember.

Mine started to freeze up on the boot screen and it got the point I could not even preform a reset. I ended up sending it to pioneer for repair. I doubt it was heat related in my case, because it has been very cold in Northern California lately. I should get it back from pioneer today, hopefully they will indicate what the problem was.

Sounds like the same issue I am having. These Z1's came from the first batch we recieved here, and we've installed about 50 or so since, seems like the problem is isolated to the first 3 we got. Keep me posted on this, mx, k?

Mine was a June 06 unit, I got it back from Pioneer on Fri. and everything seems to be fine. Unfortunately they did not include a work order or anything so I don't know exactly what the problem was...

Damn. Damn, damn, damn.

We swapped the unit, new one worked fine for about 15 minutes, then the buttons around the screen stopped responding. Can't get the disc out, can't change av/nav screens, volume or track from the face, just the remote and steering controls. Does anyone know if maybe the Z1 is susceptible to viruses carried in cell phones or mp3 files? It seemed fine until we paired a Nextel bt phone and recorded a couple tracks into the library, then backed up, the camera came on, and, no more control.

Anyone know about this? Ducatiboy?

Anyone know about this? Ducatiboy?

What viruses? I highly doubt it. It's not like this is an "open" system. Someone would have to know some real low level info on the operation of this machine and I don't know if you can transfer viruses just by pairing a phone anyway... you would need to be able to receive files from the phone over bluetooth and I don't think the Z1 can do that.

Sounds like a defective Z1 to me. Sucks that it was one you swapped out for.

OK, I can rule that out. I have installed about 40 Z1's so far, and have only sent back 2 for defects. (By the way, be careful how hard you press on the screen when holding the unit up to mount it. Whoops.) Now I have two in the same vehicle, one locks up completely, the other forgets it has buttons around the screen. Wierd.

I get the lock up on boot sometimes. It will boot, but sirius will still play (or any source it was on before)

What I have found is that it's heat dependent. When the unit gets too hot it won't boot (my vents run along top of it) I don't know if this would apply to your issue or not.

We've thought the same, because it seemed that it only happened if the truck was parked in the sun. Then it decided to never come off of it's boot screen, no matter how long it had to cool off. Maybe being locked like that so many times finally cooked something.

Ducatiboy was right the factory reset did work, because it worked for me. I would also say I had the same problem, pretty much the same as you described. I did the the factory reset level 4 which deleted everything, but it's worth it. It deleted all my music and all my settings, but it doesn't get hung up on the splash screen and starts as it did before. just my two cents.

heat could cause the hd, which is what is booting, to respond in such a way that you get this. see if moderate temps produce the same thing.

Check the wiring again? If you toss another unit in and that too bricks almost immediately, could be something more basic at fault. Also, if you're feeling a bit daring, put another and pair a different phone first. See how that runs, then try pairing that other phone which caused the last lock-up. If it locks, level 4 reset, call Pioneer, and toss that phone away.

The second unit didn't fail the same way the first did, so I don't think it is a vehicle or wiring issue. The only common factor was the phone that was paired. The new head seems like it lost connection to the hard keys on the face of the display. No volume, track selection, eject, etc., but all works fine from the remote. Unfortunately, I only was able to record 2 cd's into the HD before it locked up.