Hi everyone, I've just purchased the pioneer avic HD3-BT and just have a few questions:

1) I've been on a few long journeys to test out the gps, and the system works in terms of it produces a map with directions, but it never has me facing in the right direction down the road!? it therefore is of no help because it doesnt really understand where I am, and I receive very little voice guidance (and what it does tell me is wrong), as well as all the distances etc being wrong. I think its because the gps thinks Im facing in another direction. is there any ideas on how to sort this?

2) I've been through and personalised all my settings on the HU and then when I turn the engine off and come back to it, a lot of them seem to not have saved. this is especially the case with the radio stations where I save them as per the manual, but they then erase themselves. any ideas?

3) and also how do you make it so that the radio goes quiet when the gps is talking to you, because at the moment they are both talking at the same time and you can't understand it.

I look forward to hearing from you all soon.

Sounds defective to me.

o right... so there's nothing anyone can suggest that may be able to solve any of these problems?

lol vblue you say EVERY unit that has so much as a mouse-fart is defective.

Try doing a full reset to fix the GPS nav issue.

For your settings issue, did you install this headunit yourself? Is the ACC wire hooked up? The headunit is fully losing power when you shut your vehicle down and so your settings are getting wiped out.

The third issue can be solved by going to the AV screen, then click AV Settings, and then System Settings. You're looking for a "Mute Set" button, change it to Guide/Tel etc. Make sure it has "Guide" set in there.

lol thanks very much for your reply CaptainInsaneO, I've done a full reset today, by holding down the MAP button etc and then reseting the calibration status. I've been reading through post after post on here to try and find any solutions that have worked. so far the reset doesnt seem to have worked but from what I have read it maybe takes a little while to settle in? are there any other thoughts on what it could be? its just instead of facing down the road its looking maybe 45 degrees to the side and thus has no idea where I am...

I'm seeing the guy who fitted it on thursday and will raise the issue of the ACC wire then, which hopefully should sort that issue. And I will go and do the settings you said now.

thanks again for your help, and I will update you once I have seen the guy on thursday. If you could please keep an eye on this post for when I reply that would be much appreciated.

look forward to hopefully getting back to you with some good news.

Is your unit installed a an extreme angle? If it is that could cause the problem you are describing.

Its installed in a SEAT ibiza 05. the centre console is at a slight angle towards the drivers side but nothing extreme, its virtually flat on. I had an avic d3 previously in there and had no issues in terms of the arrow pointing so far off target.

Im very appreciative of your brainstorming efforts. hopefully we'll stumble across the solution if we keep trying.

Just been in my car and the sat nav has kicked in now... I tried numerous different ideas that I'd picked up on the forum and one has obviously worked. Or maybe it just needed a little bit of time for the reset to kick-in. But yeh it seems as if the sat nav is hopefully sorted...lets hope it stays that way and wasnt a one off.

So when you said: "Is the ACC wire hooked up? The headunit is fully losing power when you shut your vehicle down and so your settings are getting wiped out."

How would I go about checking that this wire is in fact hooked up, what does it look like, where should it be etc etc. If you could let me know all the details and I can get that fixed... then hopefully that will be everything sorted.

thanks again for all your help guys

I just had a thought... where is the antenna installed at? Are you getting full reception?

I believe the ACC wire is Orange/White, but I'm not 100% sure. I can't find my install manual to confirm, but I do know it has a tag on it that says ACC. Look for that.

the antenna is on the inside of my windscreen, drivers side, in the top corner. I never have the full reception of bars, usually only 3 are lit up...

and when I've located the ACC wire, where do I need to make sure it is plugged into?

The ACC needs to be tapped into a switched 12v source; that is, it need to be a source that turns on and off with the ignition. It's a red wire (I've found the installation manual). Again, like I said before it will have a tag on it.

There is a yellow wire with a 10amp fuse that should be connected to a constant 12v source.

Lastly, I'm afraid you may have to try moving your GPS antenna. Three satellites isn't necessarily a bad connection but that is the minimal number of satellites you need to triangulate a position. This may be contributing to your first issue in your list.

thanks very much for looking that all up for me. Im seeing the guy that installed it tomorrow so I'll let you know how that all goes.

I'll have a go at moving the antenna around as well, will it tell me instantly when it picks up more signal bars (so that then I can watch the screen and see where is best in my car), or does it take a little while to update?

There's a small lag time for it to update the connection screen, my Z3 (same unit as yours, U.S. maps) has a lag time of about 5 seconds or so. In the installation manual it says that if the windows are heavily tinted or are a composite material (usually a clear conductive sheet between two sheets of glass, usually used as an antenna) then GPS reception will be poor. You might try putting the antenna on the roof. I suppose you DO have the metal plate under your antenna right now? If not, you need to put metal under it first, and check your connection. If you already have the plate installed, or if you install it and reception is still poor, try putting the antenna on the roof. I know it's not ideal as far as aesthetics are concerned but I am more worried about you driving into a river.

haha me too! thanks very much for the speedy response and helpful ideas. I will try everything you've said tomorrow and let you know how it all goes.

and one other thing I meant to ask... when you are saving music to the library, can this only be done using a normal CD (ie. upto 20 songs like the albums you buy from the shops)? Or can it be an MP3 CD that you make at home on a CD-RW and it has say upto 100 songs on it?

because I tried putting my own MP3 CD in and it didnt copy it to the library... and it didnt even play the songs on the CD either? is this correct? or maybe I didnt make the MP3 CD correctly...

thanks for your speedy response.

It should play MP3 CDs but it definitely will not copy them to the hdd.

I make music CDs using Winamp to burn to the drive in the headunit, using MP3s. (There is a difference between a "music CD" and an "MP3 disc"; you can use MP3s to make a "music CD" though.)

Others use Nero for its ability to burn CD-Text to the disc as well but I never had the inclination to buy it.

ah okay... so you can only burn upto 20 songs into the library at a time?

and if you use winamp, then the songs only come up on screen named with the date and maybe a number... but if you use Nero then you can have them so that the name and artist etc come up on screen? is that what you were saying?

I tried to hook up the ACC wire to the 12v switched source like you said in order to stop losing all of my settings...but there was no way of getting to it (ie. the cigarette lighter). I know its hard to say but do you know of any way to get to it or is there any other way of fixing this problem...? or is there any other 12v switched source that it could be hooked up to? any extra help and detail would be much appreciated...

my car is a Seat Ibiza 2005

thank you in advance for your speedy response

If your AVIC is losing settings, I would think it's the +12V constant source to the yellow wire that might be getting interrupted, as in that wire is connected to switched 12V source when it should be connected to a constant 12V source. I would use a multimeter (or a test light could work too) and check to make sure the yellow wire has 12V at all times while the red wire only has 12V when the ignition is switched to ACC or ON. It's a possibility the installer got them reversed, especially if he cut your car's original connector because car companies don't often follow standard wire color coding. I personally hate when people do that, they should always use a harness adapter and not touch the car's factory wiring. Do you know if he used a harness adapter or just chopped the wiring?

If he chopped the wiring, you might check on some Seat forums to see if anyone has knowledge on the wire colors. Since this forum is predominantly US users, I doubt anyone here has specific info on your car's wiring since Seat cars aren't sold in the US.

ah okay... so you can only burn upto 20 songs into the library at a time?

 

and if you use winamp, then the songs only come up on screen named with the date and maybe a number... but if you use Nero then you can have them so that the name and artist etc come up on screen? is that what you were saying?

You can burn more than 20 at a time, I just burned the Dethklok album into my Z and that is 23 tracks.

The second part is correct. I have to type all the info into the unit by hand. If you use Nero you won't have to.

GnatGoSplat is correct... I mentioned the yellow wire in a previous post just for the reason he cited: you must have the yellow wire hooked into a constant source.

thank you to you both for all your help. we managed to sort everything out today and it all seems to be working now. So in the nicest possible way... I hope I wont have to post on this forum again lol.

once again thanks for all your help, it really is a great service you put on here.

Great to hear that you indeed did not have a defective unit.