First i'd like to say hi to all. I installed my f900 today and Im very much enjoying my avic experience so far. But I am having a few sour little issues that are leaving me with a little bit of a bitter taste in my mouth.

I have done my best to search to answers/solutions for the following but I have come up somewhat empty. so.

1. I am australian and such I have an australian avic, The voice control is disabled. When I was speaking to the pioneer support about a problem I asked about updated firmware and he told me there was no 3.0 australian firmware and I shouldnt install the american firmware on my avic because I will "damage it" At this point I decided he is probably the last person on earth that can help me so I politely hung up and chuckled at him. SO. If I install the american 3.0 or 3.1 firmware will I get voice control enabled? also will I lose my australian maps?

2. I'm having some serious Ipod issues. I have tested this with 2 iphone 4's and an latest gen ipod nano. When I plug the idevice into the ipod cable, There is absolutely no recognition on the device that it has been plugged into anything. No ipod icon appears in the source menu (I have set AV1 to Ipod as required). I am using the genuine Pioneer Ipod cable supplied with the avic and I have grounded the parking brake sensor. I also cant seem to be able to play music from a usb storage device (the usb icon stays greyed out when I have a usb device with music on it plugged in) Although It does power up the usb device and any lights on the usb device come on. Likewise for SD card. I the option stays greyed out If I have a SD card with music inserted. When I phoned pioneer support over it the bloke just told me "well when i plug the ipod into the f900 here the icon comes up fine" I asked him what kind of ipod it was and he said he doesnt know...when I asked him where to go from here he didnt really have an answer whatsoever.great way to support a $2000 piece of equipment pioneer

/endrant.

Anyway. Has anybody encountered this issue and found a solution?

There was another one but I've forgotten it at the moment .

Thanks in advance for your time and help. It will be much appreciated.

Edit: Just thought I would add, I can play my ipod using a 3.5mm audio cable through av2. But as I am coming from a clarion that had full working ipod control, And i got the avic as I wanted to integrate everything into one control unit, This is obviously not optimal. I also have no problem when playing cd's or listening to radio stations.

1. You will not get VR regardless of what you do.

2. Sounds defective to me. You should be able to have it serviced.

thanks for your fast reply vblue. The VR, Is this because of a hardware difference between the NA models and the ones sold over the rest of the world?

I guess im not to worried if i cant get VR working as i can still force VR on my iphone at the moment for dialing and music selection.

I would like to install the 3.0 firmware on mine to see if that will help solve my second issue. Also I have only grounded the parking brake, I havnt performed the rest of the "bypass". Would this be causing my issue?

As pioneer support australia seem as useless as mustard on a basketball I really dont want to send my unit to them, and they really dont seem to want to actually help me in any way. Is it possible to upgrade my CE and firmware without losing my current maps?

Thank you again.

I dont know why but people have been trying to figure out a way to get VR on non US units for almost three years now and no one has. And the two wire bypass is only required for US units. Grounding the P. brake wire is all that is required for non US units.

Thanks for that. One more question. If i were to import a US model, I would be able to stick the Australian maps on it all would be win? Im looking at returning this one considering the usb issue seems like a hardware problem and I really dont want to deal with pioneer australia. With the money I could buy one from america and have it shipped over. Probably for less

Yea that is feasible. Don't know for sure if anyone has don't it though.

Thanks for your time and the great information Vblue. After looking around I can get a Z series from the usa delivered for only $50 more than I paid for my second hand f900. I guess I will go about extracting a refund from the seller and ordering a z series.

Dont get a 110 or 120. You wont be able to install your countries maps on it as far as I know.

bob saget! and i was just getting excited about a shiny new z120...can nothing go right for me this week lol.