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Dynavin Info: Look here first...Part 2..."Version 5"

762K views 2K replies 312 participants last post by  Geo31 
#1 · (Edited)
NEW DYNAVIN...

Dynavin has made a substantial change in their offerings and has released their new "D90-3G platform"....following the past nomenclature I think it will likely end up being referred to as a V5. It is a new set of hardware and a new interface. In light of this it is time to update the Dynavin info thread! Discussion can continue about the V1-V4 units on the old thread:

http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=754606

Much of this post will be the same as the other one but I will change the parts that are relevant to the new unit. Scroll down past the install to get to the new info.


Please read EVERYTHING before you ask a question, pretty much everything has been answered at some point and I will do my best to put all the new info this thread.[/B]

Read the Dynavin FAQ: http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=803437


As always the Dynavin forum can be found here:
http://dynavin.freeforums.org
Check it out for tips, tricks, hacks, and info.


Due to this post, my involvement in the Dynavin community, and some scary situations with previous Dynavin dealers I have decided to become a Dynavin dealer. You can now get a Dynavin from me along with all the help and advice you might need.....DYNAVIN SOLUTIONS.... you can email me at jtdist@sbcglobal.net, look for me in the sponsor forum here:

http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?p=12273055#post12273055

or click the link in my sig to find out how you can get one for yourself.



INSTALL
I am an installer, not full time, i run a small family business that in part sells auto parts and accessories including mobile electronics. I do the installs, Ive been doing a couple a week for 15 years so Ive done.....a lot..... I am an authorized Pioneer Electronics dealer so most of my experience relevant to the Dynavin is with the AVIC line of Pioneer units. I also have owned two cars with factory nav, a 2006 acura and a 2007 lexus, so understand where I am coming from, Ive used quite a few systems like this.


Here is a look at where things start




And the car:


Regular business HU, no HK, but it doesnt matter, everything here applies to the HK system as well, I had the parrot bluetooth running off the steering wheel buttons and an ipod adapter. Its all coming out.


I also have a 4 channel amp, front two channels running the front speakers and the rear two channels running a sub, the signal was being delivered via the factory amp input wires, cut and spliced onto RCA connectors and fed into an EQ and then into the amp.

The rear speakers are stock and still running off the factory amp although I am not using them and have the fader on the HU faded all the way to the front.



look here to do a system like this, awesome write up on amp install using the factory head unit:

http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=245914



So I took everything apart and took a look at what I was in for:




Take note here that the wiring for the HVAC controls just drops down to the new location for the controls, it only has to move a few inches and there is plenty of slack. I have not yet ordered the HVAC control relocation part but the control fits the old part ok, I used a little bit of 3/8" black weatherstrip foam to support it and hold it in place, it wedges in there pretty tight and looks fine, we will see how it works out. Ignore the mess of wires on the right, thats my parrot blutooth kit, its gone now.

This is important, right in the middle of this picture you can see a white plastic arm that moves a black plastic lever in the airbox, some part of the HVAC system, this part ends up directly below the back of the dynavin unit, be careful that you dont get any wires hung up on this or you are asking for big trouble. I will double check it later from the glovebox side


Next I put the GPS receiver right behind the unit on the metal dash frame, right below the vent ducts, it is magnetic and will stick right there, reception here is good.


So then I plugged everything into the factory wiring:



Take note here since everyone seems to mess this part up

The steering wheel control harness connects to the end of this cable............



NOT here...........




Plugged in the dynavin and put it in the dash, other people have been complaining that there isnt much room in there....they are correct. There is a good amount of space on the left side of the unit, thats where my harness and extra wire ended up. All of the AV connections ended up on top of the dynanvin, there is NO space behind or below the unit:


You can see an RCA cable and a "headphone plug" plugged into the aux in jacks for later use if I want to plug in anything to the aux in or you can run a a/v cable and use the video input as well.....more on that later....

I put all the unused plugs in a plastic bag both to protect them and to keep them from accidentally touching the chassis of the dynavin and causing any weird problems.




Shoved the dynavin in...took a couple tries to get all the wires out of the way and everything where I wanted it. Put the vents back in, and put 2 screws back in to hold everything where it belongs, here you might want to make sure everything is exactly where you want it before you tighten up the screws, the dyanvin fits very well but there is a little wiggle room and I wanted to make sure my gaps were even all the way around.

Now back to that plastic arm and lever....I had my glove compartment out to remove my old bluetooth kit so I stuck my head in there to verify that nothing was binding up the lever and arm. There was a wire back there in this pic, a little too close, I moved it.



I ran the mic, ipod cable, and aux in to where they belonged, you can put them wherever you want, in my case i put the plugs in my euro tray and the mic above the rearview mirror in the factory location. Ran the RCA cable to the trunk, I ran the rca so I could do a little experimenting using the "speaker outputs" vs.the rca outputs.





back in one piece:







INITIAL IMPRESSIONS
The V5 has the same fit, cosmetics, buttons, knobs etc... as the V4 and thats a very good thing, it looks OEM and overall has a quality look and feel to it.

Plugged it in and fired it up, just like the older units the V5 turns on very fast, only a couple seconds and its up and running, MUCH MUCH MUCH faster to start up than the pioneer units that I install regularly and also much faster than my oem NAVs in my acura and lexus.

Unlike with my previous dynavin install, this one was noise free as the Dynavins now come with Line Output Converters to eliminate the past unwanted noise issues, and there is now no unwanted noise in the system. The line level RCAs work great, as far as I can tell with just my ears the dynavin will go to max volume on the RCA outputs clean. This gave my system significantly more available volume than I had with the BMW headunit. Subjectively I would say it is 30%+ louder without any audible distortion. If you are running the factory amp and speakers you should expect similar or slightly better than stock sound quality.

The new interface is completely different, it has mostly orange, white and black displays that match the oem display color and style well.








Overall the audio portion works pretty good, the settings are logical and well laid out although basic, bass, trebel, fader, balance. These controls can be accessed via the settings menu but are also accessible by pressing the volume button....old school....NICE!










RADIO

The Radio works as expected, reception seems fine and the interface is a little more intuative than it used to be. Presets are set and used on the touch screen and you can save stations by frequency or by the name. RDS data displays station,song,artist,etc...






DVD/CD/ETC...

Also works as expected, it will play mp3 data discs with the same interface as the USB.

Picture quality is similar to the older units (and that is good!)






BLUETOOTH
Bluetooth paired to my iphone 3GS no problem and the blutooth audio works very good, both audio and phone connect VERY fast, only a couple seconds to connect.

The bluetooth audio streaming feature does not get enough attention on the dynavin, I think it is the units best feature! With the V5 the audio quality is now good enough to use for music as well as talk! The play/pause button worked with the bluetooth audio, so I can be listening to a podcast with my iphone in my pocket, leave the car, come back and press play and pick up right where I left off. Very nice. I also stream sirius to my iphone using the sirius app or "pocket tunes" app. Works as a nice alternative to sat radio.



The phone book still doesnt work well with the iphone, the contacts do not transfer but you can access your recent dialed and received calls. Your results may vary depending on the phone. Ive had mixed results with calls, just like on the older dynavins I had the best results by using the built in mic and disconnecting the external mic.....I would suggest you experiment a bit as your results may vary.


IPOD
The ipod interface is a work in progress, while it looks very good and displays all the right info, it takes a few too many button presses to access the required controls and I find it to be a bit too "fiddly" to use while driving. For instance, in order to go "back" you have to access a menu while it should just be a static button on the screen. I have been in touch with dynavin about this however and they are working on updating the firmware to make the interface more user friendly possibly even incorporating the steering wheel buttons into the interface. These changes will be firmware update-able so no worries for you current buyers. Its still way easier to use than a DICE or similar unit, its just that it could be MUCH better with just a couple small tweaks. (you can turn off the annoying beep)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wtUWpFI1jc

HOWEVER I did find that using the supplied remote control makes using the ipod interface a pleasure, with hard buttons for every function its a near perfect ipod interface.....now if dynavin can just mimic the remotes features with the on screen display or the buttons/knobs it will be fantastic!

UPDATE: Dynavin has successfully integrated the steering wheel controls into the ipod interface and this functionality will be available in a future firmware update once its been fully tested and any bugs worked out. Here it is being used in my car.....fantastic feature!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOe0vBVzDxM










The old models had an ipod video function....but because of a apple imposed incompatibility it didnt work unless you had a jailbroken iphone or ipod touch. Because of this Dynavin has removed the video function from the ipod interface.

BUT you can use the A/V inputs to run video off your ipod. I used an ipod>A/V plug hooked up to the aux in. You have to control it from the ipod obviously but it works.


USB

The USB function works fine although in some ways not as well as on the older units. The new interface does not seem to have the folder limitations that the old one did but it now only support 2 layers of folders.....so it will only see your album folders and your songs but NOT your artist folders....probably not a big issue for many of you but I like to navigate my music by artist>album>song, three layers, so it doesnt work that great for me. Also the load time is a bit slow.....it takes about 45 seconds to load my 16GB USB. Not a deal breaker but the old dynavins loaded faster (although I still need to play around with the file structure to see if that speeds things up)






I got this plug from pac audio and decided to do a nice flush mounted usb in the eurotray.





sweeeeet




DVB-TV
Dynavin has now moved the TV tuner out of the unit and it will be available as a separate add on option, they did this to simplify production and better serve multiple markets (and probably to keep the price down as well)....different countries use different broadcast standards and in the past Dynavin had to make multiple models for different countries, now all the Dynavin E46 models will be the same and the customer will be able to add whatever tuner is appropriate for their country. I was not able to try one of these as the tuners have not been released yet but from what I understand they will be "hide away" and be controlled by the touch screen. The V5 has a large multi pin "Din" style plug in place to accept these upcoming tuners. Ill update this post when I know more.


3G INTERNET FUNCTION
I dont yet have this working on my unit....or should I say that I am still trying to figure out what kind of data sim card to use and I dont want to get roped into a ridiculous 24 month contract just to test it out....If anyone knows a US carrier that offers a "pay as you go" plan on JUST A SIM CARD with no ridiculous fees let me know and Ill get this thing working!



NEW SCREEN!

Dynavin is now using a matte finish screen, when used in conjunction with the supplied anti glare screen protector the glare problem that has plagued the Dynavin from the beginning is greatly improved. I specifically looked to find a reflection to take this pic, this is not the angle that I have when Im driving!



note that in the area of the screen where the rear window reflection is you can still see the display behind the glare. The screen itself is also brighter.

The new screen combined with my glare fix (see the other dynavin info thread for more info) have made glare issues a thing of the past for me.


NAV/WINDOWS

The Nav/Windows portion of the V5 is unchanged so the following is just copied over from the other thread.

The nav portion is good, the large font thing on the street names is kind of odd but is better on some of the zoom/angle settings. I also find it odd that I cant seem to make it display the direction of travel as "up" in 2D mode. I need to play around with this part some more to see if I can find settings to work a couple of the kinks like that out. Overall I would say that the Nav is on par or better than most of the other OEM or aftermarket ones I have used.

Map screens (iGo 8)




Looking for lunch....POI screen






the igo software is easy to modify and there is a large online community dedicated to customizing and tweaking it. Since the igo nav system is on the micro sd card in the front of they dyanavin it is easy to take out, stick it in your computer and HACK it. Im not going to go into the details here but I googled it and found some skins and some different color schemes, played around with it, and found some some stuff that I really liked, much better looking, cleaner, more adjustable, even easier to use. Here is what the skin I am using now looks like:







the skin you see here is from:
http://www.igo8mods.com/dimka.htm

And the color scemes I found here, I liked the stuff by "Xerses"
http://artwork-igo8.blogspot.com/search/label/scheme

Update: Im now running a customized 800x480 high res version of igo8.3, It looks amazing, it works amazing. It wasnt easy as I am not a computer programmer but i was able to figure it out (with a little help), spend some time here if you want to make it happen:

http://dynavin.freeforums.org

There is also a lot of discussion of this on the other Dynavin info thread in recent weeks.


If you want to customize your Navigation experience.....start by looking here: http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=754606&page=42 There are some good links on this page of the thread that will get you going in the right direction:


Check out the size of the fonts (yes I can see them while driving, pic quality here limited due to iphone pic while driving).....800x480.....nice!




And the windows interface, you wont see this stuff unless you go looking for it.




windows media player





Random video of the Dynavin in action

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71P3Jz6Qa_8

In this video Im running iGo Primo for the Nav instead of the stock iGo8...very nice!





a pic of a finished install in a fellow fanatics car, I thought it looked great in his dash!



and a shot in my car





VERDICT:

I gave the old unit a 6/10.....with the improvements to the V5 I give it a 7/10 with potential to be an 8/10 if the ipod and USB interface improves, as it sits now it is a fantastic value, and a very very good, if slightly flawed upgrade.

to be continued...
 
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#1,049 ·
ketchup, that is not normal function, there is something wrong with the bluetooth, ill take care of it.
 
#1,050 ·
ketchup,

question for you, you mentioned a couple of times about the bluetooth profile. Are you going somewhere to set something or have options? I have never performed anything but paired the dynavin and iphone. then just play the iphone however I want and use the phone as needed.

I do find the built in mic touch and go. everyone says it is the best option, but I have people telling me they hear a lot of background noise. they can hear me ok, but a lot of background noise as well. I feel like I am yelling when I talk just to make sure they hear me. I should have plugged in the other microphone when I had the unit out yesterday.
 
#1,051 ·
I have a friend who is very picky about that and tells me the same thing... on either microphone I'm on. I also have the rest of the people who I talk to on the phone who tell me they can hear me just fine. Might be your friends. They might just be used to all Jawbones all the time :p
 
#1,052 · (Edited)
welcome to bluetooth guys! :D What you guys just described is par for the course with most bluetooth devices. I sell Pioneer, Parrot, Ego, JVC, and Motorola....Hit and miss with all of them, for some they work great, others not so much. I think it is all about the combination of the bluetooth device, the mic location, your phone, and your car and how all the variables interact.

That said, what I find works best on the Dynavin is to speak softly Yes I know it seems counter intuitive, but try it. TRBOVNM...I know for a fact when you have called me that you could speak quieter, I can hear you fine but when your voice gets a little louder it clips the mic. The background noise is audible but not loud at all, Your voice on the other hand is too loud. Try it and see....
 
#1,054 · (Edited)
well what happens isnt that they would think you were too loud, when the mic clips it gets staticy and breaks up...makes it hard to understand and makes it sound like there is a lot of background noise. So you speak and they say "What?" and you talk louder.....and that makes it break up worse....and so on....
 
#1,055 · (Edited)
there are no menus for the Dynavin Bluetooth to select any profiles, I guess it's just included in the hardware/software and enabled automatically with pairing. I'm also unsure if Dynavin even has A2DP? not that it matters.

A2DP is pretty awesome in that it allows the receiving system to display things such as artist and song title. You can also skip tracks via steering controls. This of course depends on the car and Bluetooth setup. I look forward to seeing more of this kind of tech in the future.

Side notes, the built in mic works fine. Just talk in a normal tone. If anything, on the receiving end it may sound like they're on speaker phone.

lol Jeff, is the current steering wheel control setup for the Dynavin iPod mode all you?
 
#1,056 · (Edited)
lol Jeff, is the current steering wheel control setup for the Dynavin iPod mode all you?
Yeah....I dont know if they already had the idea but while discussing the....limited.... ipod interface I said "wouldn't it be cool if..."

And then 2 weeks later they sent me the firmware to test out! Its not exactly as I envisioned it but they wanted to make it work across different platforms with different steering wheel buttons so that imposed some limitations (like the long press to select)

Not that anyone here will care but it will work awesome in the audi models when they get them switched over to the new platform....audis have scroll wheels on the steering wheel....I had an audi until last year, best steering wheel button setup I have ever seen in a car, hands down.
 
#1,059 ·
Well I finally signed up, I've been chewing jeffs ear off because I want a member here but I figured its time I sign up lol! So ill direct my first question to everybody instead of poor jeff, do all of you have issues with the gps accuracy? I recently upgraded to primo, and even with this I noticed the gps is about 50-60 feet off. I used a garmin dash mount in harmony with this and its spot on with house numbers, where the dynavin is about 6 numbers off, and its about 60 feet off on navigation. Is there a way to calibrate the unit? Or should I try mounting my antenna somewhere besides the default location in jeffs diy?

On another note, anybody who wants to know step by step how to upgrade to primo, pm me! I'm horible with computers and I have to say I didn't think I was going to be able to figure it out but its extremely easy. Maybe I'm the only one who thought it would be difficult but it was super easy so if anybody has issues ill clear them up!
 
#1,060 · (Edited)
Hi and welcome to the forums.
I've experienced no problems with accuracy using Primo or iGO8, I have the antenna mounted on the rear parcel shelf.
Regarding nav discuusion, best to use the dedicated Primo thread (linked below) which has lots of info and downloads rather than clogging up this and other Dynavin threads, poor Jeff has enough to sift through I'm sure.

http://forum.e46fanatics.com/showthread.php?t=797457
 
#1,063 ·
I would move the antenna as well. I put mine on the dash in the corner by the a-pillar on the passenger side. not very noticeable and works well.

However, I would recommend trying the NAVTEQ maps instead of the standard teleatlas maps that come with igo. I had the same issue with the teleatlas maps and once I put the navteq maps in, everything worked perfect. and the navteq maps are older than the teleatlas. go figure. teleatlas would be off like you are saying with the house numbers, but numerous address locations were WAY off.
 
#1,064 ·
Right now I have the maps from darkoz's primo download which I don't recall if they are navteq or telatlas... And I'm going to relocate it once I do my BSW install next week. Have you found any updated POI logs online? I think there's room for improvement in this area, I found a few sites that have downloads for IGO8 which I'm assuming works for primo.
 
#1,066 ·
I had my GPS antenna where Jeff originally suggested, stuck to that metal bar behind head unit, and I usually got a fix under 45 seconds, sometimes when it was overcast, more like 2 minutes.

Then this past weekend while I was hooking up the reverse camera I moved it, I shoved it right above the duct/vent, fit there nicely, pretty secure. Now I'm getting a GPS fix within 10 to 25 seconds.

T.
 
#1,070 ·
I read a few pages back about the usb size limitations. I know the 32 gb was apparently causing issues for some. Has anyone figured out for sure what size is the largest it can support. I wana buy a larger usb stick so can get the most music on one drive but dont want to have problems with it. I have about 20-25 gb of music i want to put on one. Will the 32 work or better off with 16gb due to issues?
 
#1,076 ·
Yeah I want to move my GPS Antenna too because it keeps on dropping signal or doesn't pick up signal at all. Can someone post a picture as to where the moved it so that it gets better reception and doesn't drop, thanks!
 
#1,077 ·
Plus I don't really care for the usb folders, because you can't listen to a song and then open another folder up to find your next song, as soon as you press another folder it starts playing out of that folder. Kindof annoying to me. I will take a picture tomorrow of the 3 possible places that I see possible for the antenna. There's obviously many places but the 3 cleanest places would be, the corner of the A-pillar and dash, the rear deck corner or child seat anchors like darkoz said, or the factory spot that I might try to mount mine in which is under the grill in the bottom of the rear deck all the way at the rear of the window.
 
#1,079 ·
Plus I don't really care for the usb folders, because you can't listen to a song and then open another folder up to find your next song, as soon as you press another folder it starts playing out of that folder. Kindof annoying to me. ........
Of course you can, you can view the artist folders and choose another song while you're listening to the current song
 
#1,084 ·
The USB was better on the earlier Dynavins but they had a VERY low folder limit of 196. On the V5 dynavins there is no limit but the browsing is limited to 2 layers so you cant do artist>album>song.....you can only do album>song or artist>song. Ones step forward.....one step back....

There is no size limit that I know of.....the earlier mention of 32gb was me and another guy comparing notes on why certain USBs needed to be unplugged and plugged back in to "reinitialize". We werent saying it was a limitation. We dont know why a couple of USBs would do this and the rest not, that is what we were trying to figure out.
 
#1,086 ·
Yeah, I'm still trying to work it out but I bought a 16GB drive and it works albeit slow to register all the files but that is a known limitation...approx 3 mins to register 1200 songs....

Someone earlier mentioned the google site search function and yes I was using the dedicated site search only, but it seems Jeff and I are the only ones seeing the 'no support file' error.

Gotta go pick up the car from the workshop...just a checkup before taking off on holidays...I'm sure they're going to want to know all about the 'vin...
 
#1,089 ·
Is anyone wondering like me as to why they cant make an update that will allow track change while in nav considering the FM presets can be changed. I mean its like the possibility is there but they didnt add it for those modes yet. Its aggervating that you have to back out of nav then change then back to nav anytime you want to change songs.

Also wondering why they didnt make the USB and CD player screens look like and function like the orange screens? The usb and cd menus look terrible. I think i seen pix of the earlier versions that have nicer looking layouts for those. It seems like some simple fixes to such oversights, I would think they could make these changes and make and make a huge improvement to the unit. Also ipod function i could be better but i perfer usb anyway. just wish one of the two were good.
 
#1,090 ·
I believe because dynavin outsourced a lot the components of this unit, therfore each has its own layout which is only designed for the dynavins screen size. This is just my guess. For sure the radio/nav will be different because there two seperate units... I agree with you, but that's why I'm going to try only using the windows board for everything but radio/bluetooth. And once a new version comes out that I feel is worth upgrading too then ill sell my unit to somebody who wants one that's already all tweaked and set up with primo and all the cool applications on it, and buy the new one. Its the curse of buying any technology lol, within a few months there's always something better!!
 
#1,091 · (Edited)
Dynavin Version 4

Hey Jeff and others,

So recently I have been having the same problem and no matter how many times I reboot my iPhone or restart the Dynavin Unit it will always give me the same message when I plug my iPhone in the iPod dock, Battery Power Very Low...



I have tried numerous things to my knowledge and haven't been able to fix it...How does someone fix this???

Thanks and hope you all can help soon!


Also...after I installed my new speakers (better quality and pick up more sound than the HKs) whenever I play a CD in the unit I can hear the radio as well. If it makes sense it's like the radio and the CD are playing at the same time, when it shouldn't be. Is it possible my head unit needs to be replaced? If so, will I be able to get a new one under the manufacturer warranty (since it's only been 5 months)
 
#1,092 ·
kp, did you install an amp to go with those speakers? If so the gain is too high on the amp....what you are experiencing is the infamous "radio bleed" from the V1-V4 units. This is what we use the LOCs for. I dont recall if I installed those in your car or not. I think you probably just need a new ipod cord, yours might be damaged, email me and ill get one sent out to you.
 
#1,093 ·
Yes I did :)

I have 300/4 amp going to the speakers and 500/1 amp going to the subwoofers. I don't think we installed LOCs...where do they go so that I can get them in the car?

Ok cool, I'll email you tomorrow while at work...thanks!

Also, what about the CD and FM problem I'm experiencing? Whenever I play a CD in a car you can hear a radio station too
 
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