Hmmmm....I lied. Everything works with all colors and settings except mute. Mute doesn't work no matter what combination I try. It might be a bum unit, but I don't care, I never use mute.

 

that like having a secret password control way to the your deck. hahaha

 

Interesting.... Mute will work on mine, but nothing else. Figures.

John

 

OK, after a week's sabbatical I have some news. It's the head unit.

Alpine was supposed to email me (2 weeks ago) an engineer's contact information so I could send them a DCI to test. They claimed that the PAC unit was the only "approved" interface device and that the problem must be with the interface (the DCI). I of course immediately ordered a PAC unit which came in while I was away last week and I didn't get around to testing it till yesterday. It's a good thing I ordered it because Alpine has yet to send me the engineer's information so they have not had a chance to verify the DCI is a compatible product. I'll have to call them again and see what's up.

But anyway, after I got the PAC programmed (#%*&@!!!) I discovered that it has the same problem as the DCI, only a little worse. And, just like the DCI it ONLY misses commands when the HU is red and dimmed. Doesn't that seem odd? Two different interfaces by different manufacturers have the same defect that shows up ONLY on one particular model of head unit and ONLY when certain options are selected ON THE HEAD UNIT. As Spock would say, "Fascinating".

Bear in mind my testing is limited to one head unit and as it turns out mine is no where near as "bad" as others are reporting - mine only misses one or two commands out of the 80 commands it takes to run the volume from minimum to maximum. Others are reporting the head unit misses 4 out of 5 commands or worse. When using the PAC interface on my head unit it sometimes misses as many as 5 or 6 commands out of 80, a little worse than the DCI. I took a video using the PAC interface to control the head unit and posted it on this page along with some other information. If you watch the video turn the volume up all the way so you can hear the HU beeps - any beeping during the volume adjustment means the HU missed a command (thought the commands stopped) causing it to beep again when the commands start back up.

If I hear any good news when I contact Alpine again I'll update this thread.

.

 

####ING Alpine!

John

 

Since I haven't gotten a response via email I figured I'd try to contact you here.

Can you please send back the 2 extra DCIs I sent you? I included a pre-paid mailer with the first replacement DCI, I'm sure it will work to ship them both.

thanks

 

for the record, i have the problem - buttons red, undimmed, no problems whatsoever. buttons red and dimmed - DCI stops working.

doesn't bother me all that much - at night, i just keep the radio lid shut.

 

Wanna swap head units?

My iDA-X001 works 95% of the time with dimmed red buttons, 100% with blue. It's mounted in a "rack" rather than in a car but I can't imagine why that would account for why it works nearly all the time, so I think it should still work 95% in your car. I'm looking to get a HU that doesn't work at all on red illumination so I can figure out what the problem is.

Here's the rub - after getting burned on some previous deals I no longer send stuff out for free. So if you're interested you can either:

1. Buy my HU outright and I ship it to you. You swap them, then send me yours and I refund your money.
or
2. You ship me your HU (I pay you nothing), I swap them, and ship you mine in return.

While that sounds a little one-sided (you have to pay but I don't), I'm the one that loses if I treat you bad. I've worked very hard for my reputation as a vendor and I'm here to stay, so I can't afford to treat you badly and have you tell everybody about it.

If interested, email me - bob@modifry.com. (or anybody else with a "no worky on red" head unit)

.

 

Hey guys,

Brand new to the s2k and loving it....

Quick question on the topic of the iDA-X001...I think this is the case but just wanted to double-check. Are there any issues with the stereo cover in an 03 model for this head unit because of the protruding volume knob? Just wanted to confirm before i bought the unit.

Thanks!