ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 To those that may be interested I have a Dynavin V3 fitted at TTints yesterday. First off I would like to say a bit about TTints themselves. First off I was not happy at the £100 price hike added by TTints recently, and it did make me think long and hard about whether I would go ahead and purchase this unit. However my girlfriend said she would pay something towards this unit for my birthday and this is what eventually made me take the plunge... Saying that the service at TTints was very good. The staff there are very friendly, and very helpful. The installation of the unit itself took around 2 hours. The installer then offered to show me through the functions of this unit, but having played around with many units in the past I declined this offer and made my way home. I checked around the car as I was very paranoid there may be trim hanging off in various places where the installer had removed bits to fit the various accessories. I am pleased to say they have done a very professional job, and everything appears to have been installed correctly and with care. I would have been happy to fit this unit myself, but at the same time it was nice to have it done for me, and this goes a short way to make up for the recent £100 price hike. Overall the TTInts staff were very helpful/knowledgeable, and service was very good indeed. I would certainly use them again. Obviously things would be much better if they hadn't hiked the price up by £100!... Right, the unit itself. Here are some quick pictures I took today... THE UNIT – I am really happy with the look of the unit. If blends in great with the dash and doesn't look out of place at all. The touch screen works very well. The only small niggles I have (like others) are I prefer the button feel of the original unit (smooth without a micro-switch type click) and the illumination in the dark is a couple of shades lighter than that of the original buttons, however this can be improved by playing around with the dimmer settings. There is a noticable amount of glare in the sun in certain conditions. I am fortunate as my car was fitted with an electric rear sunblind and this has improved things massively for me. I will still be looking into getting an anti glare screen to protect the screen itself. Overall the unit has a very OEM look which is what I was looking for, and I am very pleased with this. I have been playing around with this for a bit since yesterday, and I will break the unit down into different sections with my findings so far. The standard setup is not ideal (button beeps etc), but you can play around with the settings to get things how you want them. This leads me on to - THE INSTRUCTION MANUAL – One word... Crap. It is very basic and doesn’t explain things very well. I have discovered most things by playing around with the unit, and I will continue to do so to get the unit how I want it. THE INTERFACE - The interface is not too bad at all, but not as good as it could be. One thing I would like to be able to do is change the colour of the buttons to orange. At the moment the interface colour is red, and it doesn’t blend in very well with the rest of the cars illumination. The option to change the appearance would be great, and hopefully it is something DYNAVIN or software modders will be able to do in the near future. This aside it is all very straight forward and user friendly, and those that have played around with touch screens in the past should be able to navigate their way around pretty easily. SOUND - Right this is one thing I have been very pleasantly surprised by. Compared to the factory fitted unit the Dynavin is a massive improvement. I am only running standard speakers at the moment, but even with these the difference in sound is massive. The Dynavin is obviously more powerful and this really tells. Even with the standard speakers there is a much improved bass response and a greater clarity. I felt the standard setup was always the Achilles heel in the E46 with the standard sound system sounding muddy. At higher volumes the standard setup lacked any punch and distorted all over the place. At higher volumes the Dynavin sounds much clearer with a surprising amount of bass. I have heard various different standard setups. In my old 328 I have a business CD player, in my current car I had the Professional unit installed. My friend has the Harmon Kardon setup (including 6x9 subs) in his car. The Dynavin sounds much better than any of those setups by quite a margin. I am extremely happy with the way it sounds, and it will only get better with a speaker upgrade (next on my list). Now there is a downside to the sound in this unit. As has been widely reported the earlier units suffer from radio bleed and a hiss at lower volumes. Unfortunately this is still the case with the V3 units. I did not notice this at all yesterday when I was driving, but heard it when I was sat in my car playing around with it today. This is only audible at low volumes (between volume levels 1 and 6) and is only very slight. While this isn’t ideal, it is not a huge problem for me as when driving the volume the lowest useable volume is around level 10 and this bleed can’t be heard at all. There are reports on E46 fanatics that this issue has been resolved using a LOC, and Dynavin are currently making a new loom incorporating a LOC to eliminate this issue. For the time being I can certainly live with it. SAT NAV – I used this yesterday to navigate my way home from TTints to Kent. The SAT NAV works very well indeed. It has a very good signal (I only lost it when going through tunnels). TTints installed the GPS receiver at the top left of the windscreen, and this is obviously a good place to get a strong signal. The SAT NAV software has a postcode finder which works very well. However inputting the postcode is unnecessarily awkward as you have to put a space between the first and second part (you can’t just type the postcode out in full, in one go). This confused me for a couple of minutes, but it was easy enough to work out. The SAT NAV has turn by turn commentary that cuts the music when announcements are made. At first I found the announcements a little too quiet, but the volume can be adjusted in the settings mode to improve this. However you sometimes find yourself turning up the volume to hear the announcements only to have your ear drums blasted out when it returns to playing music. It would be nice to have more control over the SAT NAV volume, and to be able to control it completely independently. I am sure with a bit more playing around in the settings things can be improved. Overall the software is very good. One of the features I like is when you don’t have any direction changed to make for a few miles the SAT NAV goes to 2D mode giving you a better idea where you are on a Motorway for example. However when you are a couple of miles away from the next turn it changes to 3d mode making it clearer what lane you need to be in etc. However I have always used TOM TOM’s and I have become accustomed to this software. In the future I would like to change the software over to TOM TOM. This is not a criticism against the IGO software, it works very well. If I had never used the TOM TOM software I am sure I would be more than happy using it. DVD – Not much to say on this really. I tested the DVD player using the MATRIX. It does exactly what you would expect, it plays DVD’s.... The picture quality is more than watchable, and it sounds pretty good to. You can change the picture settings from widescreen to fill the entire screen etc. It is a nice feature to have, but not one I will find myself using too much. RADIO – The radio works very well. I get a very good signal, and it is very clear. However I am not too keen on the interface at the moment. It is very easy to tune the radio in etc, and you can store plenty of stations. The interface displays the station name when tuned into it. The issue I have is when recalling the saved stations it does not display the radio names. You just get a list of the frequencies. It would be nice to have the stations names listed. The only other thing of note at this time is the steering wheel controls. They work fine, but I would like to be able to cycle through the saved stations, and I don’t seem to be able to do this at the moment. When pressing up or down on the controls it tunes into the next station, not the list I have saved. This again is only a niggle, and I will see if there is a way this can be done. CD playback - Again everything works great. I have played CD’s and CDR’s containing MP3’s and WMA files. It plays everything without a problem. The unit reads CD’s very quickly and it displays the artist/track names when it plays. Navigating to different folders on an MP3 CD is straight forwards and easy enough to do. As I covered before the sound quality is excellent, and much improved over the standard unit. I am very pleased with this. TV - I haven’t played around with the TV too much at the moment. It picks up plenty of Freeview channels so there is plenty to watch. However the signal is a bit hit and miss. I sometimes get a very strong signal and other times none at all. This is obviously to be expected. TTints have placed the aerial at the bottom of the windscreen out of site. The signal may be improved by moving it up to the top of the windscreen, but to be honest I will probably not bother. If there is something I need to watch I will be at home watching it. If I am not watching it I will be recording it... The interface in the TV section is easy enough to use with the remote, but not great when using the touch screen. The software seems a bit antiquated for the TV. When you want to scan for channels, change channel etc, you get a very nasty linier green display over the top of the TV. This reminds me of being back in the 80’s using an old Amstrad (for those old enough to remember!). Still, the software works and does what you need it to do. BLUETOOTH – I have connected the DYNAVIN to my iPHONE 3G. They both connected to each other without any issues, and I have made and received a few calls using the DYNAVIN. The Bluetooth works extremely well. When talking the sound is muted and I can hear the person at the other end of the phone very well, and in turn they can hear me very well. TTints have place the microphone above the centre mirror and stuck it onto my interior light. This is obviously something I will change, and there are plenty of mounting options available (I will probably mount mine next to my sunroof switch). The issue I have with the Bluetooth is regarding my phone contact list. The DYNAVIN does pick up the contact list from your phone, but it doesn’t display it in alphabetical order. It also takes forever to scroll through your contact list on the DYNAVIN. To make a call you really need to type in the phone number manually, or dial from the phone. I would like to be able to store my contact list on the DYNAVIN itself so you can dial out effectively using the DYNAVIN screen. Also when receiving a call the DYNAVIN doesn’t display the caller’s name from the phonebook, it only displays the number. It would be nice that if you are receiving a call from somebody you know their name was displayed on the screen. Hopefully I will be able to find a way to store my contact list on the DYNAVIN... STEERING WHEEL CONTROLS – These all work great. The volume works and the up/down buttons work on all modes. The R/T and voice buttons also work. The R/T button terminates a call, and the voice button works in two ways. If you tap it it will mute the stereo, but if you hold it when a call is coming in it will answer the call (if you don’t have auto answer on). RELOCATION UNIT PART NUMBERS - Right, I had a nightmare trying to get a relocation unit from BMW. It took three orders to get this right, so I will try and clarify this for anybody that might want to get one. There are two types, the 18mm (with individual switches) and the 16mm (with the long switch box). The part number for those with individual switches (18mm) is The part number for those with the long switch box (16mm) is These part numbers are for the relocation units with the smokers package (ashtray and cigarette lighter in cubby hole). SUMMARY – Obviously this unit still has issues to resolve (the radio bleed and hiss) but this is not too loud, and it is not a deal breaker for me. This issue has been resolved using a LOC by other users. There are a couple of improvements I would like to see with the interface itself, but again hopefully this can be done with a software/firmware update in the future. Overall I am very happy with this unit. It blends in very well with the rest of the car, and has so many useable features. The most important things I wanted from a head unit was good sound, Bluetooth capability and SAT NAV built in (I hate having a TOM TOM stuck to the windscreen). As I have mentioned earlier the sound improvement is massive, and it will only get better when I add better quality speakers. The SAT NAV and Bluetooth features also work very well. I personally do not regret buying this unit. If anybody has any further questions fire away and I will do my best to answer them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mit Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good write-up, seems like they are 90% there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamesy Boy ACS3d Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good review buddy Just 1 question - Does it play movies and tv on the move? Or do you need to buy yet more bits of kit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good write-up, seems like they are 90% there Cheers mate. Yeah 90% there is a fair assessment. With the introduction of a loom with a built in LOC I feel the unit will be pretty much sorted. The only thing I would really like to see apart from the LOC is getting the phonebook niggle resolved. It isn't the end of the world having to dial up from the phone, but it would be much better to call it up from the unit. For me the rest of the niggles are very minor and are things you could encounter with many other units. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good review buddy Just 1 question - Does it play movies and tv on the move? Or do you need to buy yet more bits of kit Thanks mate. The guys at TTints asked me if I wanted to be able to play TV/DVD's on the move (for passengers of course) and I told them I did. I have read that to do this you need to ground the park cable. So yes it does play DVD's and TV on the move. However the TV signal is not strong enough to be playable on the move, it keeps cutting in and out. This may be resloved by moving the aerial to the top of the windscreen, but to be honest I probably won't bother doing that as it isn't a biggie for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swilton325is Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 top write up mate,im glad someone had the balls to go out and buy one! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
///Marty Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good write up dude. Glad to hear you are happy with your purchase despite the price hike. And good info on the relocation unit too - this question gets brought up time and time again. In fact, if you want to make a seperate thread under something like relocation panel part numbers and paste the info in there i will sticky it under the ICE section to make it nice and easy for everyone to find. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good write up dude. Glad to hear you are happy with your purchase despite the price hike. And good info on the relocation unit too - this question gets brought up time and time again. In fact, if you want to make a seperate thread under something like relocation panel part numbers and paste the info in there i will sticky it under the ICE section to make it nice and easy for everyone to find. Thanks mate. I have added the relocation part numbers thread as requested . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
///Marty Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Thanks mate. I have added the relocation part numbers thread as requested . All sorted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 All sorted. Cheers Marty mate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m7alj Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 great write up mate im having mine fitted tomorrow at ttints Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m7alj Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 how does the iphone work any issues & where did they put the lead i want mine in the centre console but heard the lead they supply isnt long enough ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scrimja Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Great review. By the sounds of it, someone really needs to come up with a new interface for the radio portion and sort the niggle. I think there was a bloke on the dynavin forum creating one. Hopefully he can fix the phone issues too but I think that will be down to Dynavin themselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momo Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Great write up mate! Deffo food for thought! At £650 though I think I may wait until I get a few other bits and pieces sorted.. Deffo good info here though so thanks for that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amowolves Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good write up mate. If I never had the oem satnav and tv this is deffo something I would consider. Enjoy... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Good review mate. Manage to get it cheaper then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 how does the iphone work any issues & where did they put the lead i want mine in the centre console but heard the lead they supply isnt long enough ? I have only used the iPhone connecting via bluetooth, I have not tried connecting it to the phone itself yet. I don't really use my iPhone to listen to music, and in the car I usually listen to MP3's via a CD. The USB cable they supply is around 12" long, probably a bit on the short side to get to the centre console, it all depends how much slack there is on the USB cable from the stereo loom. Good review mate. Manage to get it cheaper then? Hehe cheers mate. No I didn't manage to get it any cheaper unfortunately, I wish I did! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peakey Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Guys, Can someone explain to me about the relocation unit, whats it for ? I currently just have the standard business CD and am interested in getting one of these units so want to know what else i need to do apart from just paying for the unit and installation. Also whats the MP3 playback like, i see it has some memory card slots, can you slot in a card with a load of MP3's and it will play them directly off it ? A few pics of the unit navigating some MP3's would be good, I assume you can browse by Artist, Album etc ? Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Peaky, The relocation unit is required for your heater controls. With the standard single din stereo the heater control units are just below the stereo. Obviously when you intall a double din unit the heater controls need to be moved. The relocation unit is basically a cradle that houses the heater controls underneath the stereo (see the pictures above). Without the relocation unit you can't mount the heater control underneath the stereo propery. Once the heater controls are moved the Dyanvin can be installed. The MP3 playback is very good. I have not tried it from a memory card, but I see no reason why you can't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J Dub Posted April 13, 2010 Report Share Posted April 13, 2010 Great wirte up they are almost there and I am happy ALL the steering controls now work, felt that was fundimental for the unit. How odd tho the colours dont match right, would have thought that was also fundimental to this unit, again lets hope they sort this. Happy to hear about the sound with the exception of the hiss, again that needs doing as does the caller display. one thing I did not see was anything about ipod? this can be plugged in right, do you have one? will you be trying ity on there too? as a key item in my ICE these days is my ipod Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peakey Posted April 14, 2010 Report Share Posted April 14, 2010 Peaky, The relocation unit is required for your heater controls. With the standard single din stereo the heater control units are just below the stereo. Obviously when you intall a double din unit the heater controls need to be moved. The relocation unit is basically a cradle that houses the heater controls underneath the stereo (see the pictures above). Without the relocation unit you can't mount the heater control underneath the stereo propery. Once the heater controls are moved the Dyanvin can be installed. The MP3 playback is very good. I have not tried it from a memory card, but I see no reason why you can't. Thanks Rookie, appreciate your time, a few more queries: - Do you know if the unit can play MP3's off a DVD as well, including a dual layer DVD ? Basically i want a load of MP3's without having to swap discs all the time. - Does anyone know the max size of USB drive the unit can handle ? - Does it have a DAB tuner ? The Dynavin site does not mention it but the TTints site does ! Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 14, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 14, 2010 Great wirte up they are almost there and I am happy ALL the steering controls now work, felt that was fundimental for the unit. How odd tho the colours dont match right, would have thought that was also fundimental to this unit, again lets hope they sort this. Happy to hear about the sound with the exception of the hiss, again that needs doing as does the caller display. one thing I did not see was anything about ipod? this can be plugged in right, do you have one? will you be trying ity on there too? as a key item in my ICE these days is my ipod I don't have an ipod, I have an Iphone, but I don't really use it for music so I have only connected that via Bluetooth. There is a good post on E46Fanatics here that talks about connecting an ipod. The answer is yes it can be plugged in and used. Thanks Rookie, appreciate your time, a few more queries: - Do you know if the unit can play MP3's off a DVD as well, including a dual layer DVD ? Basically i want a load of MP3's without having to swap discs all the time. - Does anyone know the max size of USB drive the unit can handle ? - Does it have a DAB tuner ? The Dynavin site does not mention it but the TTints site does ! Thanks No problems mate. I haven't tested MP3 playback off a DVD, but it is a good point, and I will test that later. It supports DVD's and MP3's so I see no reason why it won't work. I will post back a definite answer later. I am not sure what the maximum USB stick it can handle. Mine currently has a 2GB SD card that works fine. As for the DAB radio TTints advertise it as having one, and the radio quality is very good, but I am not 100% sure. I will send an email to Dynavin to get this confirmed... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m7alj Posted April 14, 2010 Report Share Posted April 14, 2010 had my dynavin installed today havnt had much time to try it that much but im well happy with what ive tried the sound quality is so much better than the bmw business sterero my iphone works fine bluetooth hooks up great & thats about all ive done just a word on ttints they were brilliant very profesional & gave me an excellent demo id defo recomend them ill have a good play at weekend & report Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stringy93 Posted April 14, 2010 Report Share Posted April 14, 2010 Top write up mate, glad someones bought one to give an honest opinion! From your review it sounds good. Im just still not sure if I want to spend £650 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ROOKiE Posted April 14, 2010 Author Report Share Posted April 14, 2010 Thanks Rookie, appreciate your time, a few more queries: - Do you know if the unit can play MP3's off a DVD as well, including a dual layer DVD ? Basically i want a load of MP3's without having to swap discs all the time. - Does anyone know the max size of USB drive the unit can handle ? - Does it have a DAB tuner ? The Dynavin site does not mention it but the TTints site does ! Thanks Just an update regarding MP3 playback from a DVD. I filled a DVD today with over 4GB of MP3's and it plays without any issues, however the load time on this disc is considerably longer than that of a CD, but this is to be expected. had my dynavin installed today havnt had much time to try it that much but im well happy with what ive tried the sound quality is so much better than the bmw business sterero my iphone works fine bluetooth hooks up great & thats about all ive done just a word on ttints they were brilliant very profesional & gave me an excellent demo id defo recomend them ill have a good play at weekend & report Glad you are pleased with it mate Top write up mate, glad someones bought one to give an honest opinion! From your review it sounds good. Im just still not sure if I want to spend £650 Thanks Stringy mate... The £650 price is indeed steep, but I personally have no regrets in paying that. The features and sound quality improvement have definitely made it worth while in my opinion. The Dynavin has solved what I felt was one of the biggest issues with the E46, the crap stereo! Obviously there are other routes to consider (factory Nav/Tv setup or a full double din), but these are more expensive and will be harder to install correctly. While the Dynavin isn't perfect, I feel it was the best bang for buck option for me to take, and when the noise bleed issue is resolved (hopefully with the new loom) and a few minor interface tweaks (hopefully from some Dynavin or some software modders) it will be even better Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
