negev Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 So I've just bought a 330, put a really decent sub system in it which is firing through the ski hatch and sounding awesome. Unfortunately it's a bit let down by the rest of the car which is the base stereo system originally installed by BMW. It has the double-din navigation head unit, which I understand is just a monitor and all the actual audio stuff like the amp, tuner etc are in the boot. The guys who did the sub told me that I'd be looking at £250 before I even started doing anything to put a new head unit in because they'd have to run all the cables through to the front where the nav unit is. So I guess I'll probably just have to bit the bullet at some point and do it, was wondering what the best option was for an aftermarket head unit for the E46? It would be nice to retain the computer and nav functions if possible (although honestly the nav is crap) but not the end of the world if I can't as I'm pretty sure you can still set the time using the stalk dials on the cluster. I have focal speakers from my old car which I will put in the rear parcel shelf and the front doors at some point. Really not sure what to do about the head unit though. I'm torn between leaving it semi-original as it is now, with just my new amp and sub in the boot that I can easily remove and put into my next car, or going all out for a better system on this car. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimp Choker Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 Hi. 3 options mate either an e46 specific unit like this. http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=111378342763&alt=web. Or a double din sat nav unit that will require you to cut the airbox for it to fit Or one of those parrot shallow double din units so you don't need to hack at the airbox. I have the 1st option and love it. Full Satnav as it's android however I also have a 4g dongle so have full Internet access. I have a Spotify premium account for music as well as power amp and about 50gb of music. It also has torque installed for engine management and diagnosis as below. As said I love it. There is also a massive thread on XDA-Developers site. Just Google huifei xda M3NXN and Cannockwolf 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 Hi, In addition to the above 3 options, there's a 4th I'll mention that further below. My recommendation will always be for a premium brand unit as everything about them is quality orientated. There's only two choices which are shallow depth and fully featured - the Alpine iLX-700 and/or the Parrot Asteroid Smart. These two options make fitting very very easy as no cutting and modifying of the airbox/pipes is needed. If you want to use a head unit with a disk mechanism, then you'll need to modify and that starts pushing the price up considerably. Here's what the Parrot Smart looks like in the E46 interior The cheap chinese units are ONLY good if you get a fully working unit upon delivery and that it stays working over time. Chances of that are actually relatively low due to all their internal electronics and components being of low grade/generic quality and the factory somewhere in China that makes them having lax quality standards. There's a number of users on this forum who seem to have got 'good' units, however for every one of those there's perhaps 10 or more other guys who got unit's with 'issues' and 'problems' ranging from the 'annoying but will live with it' level to the 'dead on arrival' and 'absolutely terrible' levels. In short, there's no consistency with what you'll get. Add that to relatively little or no support from the sellers/manufacturers they're basically a £300-650 gamble. The 4th option is to keep the oem head unit and setup and take all the outputs from the oem amplifier and connect up to a Sound Processor. That will intelligently 'clean' the signal and provide you with as best, non distorted, voltage boosted and flat signal as possible. Connect that to quality amplifier(s) and speakers, and it's the best solution for those guys who *must* keep the oem head unit but want as 'best' a signal to use with upgraded quality equipment. The '5th' option is to fit a full on car pc - however, there's perhaps only a handful of people who've gone this route. You can get all the oem and more functions to work via this route - it'd basically be a much better quality version of one of those cheap chinese units, but costs will quickly increase for when things need to be purchased. Each solution has it's own positive and negative points. The high quality aftermarket route gives the best value for money, expenditure and satisfaction, reliability and support (if needed), functionality and of course Sound Quality. The negative aspects are they don't have the oem'ish looks. The cheap chinese unit's have the positive of 'sort of oem'ish looks' but potentially everything else about them is a negative. The oem route has 100% oem looks and functionality, but it's very very expensive to keep the system working long term, very very expensive also to 'add on' functionality to it (bluetooth, keeping tv working, adding an iPod controller etc). The choice, is yours! Cheers, Dennis! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daz 330 Cs Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 I've had my Dynavin almost four years. Zero issues. It doesn't look "sort of OEMish", it looks like it came from the factory when the car was built Some of the aforementioned premium units look ridiculous. Cannockwolf 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 I've had my Dynavin almost four years. Zero issues. It doesn't look "sort of OEMish", it looks like it came from the factory when the car was built Some of the aforementioned premium units look ridiculous. To 'look' like it came from the factory, for me the buttons would be the same shape and size. None of the chinese E46 units have the same size/shape buttons so don't look 'completely factory' for me. It's great that your Dynavin unit hasn't had issues! however some recent purchasers have had problems etc. There's no one single chinese made unit that 'consistently' gets unit's working to what you've (and a handful of others) experienced. The Asteroid Smart pictured above doesn't have oem'ish looks as I've mentioned already - I think 'ridiculous' is perhaps too harsh of a word though! Cheers, Dennis! Naj 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gamesman2001 Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 I agree with chimp I have the erisin same as chimp has and it has everything built in satnav/dvd/sd card slot/plus a lot of android kitkat 4 witch is great for the internet only thing with mine is I have a separate d-tv tuner. but I carnt fault it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cannockwolf Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 There's a number of users on this forum who seem to have got 'good' units, however for every one of those there's perhaps 10 or more other guys who got unit's with 'issues' and 'problems' ranging from the 'annoying but will live with it' level to the 'dead on arrival' and 'absolutely terrible' levels. In short, there's no consistency with what you'll get. Add that to relatively little or no support from the sellers/manufacturers they're basically a £300-650 gamble. all you say is quite correct but i must stick up for the official UK Dynavin supplier here, he's always responded to questions, sent cables when asked for and i did have an issue with my unit last week, with the screen delaminating and had a replacement unit sent to me in 48 hrs, I bought the unit last july so still in the warranty period, but i did pay a £250 premium to get that service. The digital TV is great too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cannockwolf Posted March 14, 2015 Report Share Posted March 14, 2015 To 'look' like it came from the factory, for me the buttons would be the same shape and size. None of the chinese E46 units have the same size/shape buttons so don't look 'completely factory' for me. have to agree with this, why did they do that? they got the E39 unit spot on in my view Plus the menus do look like they belong on a bmw unit, thats a big plus for me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
negev Posted March 15, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 15, 2015 Thanks for all the replies, this is really useful. I guess the aftermarket head unit is the best option as the sound processor thing you mentioned Dennis probably just gives me better sound but doesn't give me bluetooth right? So then I'd still need some kind of bluetooth solution and it'd work out just as expensive anyway. That parrot headunit looks pretty good to me, will check out the other one you mentioned too. Unfortunately I probably won't be able to do this anytime soon as the audio shop quoted £250 just to run the wiring for a new head unit because I have the nav screen. If anyone knows somewhere I might be able to get it done for less I'd be very grateful! Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted March 15, 2015 Report Share Posted March 15, 2015 Hi Negev, You'll need to sharpen your search skills on these forums!! You can buy an extension cable which plugs into the back of the car where the loom is and run it to the front dash area and it'll give you power, ground, antenna, amp switch on lead etc. It's around £50/60 to purchase. Commonly known as a FAKRA extension cable you'll want the 5 metre version. The sound processor won't give you features like bluetooth. Each option you could go for will have it's respective fans for differing reasons. You just need to work out which best suits you. Gamesman2001 - This is great for you! as mentioned before, for every 'one' owner of a chinese unit that fully works and continues to work long term, there's perhaps 10 others who have issues/problems with their units and causes lots of grief and stress as well as wastage of money. 'Hopefully', your unit will continue to work well ! Cannockwolf - Recently, there has been mentionings of 'the official UK dynavin importer'... is there a good reason why this company isn't ever mentioned by name?!! according to this dynavin.com website, there's quite a number of UK fitting centres/dealers - http://www.dynavinstore.com/Installationbut no mentions on the forum where owners have gone to such a dealer and had a unit fitted. There's no UK address listed for 'the importer' either, and their returns policy doesn't make it clear where to return the goods in the event of a warranty claim. If there's owners who've had a unit fitted by the 'dealers' they have listed, they should return units to them etc as the contract of sale lies with those dealers. It's all a bit funny and not 'clear' with UK representation of 'Dynavin' and it's the same with other chinese brands in the UK too. As for the aesthetics of the E46 unit, no idea why they decided to use oversized blocks for the buttons, perhaps whoever was in charge of the design in whichever factory made them missed his optician appointment that week, or was forced to go work outside in the smog ? !! Cheers, Dennis! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cannockwolf Posted March 15, 2015 Report Share Posted March 15, 2015 (edited) he is on ebay i was pointed to them by dynavins website irrc, and bunbgers pointed me to ebay where i got a discount on the offer system, his details are www.auto-electronics.com | sales@auto-electronics.com | +44(0)845 075 6050 Status Vehicle Technology 26 Broadstone Road Reddish Stockport SK5 7AE Edited March 15, 2015 by Cannockwolf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted March 15, 2015 Report Share Posted March 15, 2015 Hi CW Thanks, I think I did skim read that from you earlier.. Here's auto-electronics 'About Us' page.. http://www.auto-electronics.com/index.php/about-us/ Most of their other 'helpful links' are the same! However, I do now see that in fact the company itself are named status vehicle technology and are based in stockport UK - they do appear to be very amateurish at best with their website and hardly inspire confidence ! glad you've had a decent response from them, seems a few other's haven't though ! Cheers, Dennis! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cannockwolf Posted March 15, 2015 Report Share Posted March 15, 2015 i try to be very neutral in how i view people even if ive invested a lot of money in them and it would be embarrassing to admit it, id still name and shame Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DelMonty Posted March 23, 2015 Report Share Posted March 23, 2015 Do you know if and when Alpine plan to release an Android Auto version of the iLX-700? After having an Andrive 2.5 I'm not sure about trying another variant of these Chinese units. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted March 25, 2015 Report Share Posted March 25, 2015 Hi, Alpine have placed themselves as very close Apple partners what with release of the iLX-700 Apple CarPlay car head unit and the Alpine headphones for home/portable audio use http://www.alpineheadphones.com/ So, for now, it looks like they'll not do an Android Auto head unit. That said, Given that both platforms will likely be used in many new cars from many manufacturers, it makes sense to cover both, and I think that will also happen for the premium brand aftermarket partners - currently only Alpine and Pioneer offer Carplay. Parrot will support both platforms in the Q3/Q4 2105 release date for the RNB6 head unit, the only aftermarket brand to make such an announcement so far. I don't think any Chinese unit will support either platform officially, the requirements to license means everything needs to be high quality. Perhaps if one of the chinese brands invests the multiple millions of dollars making their product reliable and competent in every department and begin to gain a reputation for quality, perhaps Apple or Google might officially partner with them ?! Cheers, Dennis! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cdodds2004 Posted April 9, 2015 Report Share Posted April 9, 2015 does the parrot and alpine unit fit without having to cut the heater box? anybody on the forum got one installed? would like to hear a review Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DennisCooper Posted April 9, 2015 Report Share Posted April 9, 2015 (edited) does the parrot and alpine unit fit without having to cut the heater box? anybody on the forum got one installed? would like to hear a review The answer is Yes! (as mentioned in post no.3 in this thread) both the Alpine iLX-700 and the Parrot Asteroid Smart fit without having to modify the cabin airbox. I use the Parrot Asteroid in my E39 and had it from the day it was actually released - no issues, no problems and it works (I had 2 instances where one of my amplifiers didn't switch on about 18 months ago and about 2 months apart, I think it didn't sense the auto on pulse - thats as far as any 'issues' with my unit have gone) The Alpine unit is very new and there's some guys on the M3cutters forum who've just installed them and feedback is also similarly excellent. In 'case' you get issues, you can be in touch with the retailer of the unit or the manufacturers HQ's which are in the UK and you'll get excellent support. Cheers, Dennis! Edited April 9, 2015 by DennisCooper Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cdodds2004 Posted April 9, 2015 Report Share Posted April 9, 2015 thanks dennis im well and truly sick of my Chinese unit. I need something premium Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
