swauto

We have just imported our X5 (2012 blue performance model) to Sydney and are having problems with trying to change the GPS (a 2011 Japan map system) to Australian maps and also the radio. BMW said they will need to change the hardware - a component or more components and will be very expensive and with no guarantee it will work. The information they gave me was they will need a CIC part number 6G129220074 for $2,079 (part only). Anyway - I am wondering if any of this makes sense to you and/or you have more information. Anything will be appreciated.

We can help you convert it no problem

Hi folks,

I recently purchased my first bimmer- an X1 ( jap import ). Its a 2010 sdrive18i.

Few queries for this please;

1. I was told that navigation conversion to NZ is not advisable, as the dna is japanese & that if this is done and for

any future issues, if BMW plugs in to check, the computer will reset the system back to japanese dna. This will

result in all settings being lost. I was told this by Jeff Gray BMW and also another vendor thru Trademe whom

i had approached for this. Is this true?

2. Mine doesn't have PDC. I was given a quote of 2300$ by Jeff Gray.

Is there any cheaper & reliable options available please.

3. My steering wheel has buttons for bluetooth, voice recognition. but upon trying it doesn't work.

The dealer told me it is all present & needs to be enabled for use. Is there any way to check if it will work & if i am checking it wrongly.

Any inputs on this please?

Appreciate if experienced folks can help me out, as this is my first BMW and would like to have the best of

without having issues & also in lieu of future re-sale value when we decide on our next X3.

Thanks in advance.

we can do all you want.

also we have fully integrated PDC solution for your car as well, the price will be way lower than dealer has quote you.

is this original aux port, or retrofitted ?

have this 2007 e64 M6

nz new etc

but there is no nav disc in the dvd player drive

wants involved in getting one of these??

the car is spec'd to have navigation etc

also whats required to get a ipod or usb device to play music through it etc

also it has blutooth in the menu but I cant get it to sync with my iphone 5s

thanks brent

If you post your vin number, I can check to see if the bluetooth module is install in your car or not. However, from the picture you have posted, the idrive software is way too old, which is year 2004, looks like your car has not been updated since that time. but your said your car is 2007? so I believe the CCC computer has been replaced with a used one from 2004.

Also even you have bmw oem bluetooth, you will not be able to see the contact name, because it does not compatible with iPhone contact name push profile

For BMW without Front PDC now you can retrofit it with our newly released product

It also allow you to install aftermarket camera which will be fully integrated into iDrive system

BMW FRONT PDC retrofit kits for BMW 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 SER F20,F30,F10,F07,F01,F22,F34,F32

Map will not going to work, the whole CIC system has to be modified in order to take the nz map.

Hi Guys

Finally got some time to put some infomation here.

Thanks to the USA distributor has done a really good job to wrte up this review.

This is a very detailed review and hope you guys can see the big improvment on this product.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The new N6 unit is 2 years in the making, with a big emphasis on higher quality audio components, features, and improved ease of use. You audiophiles will appreciate features like 24bit burr brown D/A converters, 5 band EQ, time alignment, 4 volt preamp outputs (for those of you with aftermarket amps), basically higher end internals across the board... The result is cleaner sound, much more consistent performance, a much better user interface, and a better appearance.

....and the best part? The price went DOWN....

WHATS NEW?


The "hard buttons" on each side have the same configuration as dynavin has had from the beginning but I noticed right away that the previously "clicky" buttons are now "soft touch". Subtle but nice upgrade and similar to a lot of dynavins more recent models. The knobs are similar to those on the D99 and newer, and thats a good thing, solid with a muted click as they turn. Other than that the unit has a similar "feel" and is cosmetically similar to earlier units.



Digital Music: IPOD/SD/USB/Internal HD

As part of the simplification and refinement of the new N6 user interface the ipod, SD, USB, and the internal 4GB storage functions all share the same basic interface. Simple and intuitive, with selections for artist/album/song/playlist, and in the case of SD and USB, additional selections for folders/video files/picture files. The list can be swiped up and down and there is a scroll bar on the side AND a quick jump alphabetical search allowing you to jump to any letter in the lists so large libraries are no longer a problem to navigate.

Also in the name of simplicity the ipod now just plugs into the USB plug, no more proprietary cables, no more need for lighting adapters for the newer apple devices. Just use the cables you already have. The unit comes with a USB extension to get the rear mounted USB media plug to the glove compartment, console, etc... and we also have on our website flush mount USB plugs and ipod to USB cables if you want to do something a little more custom.


Album art now displays alongside the track info. As you can see, clean and refined is what Dynavin was after here....
Interestingly apps like pandora display similarly (from my iphone at least), displaying track info and album art.

For those of you interested in higher end audio the unit will play lossless files, In my testing FLAC files played fine from USB and SD and Apple lossless (ALAC) played fine from an ipod.





Source Selection Screen

Like previous Dynavin units the MODE button brings up a source selection screen, large easy to press on-screen buttons display your most used sources for easy selection. You actually don't see these screens much....only when switching sources or getting into the settings menus.



Swiping the screen side to side reveals a selection various settings menus and ALL of the potential sources.





While the Radio, Phone, and Navigation buttons are fixed on the home screen the other two are selectable so you can put your most used functions there for easy access.




BLUTOOTH PHONE

Dynavin continues to work with Parrot on the bluetooth system, its now cleaner than ever, will display your phonebook, and has a quick alphabetical search function to jump to any letter in the alphabet. As before it works with the phone buttons on your steering wheel. There is a built in mic AND an external mic, as before I recommend using the external mic as it allows you to experiment with its location for best results.





BLUETOOTH AUDIO STREAMING (A2DP)

This is another big step forward, the Bluetooth audio streaming quality is now as good as plugging in, It connects pretty much immediately and works with apps like pandora, stitcher, etc... in addition to your standard media apps. In addition track info is now displayed on the screen:



The steering wheel control buttons work as well, including in apps like pandora. I find that this is now my go-to choice as a music source.


RADIO, CD, DVD etc...

The radio is what you would expect, 15 presets, RDS, Pretty standard stuff here. Settings for different regions etc...

The unit plays CDs, DVDs, etc.... same as before.







NAVIGATION

As with previous dynavin units we are able to offer our units with pre-installed, licensed iGo Primo on our Dynavin units. This program has long been a favorite of the "hacker community" and I know some of our competitors are pirating it but Im glad to say we can offer it to everybody in a legit legal way. The licenses are not cheap but we include Primo with all of our Dynavin units. This also greatly simplifies things like future map updates etc... as iGo is well established and has an easy upgrade path available via their website www.naviextras.com

Its clean and intuitive, easy to quickly search and enter addresses, all the maps are already on board so no internet connection is needed.






The new N6 unit has an option to overlay the current media info over the nav screen, displaying track info and album art



A few more iGo Primo Screens...

Main Menu




Main Map screen









REVERSE FUNCTIONS

As always the new Dynavin N6 will work with a reverse camera, but dynavin continues to refine this function to work with PDC (parking sensors, if your car has them) and is completely configurable within the settings menu. You can have just a backup camera, PDC, backup cam WITH PDC displayed, or nothing at all.

In cars that have canbus connected steering angle sensors the unit can even display parking assist lines that move based on steering angle, this is model dependent and remains to be seen what all cars it will work in....but for those where it does its some cool eye candy:




AUDIO FUNCTIONS

Here is where some of the biggest changes are.....Dynavin is going after a higher end market and as such has added a lot of good audio features to the new N6. Time alignment, three band bass/mid/treble AND a 5 band EQ with separate sub control, 4 volt RCAs for clean signal transmission to aftermarket amps, and 24bit burr brown D/A converters....you old school audio guys will know what thats about.



Most of you guys probably dont know what time alignment is or what to do with it but its probably the single biggest factor affecting sound quality in a car stereo environment, this adjustment allows for you to delay the speakers at the 4 corners of the car independently so that the sound from each reaches your ears as the same time....basically putting YOU in the "sweet spot". Ive been running time alignment of one kind or another for a couple decades now, in my opinion its a MUST HAVE for any higher end system. One thing to keep in mind though is setting this wrong can also make your system sound terrible so its important to at least understand the basic fundamentals of time delay before you jump into this setting. Also keep in mind this is optimizing ONE spot in the car at the detriment to the other seating positions. So if you regularly listen to music with passengers you may not want to use these settings.



5 band EQ, self explanatory:







LIGHTING AND SCREEN ILLUMINATION

Dynavins have always had matching button lighting, not a big deal, but FYI, the buttons match the other buttons in the car and dim with the dash light dimmer. Nice and OEM.

Now this next thing may not sound like a big deal at first, but for day to day, real world use....its HUGE. The LCD dimmer can be configured in multiple ways and the dimming amount is fully adjustable. There is now an onboard ambient light sensor as well. SO you can set the unit up to dim when your headlights come on OR when the sensor sees its getting dark, or you can dim it manually. There are pros and cons to each approach and the overall ambient lighting where you are at and your headlight use habits will dictate which setup will work best for you. The adjustable LCD dimmer looks great as it does not just darken the screen as most "dimmers" do, it dims the backlight, so there is no "LCD glow" at night. Between the nicely dimmed screen and the clean white/red on black interface this is the best looking aftermarket unit at night ive ever seen

A night pic in my E92,





E46 night pic.....







ETC...

You can set the boot screen to whatever you like. Put it on a SD or USB and select it as your boot screen, real simple. A word about start up.... The N6 has about a 20 second boot time BUT dynavin has done something clever, the unit starts booting when you unlock or open a door.... and it does not fully turn off until about 20 minutes after you shut the car off, it goes into a standby mode. So in regular use, running errands, that sort of thing, you rarely see the boot screen, or if you do its only for a few seconds. I like things clean and OEM so I went with this in my personal car....




Dynavin went to an oem style Fakra antenna plug on the unit so that the cars antenna can plug directly into the unit without any adapters. One less thing to install, one less thing to go wrong. For those of you with the old style antenna they provide an adapter.






There is still an OBC display but at least on the E46 it doesnt show much at this time....just a couple temps:





On my E92 there is a lot more, Im assuming this is a canbus/ibus difference thing, I guess it just depends on the particular model:




Finally, a word about updates. Dynavin is really pushing the "DynOS" thing on these units. They have built into the unit (and their new website) an easy update path so that as they develop and activate new features it will be easy to update the units. The current units are running DynOS 1.0.0. so its clear that they intend the current unit to be "generation one" for their software. Its fairly finished as is, but I guess they have things in the pipeline.

I was skeptical of this approach as marketing this as a feature obligates you to use it but Dynavin assures me they have plans in this regard and they have given me a few details about things they are working on. Dont expect huge, earth shattering, changes. But just know that there are further refinements and a few interesting features in the works and as time goes on these will be easy to apply to existing units.



Finished look:

Hi there,

I am based in Wellington, can you fix remotely and what is the cost? It sounds like both has happened to my car...I don't have any bass in car and seems like the speaker in the back...from what I have read, the speakers under the seat aren't making sound now.

Cheers,

yes, we can fix it for you. contact us via phone to schedule a time. we also need some more info about your car and current spec

Today I had my firmware upgrade on my 2009 BMW 135I to be like a NZ new model and replace the japan software that it had on it. Everything went fine and I got radio + Navigation through a place in town which does work for our local BMW franchisee. However, on driving away the sound quality was really poor (No bass and really quiet) and the radio reception was really poor....my gut feeling from putting in older style radios in older style cars, was cables were in backwards or similar, but the electrician assured me that could happen with this.

He is getting some software/computer to do some testing on Monday...but really interested to know what your thoughts are on this and what may have caused it?

I guess you have CIC equipped car, the JAPAN CIC radio tuner hardware is different to European model, the normal software conversion will result poor radio reception. We do have solution to fix it. For sound quility issue, it maybe caused by wrong coding

For what its worth, Ive tried contacting Renming @ SWautomotive several of times about a link to download updated maps for my WinCE D99 but have never had a reply. Good luck Peter, let us know how you get on.

Well, not sure where did you send email to? We haven't received your email.

The business name has changed to Auto Gravity

Contact us: info@autogravity.co.nz

Or 09 6390168

Retrofit CIC is the way to go. We can do the retrofitting with different options. Reversing camera...etc

This is a Japan import BMW, we have converted the hundreds of them to NZ radio and navigation with NZ map. We also retrofit BMW oem integrated bluetooth etc..

Contact us, we can sort everything out for you very easy.

I've been wanting to know if the obc functions are still able to be used too. Care to elaborate?

only can view 4 values from obc but you can't set them anymore

Hey guys,

Just a question to the guys running the WinCE version of the D99. Do any of you know where to download up-to-date mapping software for my sat nav? The unit was installed around Feb this year so Im looking to update the maps. Ive contacted Renming at SWAUTO but he hasnt replied in a while.

I havent checked what file format the maps are on the microSD, is it a common satnav file extension? Can I pull the maps say, off a TomTom and itll work?

Secondly, is anyone aware of a firmware update for the D99? Ive noticed a few bugs that are starting to annoy me with the unit, if theres a new firmware available that would be sweet. Ive contacted Dynavin to ask but, no reply..

Cheers,

Nick

Sorry, I may missed your email.

You can call me to discuss the map update

i want to be able to at least skip tracks etc with the buttons on the steering wheel

What about BMW OEM ipod system we can retrofit it for you

video demo

Dr Kahu likes this.

I'm not up to speed on the different units, so it might sound like a silly question, but how does this work out for basic M-ASK units without nav & phone, and how is it integrated (i.e connected) with an iPod?

This is specially designed for the car with M-ASK without nav and phone.

The original oem screen will be replaced with this unit. This new unit will have bluetooth phone, iPod, navigation build -in. so original M-ASK feature will be still retained on that screen, and you can use idrive controller to go between new system and oem system and also control all those new features with it.

Now, is in stock

Price: $1750 installed

Support OEM idrive controller, so you can use your idrive controller to control the new system

Relly good deal for those E60 or E90 with smaller 6.5" screen.

Support reversing camera, and OEM parking sensor display.

price would be helpful

Price is around $1000 including paddle shuffling steering wheel.

Hi,

It would be good to provide some details to go with your photos like of how you did it what parts you used and anything to look out for. Does the paddle shift and all the buttons work as they should?

We provide the installation service.This can't be just DIY, as it may does not work properly without coding

Hi. Can anyone explain how to activate the 'greyed out ' Audio Aux option. BMW have looked and say it is coded and it is on the vehicle order. It is last in line on the entertainment screen with FM, AM, CD, DAB, & Audio Aux.

UK import 2007 530 LCI M Sport, manual. Prof Nav. Has the usb and round plug in the armrest.

Many thanks in advance. Rob

very easy to activate, we can do the coding for you. Dealer does not know there are 2 type of AUX options. each one of them has to be coded with according VO, we can do the special coding even for defferent VO in your car.

New update D99 DVN-E39A android version is now in stock

There are some major update on this new version including graphic of PDC, DVD Player, USB Player...etc

Now we doing special price for it $1550 limited stock.

suitable for E39, E53

how do i get a proper ipod dock? the car has an aux in plug for the stereo and also has a cd stacker in the hatch with the following options noted for the stereo

663 RADIO BMW PROFESSIONAL

672 CD CHANGER BMW FOR 6 CDS

677 HIFI SYSTEM PROFESSIONAL

must look original

We can do BMW OEM iPod retrofit

OR

BMW OEM 6FL USB/IPOD with 644 bluetooth fully integrated for your car.

Diversity tuner is one thing

The ability to control the BMW diversity antenna switcher is another

Does the Dynavin have the 2 x different diversity antenna switch control signals that the BMW needs?

Pre 2001: IF signal output on small coax cable to tell diversity switch when to switch

Post 2001: IF signal output on same antenna cable to tell diversity switch when to switch

you main the ZF signal I think