Experience with Dension 500S BT and Recommendation
#91
You have to remove your PCM 2.1 and find pin 5 of the PCM. Hook up your Dension 500S BT positive wire to it. It's the white wire. This is the switched power positive used for the antenna. PCM sends out + voltage to Dension gateway when u push power button or start car. tap there and call it goodnight! in a nut shell, it starts everything from time zero. Trust me do it and you will smile. End of story. I will open a ticket with Dension and ask them to review the circuits "window of detection". I believe this is where the problem for us " Porsche" owners with PCM 2.1 reside. Are cars FOT is to fast for the Dension to respond to the transmit LED going into the Slow as kcuf Dension. Sumatra coffee at Starbucks when u can :-)
#93
Let me know mine crashed all the time hooking it up as recomended. At first it worked then it did not, then it did, then it did not.....you get it. After I did that, goodnight. starts all the time. I have factory cd changer looped out.
Last edited by Al Nunez; 10-18-2014 at 05:49 PM.
#94
Reason they want u to hook it up to positive uswitched is for the unit to be ready for the transmit LED(light) that starts(wakes) the Dension. Part of any engineering design is efficiency. In today's systems, power conservation is key deaign. Dension sleeps and does not hear the alarm going off sometimes. It's been reported here and in many forums. Great unit but just too slow! When it comes to detection gates within the unit. My solution simply tells the unit "heads up, incoming". When they correct that if they do, I will hook it up as designed.
#96
If you all need an explanation of what I mean by sensitivity of the Dension, well here it is. Hopefully they can optimise the window of detection so that in our particular installation, this unit will function without the need to reset the system every time we push the PCM button or insert the key. If your not an engineer, it may be difficult to understand but it is a general design topology on the front end of any MOST input(receive light) and output( transmit light). It's a ring topology using FOT. Like I have mentioned, the Dension appears to not wake up when a light source is input. If it does not, then the Dension does not output a transmit signal to the rest of the devices. Hence the shutdown of the Porsche PCM. It could be a component tollerance issue.
http://www.avagotech.com/cs/Satellit...&ssbinary=true
http://www.avagotech.com/cs/Satellit...&ssbinary=true
Last edited by Al Nunez; 10-18-2014 at 06:03 PM.
#97
Just my 2 cents on getting power.... I had the factory CD-changer in the frunk which was no longer useful after getting the Dension. So it had been disconnected and the power is now feeding the Dension instead.
It's been months now and so far so good.
It's been months now and so far so good.
Last edited by simoncpw; 10-18-2014 at 08:56 PM. Reason: corrected typo
#100
Hi All
Rewired the dension so the positive feed is connected to the white wire (pin 5) rather than the constant power. So far so good - no annoying crashes! Thanks Al Nunez
Will report back in a couple of days if all continues to be well.
Next challenge - find a way of getting rid of the very high pitch whine I can hear sometimes.... I assume it's the typical amp / alternator thing but i don't remember hearing it before the Dension was fitted. If anyone has any idea on this please let me know!
Thanks again Al for the fix!
Rewired the dension so the positive feed is connected to the white wire (pin 5) rather than the constant power. So far so good - no annoying crashes! Thanks Al Nunez
Will report back in a couple of days if all continues to be well.
Next challenge - find a way of getting rid of the very high pitch whine I can hear sometimes.... I assume it's the typical amp / alternator thing but i don't remember hearing it before the Dension was fitted. If anyone has any idea on this please let me know!
Thanks again Al for the fix!
#101
Great!!! Now, next step is to report this to Dension to have them build a firmware exclusive to Porsche PCM 2.1. I believe the problem resides in the Densions inability to report back to the PCM 2.1. Please try all peripheral devices, for example, Ipod, USB, lightning cable, Android..etc. For the noise, make sure you have a good ground. It's fiber, not supposed to allow EMI in.
#102
I spoke with Al at length. His approach is very elegant.
Earlier in this thread, we postulated that connecting to a switched power (from the fuse box) would force the Dension to reboot at every start, and may be a workaround for the issue known as "bluetooth reconnection crash" or "the clicking sound at start".
Al's approach is to use the white power line that feeds power from the PCM to the retracting antenna (? who use these anymore ?). This is a very elegant workaround to the issue.
I will have time this coming week-end to test it on my car. I will report as well. I don't expect that approach to solve the other issue "intermittent switching between iPod and GW AUX interfaces", when a USB-Lightning cable is used to connect an iPhone to the gateway. But if bluetooth works and is stable, it would be sufficient for most of us.
Thanks Al, and looking forward to testing your approach on my car soon!
Earlier in this thread, we postulated that connecting to a switched power (from the fuse box) would force the Dension to reboot at every start, and may be a workaround for the issue known as "bluetooth reconnection crash" or "the clicking sound at start".
Al's approach is to use the white power line that feeds power from the PCM to the retracting antenna (? who use these anymore ?). This is a very elegant workaround to the issue.
I will have time this coming week-end to test it on my car. I will report as well. I don't expect that approach to solve the other issue "intermittent switching between iPod and GW AUX interfaces", when a USB-Lightning cable is used to connect an iPhone to the gateway. But if bluetooth works and is stable, it would be sufficient for most of us.
Thanks Al, and looking forward to testing your approach on my car soon!
#103
Thanks guys. Appreciate the efforts and sharing of info.
Yaredna: have you tried another iPhone/cable combination? Or even an iPod? Your hard wired disconnections may be a separate hardware fault.
Yaredna: have you tried another iPhone/cable combination? Or even an iPod? Your hard wired disconnections may be a separate hardware fault.
#104
Eric@bumperplugs has not been helpful, other than asking me to verify the MOST and power connections. I submitted the log file, but haven't heard back from him in two months.
It may be that I have received a defective unit, but it doesn't seem that there is a recourse, other than *****ing on forums. The seller (bumper plugs) refuses to recognize that my unit may be defective.
In summary, I'll try soon the Nunez-Hack, named after Al, and will live with it until i pull the plug on the entire PCM thingy.
#105
Have you tried a USB drive with a few mp3's' or another iOS device? Would be worth experimenting. Might also pay to adjust the sleep setting on the iPhone and see if that has any impact.
If there's anyone else locally with a Dension you could swap units and test.
If there's anyone else locally with a Dension you could swap units and test.