thunder04

iTrader: (1)

Hey Guys,

I bought the DICE iPod Integration Kit in '07 and it had always been a little flaky (slightly annoying, but tolerable as I found ways around the annoyances). Well...as I was listening to my iPod on my way to work it officially stopped working for good. It won't charge the iPod, I don't hear any audio, and the iPod doesn't respond to the controls on the steering wheel or head unit.

Should I just buy a current generation DICE unit, or is there a better iPod adapter out there?

I currently have an old 20 GB iPod Color (bought in '05), but I'd like to upgrade to an iPhone some day.

FWIW, I have an '04 /w Navi.

ofusball21

I have an 04 as well without Navi and have always used the USA Spec iPod adapter. I got it from Crutchfield shortly after I got the car. (Had a coupon at the time so you might be able to find it cheaper elsewhere). Has worked fine since I got it. Highly recommend it.

princelybug

iTrader: (16)

There are pros and cons to all the iPod integration kits. If you want to stick with Dice, all you have to do is call them and tell them your situation. They have great customer service, from my experience. They might ship you a new updated unit for a discounted price. You never know.

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

Well, I may have voided my warranty...

About a year ago the unit started to rattle terribly. I opened it up and found that the board inside was loose, so I took my low temp hot glue gun and stuck a fat bead of glue under neath the board. Solved the rattling issue. I guess I can call them and explain the situation 100% (in case they want my old unit back) and see what happens?

princelybug

iTrader: (16)

^


I mean...it can't hurt to try. The worst they can say is, "No." But, I'm sure if you speak with them, they'll at least give you a discount on a new unit.

fast1

I just replaced my USASpec PA-11 with a PA-15 unit. The old one had a short in one of the wires and I couldn't find a place to buy just the harness I needed. The PA-15 has a slightly different interface but is a nice update to the nearly bullet-proof PA-11.

jswim99

I had some quality problems with my first DICE units a few years ago--sometimes it wouldn't start when starting the car, and the only way to recover was to turn the engine off then back on again! It took awhile to convince them, but DICE eventually sent me a replacement unit that has been fine ever since.

I guess my point is that flaky hardware is pretty common for them.

Also, the good news is that by upgrading your unit, you'll get charging compatibility with all the latest ipods/iphones (mine won't charge an iphone).

ofusball21

Yeah I don't have charging in newer ipods/iphones either for my USA Spec. You can just buy the cable right and not the entire kit again?

msmching

btw.. what does FWIW means?

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

FWIW - For What It's Worth.

I think I'm going to e-mail Dice...if they can't do anything for me, then I'll just buy the newest USA Spec adapter.

Nogard13

Any word? I've been thinking of upgrading mine.

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

Not yet. It started working again last week...but I think it's officially dead dead now. Didn't work at all during my 60 mile commute this morning.

I'll e-mail Dice and see what they say. I'm guessing I'll have to pull the unit to grab a serial number or something.

If there isn't anything they can do for me (which is understandable), I'm going to go with the newest USA Spec adapter for sure.

kaliraver69

I got the newest Dice unit and it is a big improvement over the first units they released. They fixed the start up issue and don't have to turn off the car and then turn it on to get it to work. I had to replace my original when my stereo lights when out and they swapped out the whole head unit. My first Dice unit wouldn't work at all with the new head unit. I bought a new one since I really liked my first one except for some bugs that it had, and the new one is really nice and works every time now. BTW, I contacted Dice electronics before I bought my new one and they wouldn't help me out at all.

jswim99

I think it's more than just a cable...

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

So I went ahead and picked up the PA15-HON2 USASPEC kit. Everything works great so far. Though, when playing with the different modes you can set the adapter to operate in (two text and one non-text mode), I discovered something...



I have an '04 /w navi...I don't remember XM being an option for the TSX in 2004. Was it?

It doesn't quite work, though. It'll show the song information but that's it. I can't switch songs or "XM channels" or control the iPod in any way, shape, or form. If I switch inputs, like to FM, I'm stuck...I can't switch back to the iPod.

Everything works fine when the USASPEC adapter is set to the non-text mode. I'm just curious if it'd be possible for me to "hack" the text display to work?! That would be SWEET!!

fast1

interesting

fast1

Are those MP3s or ACC songs that are showing up?

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

Why would it matter what format the music is in (I assume you mean 'AAC')? It's my iPod.

fast1

Yes AAC.. just curiosity if it was the iTunes music or MP3s (or both) that were being read by the adapter.

sortudo7

Odd situation. I have the iSimple and love it eventhough I'm a bit late lol. Also, it sounds like maybe some wiring was loose somewhere too. Anywho, that is odd how you're having those issues. You should ask the company as I'm not familiar with that ipod adapter. I know with the iSimple it had different settings with the pins on the actual body of the adapter and if you messed with them you had different results.

thunder04

iTrader: (1)

Well, that specific song was purchased from ITMS, so it is an unprotected AAC. I have a mixture of MP3s and AAC encoded music. I don't think the format really matters as the iPod is what's decoding the data and streaming it to the USASPEC adapter.

The DICE unit I had started showing problems early on (shortly after purchasing it in 2007). The adapter would go into various states of unresponsive-ness. Up until recently, it didn't happen very often, so I brushed it off as quirky technology.

In every case, the first symptom was that the display above the navi display would go blank (minus displaying "CD-C"), and if I switched from CD-C to any other input, I couldn't switch back. I assume this is because the head unit and DICE adapter lost communication (for whatever reason) and it caused confusion among the devices.

I noticed that, sometimes, the DICE adapter would respond to track changes via the head unit, but NOT from the steering wheel. In this case, turning the head unit off and then back on fixed the problem.

However, other times, the DICE adapter wouldn't respond to track changes at all. To fix this, this required turning the car off and then back on.

Recently, before the unit totally crapped itself, the issues above started occurring more frequently. I even noticed that at times, when the unit would go unresponsive, it would stop charging the iPod and would cause all navi controls to stop functioning. When THIS happened, I literally had to disconnect the DICE adapter before things would function again. The navi instantly became responsive, and it was still connected to the DICE wiring harness...so I know the connection between the head unit and the DICE wiring harness was fine. It's possible that the wiring harness had a problematic connection somewhere, but I didn't want to gamble. I'm guessing that the DICE unit would become stuck in a bad state and flood the bus with garbage which killed any communication between the navi and head unit.

I dealt with this until it became to frequently. I decided to purchase the USASPEC adapter when the DICE adapter would die not even 5-10 minutes into my commute (which, in the afternoon, can be as long as 1:45).

I didn't know about the iSimple until after I ordered and received my USASPEC unit. I may have gone with it if I had known about it sooner. Though, I was able to find the USASPEC adapter for cheap (well, ~$120, not sure how "cheap" that is).

The USASPEC adapter has some querks of its own that I'm going to have to get used to.

1) When I connect my iPod, it aromatically switches the input on the head unit. I guess you can equate this to inserting a CD, but in the mornings I don't listen to my iPod right away so it's annoying.

2) I wish it defaulted to disc 8 instead of disc 7...or at least remembered the last disc you selected when you unplugged the iPod.

3) This may not be USASPEC's fault, but my iPod periodically crashes when initially connecting it to the adapter. More specifically, when trying to change from disc 7 to disc 8 3-5 seconds after connecting it. Maybe I need to give the iPod and USASPEC more time to "handshake"? I don't know...but it did it to me right after I installed the adapter, and it did it to me this morning when getting ready to go to work.