I purchased a 2008 navi on ebay which never came with a disc. I bought a new disc through the ebay link that everyone is recommending but my screen says 'unable to read disc- please contact dealer'. Without my base model compass unit I lost the option to change the time of day and change the screen color.

I don't know much about electronics, but I assume that the navigation is working correctly since it is communicating with the screen. It sucks that this is happening because everyone reported that their ebay disc works.

It would be great to find someone in the area with a 2006+ navi disc that I can borrow to see if that works.

Anyone have any ideas? Anyone in the NY tri-state area want to help a brother out?

 

I jumped in here to see the date that I posted this. I now have 2 ebay discs that do not work. My white dvd update disc just arrived today. All 3 discs do not work, damn it. So it is obviously the navigation unit I bought on ebay. This is the first time I have been ripped off on ebay. The seller wont respond to any of my messages. I can not get a human being on the ebay phone. I've been trying to start a claim on the site for a month now and every time it tells me error- please try again. The listing isn't available to view anymore. So frustrating...

Have a nice day everyone

 

that sucks... so you have no original discs, or are the eBay ones real?

 

It did not come with the original disc so I bought an ebay copy 2014 update. I contacted the seller of the disc and he was nice enough to mail me another one for free. After that one didn't work, I met with another AZ member and tried his updated real white disc. It didn't work either but he said his came with 2 discs: 1 disc to update and the one that stays in the unit all the time. He sold the first disc that updates. He does not have the 2005 model.
I call Navteq and they said the 2014's come with only one disc, so I buy it knowing I can return it. That ones does not work either.
The navigation unit powers on, and communicates with the screen, but is unable to read any discs.

 

I can send you an update disc, I got it with my last map update.

 

Here's the skinny with the drives. Your discs are likely fine.
The DVD transports for the Nav units are crap.
Alpine outsourced the DVD units from China as they sometimes do for the low end head units. Branded Alpine units containing DVD drives have a much higher quality drive assembly. I'm talking the drive assembly and not the entire Nav ECU. The drive assembly comes out of the NAV ECU with a few screws and a disconnected ribbon cable.
I know all this because I am currently consulting with a large company in Texas that supplies some of the chips for the two drive units Alpine used in the Gen 2 RLs. Supplies as in the drives are still being manufactured and quite a few Chinese mobile electronics companies use them.
Pointless info? Fraid' so as the unit still needs to be replaced. Mechanical failures are what killed mine and many others and started my journey into trying to find a penny pinching way to not pay Alpine 300 bills to replace the drive.
Sorry

 

TI chips?

 

Thank you for all that info Brokenhead. I've been lazy about replacing it. I found a company on ebay that will repair it for $350 but I have not contacted them. I didn't know Alpine would do it for $300.

 

any update brokenhead? im holding of about getting my player replace since it struck on the check disc screen and i dont want to replace it from a junk yard one cause my subwoofers are probably just going to fuck it up again.

 

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Update yes! I travel for work and I've been in Argentina. Sorry all. I found a manufacturer in China that sources just the DVD drive units. If your NAV ECU is good and all you get are Disc errors then this is good news. Good news to the tune of a few dollars over 100 bucks for a replacement drive. I've ordered a couple and as soon as they arrive I'll do a video on the replacement and hopefully some successful testing.

 

UPDATE: I received the DVD drive unit and installed it into the NAV ECU. Success. It works. Total Cost is 135.00. I will start a new thread with a picture and possibly video breakdown of the install. It is pretty simple and from the time it took to remove the ECU from my trunk to the time it took to put it back in my trunk with the new DVD transport was less than 40 minutes. I'll include the link and part number for ordering. Screw the 300+ for Alpine to do the same thing.

 

Sign me up

 

Give me a day or two to get it together. A video editor I am not. I'll start a new post immediately though with the ordering information.

 

Just thowing my 2 cents in. I had issues when I tried to up date to the previous black disc from the most current. What I heard was Pioneer was making those disc and they didn't work well. I had issues from not reading the disc to the on screen icon wigging out and off the road and screen showing "not in real road" and other issues. Sent back got replacement. Same issues.
Sent back and got previous disc to load and work again. Company tried to say my system was broken, I said BS.
Got a notice that Nav-teq had a new and improved FINAL disc for the CL and I bought it. Loaded it and it has worked fine. See my other post about Nav issues.

 

Any new information on this? How is it working and doe have the links or a write up?