Boom

Here is some good information that I put together for installing the GEX-P7000TV.

The url has changed to....

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/boom3/

I hope this is helpful to others considering this installation.

magiviper

wow.. you weren't kidding.. I'm gonna sticky this

mp3coupe

This is what I've been in search of since Aug... THANK YOU!!!!!
just a few questions for you on the circuit.


is the 100uf supposed to be polarized? It seems like it might be
but it doesn't show in the schematic. Should I use an electrolytic? It looks like your using it for smoothing the voltage. Also why the 35v on a 5v output? its really no big deal, thats just the max voltage.
You wouldn't happen to have part numbers?
coupe -- time to rape a few old motherboards for parts

Boom

Yes the capacitor is a polorized electrolytic used to remove the ripple from the output. I happened to use a 35V because it is what I had. It is a good idea to usa a capacitor that has a voltage rating greater than 5V. I believe you can buy one at Radio-Shack, just look in the capacitors section. I do not know the part number.

Sask32TL

It might be a good idea to copy out the contents of the linked page and paste them here. If the other web page disappears, all the info will go with it. If you paste it here it will survive as long as this site does....

I've had a lot of experience with linking to web sites that only last for three months, and having to spend hours and hours trying to re-assemble the information.

P.S. GREAT JOB! Clear, concise, no bull, good graphics.

mp3coupe

.Items from Radio Shack
(1)Voltage Regulator 276-1770
(1)Electrolytic Capacitor 100uf 272-1028
(1)IR Dectector Module 276-137B
(found near the circuit boards..if they still carry them)
------------------------------------------------------
Items from Digi Key
(1)VIDEO SYNC SEPERATOR LM1881N-ND
(1)Resistor 680k 680KH-ND
(2).1uf Cap P2053-ND

Optional Items from Radio Shack
IC PC Board 276-150A
IC Socket 276-1995

Before ordering please double check my info listed above. At this time I haven't actually built and tested the above. However items have been ordered.
coupe

Boom

I agree, however I am not a paying member and cannot post pictures. If someone is willing to step up and post everything, I have no problem with that. I think it is a great idea, just in case I get ran over or something.

funnybone

Boom,

From looking at your wiring diagram, I was wondering why you still needed to use the RF modulator from te GEX-P700TV? Why not just plug the DVD audio output to the to the GEX and the GEX-P700TV's rear RCA audio output to the blitzsafe?

Can you also tell me how much these parts costs? Because it looks like someone has come up with a very clean and easy kit for $300 and $70 for an additional Pioneer RGB Cable 20-pin:

http://www.video-nav.com/product.html

I was just wondering if it's worth it to build my own, than to spend about $370 for the kit.

Thanks.

mp3coupe

The video navi kit still requires you to buy the GEX-P7000TV. That goes from 240.00 to 300.00.If you want TV your going to have to buy the antennas they go for 75-99. The parts required in this mod to get the OSD and the remote is under 20 bucks. So if you are a DIY type of person why blow 370 which could be done for under 20 bucks? I don't think the -video navi- kit has honda/acura connectors -- just lexus.
coupe

asiankidd

question does teh gex do the switching from navi to dvd or do you need a 4 pdt switch for that? and the infread block is that just a fancy block to control the dvd and the gex using only 1 infred eye to control? can you explain how exactly the osd/infred mod connects to the gex? thanks
JON

Boom

Good question about the audio. I had the RF modulator installed before I got the Bliztsafe. I guess when I got the blitzsafe, I just didn't think about it. I will definately give your idea a try.

You can build the circuit for less then $20. It isn't quite as clean as the kit because you have to cut your GEX-P7000TV cable in half and strip out the wires, but it will save you about $350. I also think the kit seems reasonably priced considering it is complete and has connectors to accept the pioneer cables. I guess it comes down to what your time is worth??

Boom

Boom

Jon,

The GEX does do the switching from navi to dvd, tv, and 1 other input. You do not need the 4pdt switch.

Yes, the infrared repeater has one pickup but has 4 outputs. It will repeat almost any remote control. It is useful because you will most likely have more than one remote control. The infrared / osd interface connects to the GEX via the cut in half pioneer cable. Look at the wiring pinouts on my webpage for specific connections.

Boom

funnybone

Boom,

I would love to build that device myself. However, I'm having a difficult time getting the parts. I've tried my local radio shack and fry's electronics. They just don't carry those things. Can you direct everyone, who's interested in building this conversion, as to where we can purhase all the parts needed?

Thanks.

mp3coupe

Boom,
I pretty much built the circuit you posted. I am just waiting on the LM1881N chip from digi key.Its going to take 7 days for ups ground...im looking at tuesday. Im about to order one for overnight
Ive been reading up at clublexus. Just a simple question for you. When i wire up the GEX-P7000TV to my car. The connector has 4 wires, Red, Yellow, Orange, Black. Do i wire up the orange wire. The orange wire ties into the light switch. Is this wire needed?
thanks
coupe

Boom

Coupe,

You do not need to hook up the orange wire. Your display will continue to work just like it does now. Day, Night, or Auto regardess of what input you are using.

Boom

mp3coupe

Boom,
Thanks for the information you've provided! This seemed to be one of the best kept secrets IMHO. Thanks for those that leaked it
About the orange wire, i wasn't so sure about connecting it since i was jumping the illumination wire (orange) inside the unit.

I plan on taking out my back seat tomorrow to connect this 'hack' . I figure if something goes out to lunch well, what the tech doesn't see I will get for free
Here are some pictures of my abortion





The reason for all those resistors is, well rat shack sucks they don't carry the 680k resistor. So I had to buy 10K+100k+100K+470 =680k - for those that are going to do this mod order the resistors from digi key when you order your LM881N.
Boom also your schematic does't show the 100 ohm resistor for the remote. Your pin lay out had the info FWIW

One more question, I should be able to connect this without the lm1881n inserted and still use my navi, and the gex unit? The only thing that wont work is the OSD

snowman

Boom, thanks for the info. I completed the circuit and got the OSD working, but the on-screen display is shifted to the right, and its unstable when the TV reception is bad. Is this normal? or am I doing something wrong.

Boom

Snowman,

It is working properly. The OSD will be slightly shifted because we have to use the "Back porch output" on the LM1881N. That is the best we can do without having a real pioneer display. The unstable menu when the TV reception is bad is also normal because the menu is sync'd with the video. So if the video is bad, so is the menu.

Glad you got it working.

Boom

Boom

Coupe,

My schematic does not show the 100 ohm resistor, but I do recommend it. I soldered mine to the end of the wire before I landed it on the circuit board terminal. I should have shown it in the circuit.

I would agree that you could test it out without the LM1881N. Just remember you will have to enable the inputs in the menu blindly before you will get video.

Your circuit looks decent, but I would recommend a little bigger box. There are a lot of wires coming in and they would be a lot more manageable in a larger box. Make sure you insulate the ends of all the un-used conductors too.

Good luck!

Boom

mp3coupe

boom, check pm
coupe

songoku

So if I install LM1881N, I can have OSD for my GEX unit?? How much & where can I get it??

calvinpham74

is there anyone in the bayarea who know a place who can do this or willing to help me. I will pay for the labor. I Really want to have this mod, so please help me out. my email is thanh_pham@sbcglobal.net if you can help me thanks..

mp3coupe

songoku
http://www.digikey.com search for lm1881n. Its under 3 bucks but they charge 5.00 handling fee for under 25bucks....See page 1 of this thread I listed all the part numbers.

Boom, how do you like your antennas....im not too impressed with them..... however i now have video inputs now for my micro pc

geninfty

Hi Guys,

I have been hooked up with this GEX project for last a
couple of days.
I have had a number of difficulties, but finally it began to work fter
three days of back breaking work!!! My first problem was
the ACC power drop- I tapped ACC power from
the radio connector, but somehow, when it is on, it drops to
7.6V, which is not high enough to drive 7805. So I used
the constant-on power for the littel circuit Boom designed.
I wonder why this happens.

A good news is, we can use 276-640 from Radio Shack instead
of 276-137, which is obviously obsolete. I think 276-640 is
the replacement for this.

I thank Boom and many other people for providing wonderful
information.

songoku

I hook my power core(red) to ignition & connect switch for ON/OFF. There's also yellow core. You need to connect it to the constant power. I've found a plug under the dash, behind the fuse box. If you don't connect yellow wire to constant power, you'll lose your power on GEX unit after ignition's OFF(you need to set up everytime you turn your igition ON).

geninfty

It's been two weeks full of fun and pain- i have played with
various combinations how to connect the constant-on power
and ACC-on power to GEX and also AN-3 antennae.
For now, I have settled down with the following choice.

ACC-> tap the wire going to the cigarette jack in the center
console box
Constant ON-> tap from the sub-woofer amplifier connector

Electrically, any place would be fine except for tapping the
radio connector- my first choice- because we not only want to
mess up with the connector, but also the radio
may suffer from voltage drop as it sucks out too much power
to make that muddy sound (I am so much wanting to replace
the head unit as well, but I don't want to mess with that
integrity- i am in dilemma here)

I put my GEX in the trunk, under the plastic tray my dealer
threw in for a good price. So I got some bulge, but it's not bad-
it actually keeps GEX out of sight.

I also get a shaky operation of LM1881N partly due to the
flaky tapping and electrical noise at some other time. I need
to take the rear seat out again to fix it up. Of course we
can operate the unit without the menu, but it is certainly helpful
to have it especially when you need to change the setting
for other video source connection (VTR1, VTR2).

I connected by Blitzsafe AUX unit to the rear TV out connector set. This way, you don't need the FM modulator and I am sure it
sounds better. I wonder, if we connect Blitzsafe for Pioneer IP-BUS, we can get the sound through there as well without occupying this AUX connector, which can be saved for MP3 player connection. In this way, I wonder I may be able to connect a
Pionner XM unit later in daisy chain- the way IP-Bus was designed for.

This is certainly one of the largest scale work- I have been installing power amp for my sub, replacing speakers and head units myself in my TLS and other cars, but this GEX project beats them all because there are so many wires to deal with- power, ground, nav video cable-you don't want to mess with $2000 option device- which would be more expensive to replace if we blow it-, parking brake line, custom circuit board, IR line, antenna power and signals, FM modulator, audio line. However, when I was watching the Simpsons on my nav display, I felt so much rewarded.

I guess we can now drop the obsolete AVC-RGB1 thing for sure- GEX does it all electronically with a touch of a button, and on top of that, we get TV-tuner and two more video inputs!!!

SilverBullet

boom,

were in wa are you located, would you be interested in doing this mod for people who aren't as electronically inclined as some of you guys...

could you also maybe tell us what the final cost of this mod?

thanks

geninfty

I paid ...

Pioneer GEX-P7000TV TV GEX-P7000TV 1 249.99 Pioneer AN-G3 TV Tuner AN-G3 1 74.98

from Let's Go Digital - www.lgdsuperstore.com

LM1881N costs $2.78 from digikey.

Instead of the obsolete IR sensor 276-137, now you can
use 276-640. It works just fine.

http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...5Fid=276%2D640

You will need to throw in a couple of bucks or more,
depending on what you have in your toolbox- in my case,
I had to buy some crimping connectors, heat shrinks,
electric tapes and so on....

Boom

Before I did the GEX-P7000TV project, I installed a sub amplifier and had simular power problems. I couldn't find a good place in the fusebox for key switched or constant power. So I ran a wire through the firewall and connected it to the battery through an inline fuse. Below the fusebox I installed a 12V automotive style relay. I found that I can trip the relay by connecting a wire to the the #1 terminal in the lower left hand side of the fusebox. (I am not sure what this terminal is for, but it does turn on with the key, and has enough power to trip the relay.) I tapped off the direct battery connection and wired it through the automotive relay to provide switched power. Now I have constant 12V from the battery and switched 12V from the battery which I have used for all my projects including the GEX-P7000TV installation. If you decide to do this, make sure you fuse this wire at the battery. That way if anything shorts out it will be protected. It is a pain to get through the firewall but worth it.

geninfty

thanks for your tips, Boom.
I thought about doing the same thing- so I even bought
a relay for that. But I thought I would give a shot to tap
the wire from the cigarette lighter jack and so far so good.
TV works fine, my radio seems to work fine-
But I am not sure if I got rid of this problem completely because it looks like the cigarette lighter jack is connected to the radio
ACC-ON anyway, according to the wire diagram. The problem
is not noticeable yet- if I find the head unit shows any
indication of trouble due to the voltage drop, I will have to
bite the bullet and do the relay job as you did.

Dvs rice

ok i see a picture on mine screen but its all wavy and i can't see a menu screen on my navi, how do i adjust my screen???

songoku

Mayur,

It's all wavy?? Have you check your RGB wires connection??

wonderer

This is great info. Would the GEX setup work for the Infiniti NAV. I have a G35 COupe and wanted to do this for a while .. I know that the stock NAV screen inputs only rgb signals.. I am thinking it would work. Please advice. Thanks

geninfty

I have had very shaky, or sometimes no OSD with LM1811- i figured out finally today that it's because of the noise from power line. it may be the long power line picking up the noise or 7805-
voltage regulator itself. I got stuck in my car for a couple of hours
and finally found a great solution- there is a yellow color line
of "green connector" from GEX which gives +5V when the unit is on... so I powered LM1881 with this 5V and voila!!! I got now consistently clear OSD everytime!! (OSD is on-screen display FYI). Of course
TV tuner, navi, and DVD always work without OSD, but it's
absolutely better to have one to fine tune my system.
But, one small problem is that the 5V supply is not enough
to drive the infrared receiver together... at least for my case, because I don't use the IR repeater... i just used a long shield cable to connect my IR unit under my steering wheel column to the circuit board behind the backseat. So I still use 7805 to power
the IR receiver, but LM1881 on the 5V output from GEX. It sounds
complicated... but it works fine. I bought panasonic PV40 from ebay... at $180... it came without box or S-video cable, but it works great.

The quality of the TV screen is greatly affected by how you do the wiring... the noise can make the reception very bad... so you may want to experiment your wiring. In my case, I powered AN-3G antennae with the power from the stock subwoffer connector, which is also connected to GEX itself. ACC-ON of GEX is connected to the cigarette lighter in the
arm console box.

Cheers!!

mp3coupe

With this mod has anyone noticed some interference on the navi screen? I have some very very slight horizontal lines when using the navi viewing a map.
When viewing TV I have terrible reception. I've talked to several install shops around here(northern Jersey) known problem;(
oh well, but when viewing TV it fills the entire screen. When I switch over to an input source the left side of the screen is shifted (roughly a 1/4inch) and some very bad interference. Its can be seen when the screen is blank(black) with an image on the screen its not that noticeable.
I have the Gex power leads connected to the 4gauge from the battery, The ground same spot i used for the amps and the acc wire connected to the remote turn on for the amps via a relay.
I may try to power the lm1881 as stated above and see if i can tap the navi unit in the trunk for + and - .
As for the shielded cable on the red and green connectors should I connect these together or will this cause some sort of ground loop?

turbox777

I see slight horizontal lines once in a while on my navi while viewing map. I have no modifcations on my navigation, not for long though.

geninfty

mp3coupe,

I think my tv reception is reasonably good and I don't see
any interference on my map screen. I didn't do anything to
the shield wires- although I worried a bit intially about
the noise.... I see the whole screen- no shifting.
LIke I posed above, I tapped ACC-ON power from the
cigarette jack in the arm console box. I tapped constant-on
12V from the stock subwoofer amp connector- I have an aftermarket subwoofer, which is powered directly from the battery. Now, I power AN-3G from the same constant-on source- from the subwoofer connector-not so great thing to do for the constant power dissipation- about 1.2W all the time- (i worry about my battery draining)

From my experience, you may need some experiments- and try
to keep the wiring nice and neat because we are dealing with
high frequency, weak signal.

younglim

Hi guys, I'm new to the forum. Would anyone here know how to do the navi2video mod with a unit that is already outputting in RGB? I want to do mine using a Sony PS2 with the component (RGB) cable, but what should I do about the sync line? The cable has only five outputs: red, green, blue, left audio, right audio. Is the sync hidden somewhere? Any input will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Young

turbox777

Hello, I think I am having a problem with power. My friend tapped power from the stock navi. When we powered everything up, the navi screen was just blank.

I think that the power was not enough to power up the GEX and the OSD is tapped power from the GEX, so the OSD wouldn't work either.

Any input is highly appreciated.

Steve

turbox777

NM, i got it all working today. WOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOO