[Zooks527]

The reflash runs halfway, fails when it gets to the radio section, then bricks the car.

On my way home to get the spare car and the OEM amp, and we'll see where it goes from there.

[Viffermike]

Originally Posted by Zooks527

The reflash runs halfway, fails when it gets to the radio section, then bricks the car.

On my way home to get the spare car and the OEM amp, and we'll see where it goes from there.

No. Frakking. WAY!!!

Man. Were you getting a performance reflash, or was this being done at the dealer per this thread in the General Forum?

If a bunch of us are about to need an ECU reboot at the dealer -- particularly those with an aftermarket amp installed/ASD disabled, either by harness or coding -- then we need to figure something out and get a sticky going in the General Forum. Basically, anyone who's coded their car will lose coding -- and anyone who's modified iDrive in any appreciable way (that includes the audio system) may need to revert to stock.

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by Viffermike

No. Frakking. WAY!!!

Man. Were you getting a performance reflash, or was this being done at the dealer per this thread in the General Forum?

WAY!!!

At the dealer, per that thread. A BMW dealer uploading a corrected version of the ECU software as part of a BMW software change. Got partially through the upload and then failed, leaving the car stone dead (I was told that they couldn't even start it to move it out of the service bay).

Originally Posted by Viffermike

If a bunch of us are about to need an ECU reboot at the dealer -- particularly those with an aftermarket amp installed/ASD disabled, either by harness or coding -- then we need to figure something out and get a sticky going in the General Forum. Basically, anyone who's coded their car will lose coding -- and anyone who's modified iDrive in any appreciable way (that includes the audio system) may need to revert to stock.

Ah, crap, I left the ASD harness in place. Well, this will let us know if it's the amp or the ASD module that's causing the upload fail.

FWIW, I'm getting good at pulling the trunk liner. Under 15 minutes from walking into the dealer to having the old amp in place. They let me do it, as I knew where everything was (and I don't work at book rate).

[Danny_Shadow]

Sorry to hear that buddy. What a bloody pain!
Hope you get it sorted quickly.

You would think there would be some sort of verification check before it actually starts writing to the car!?

[JohnnyCanuck]

Was just about to install and ASD bypass harness tonight ... maybe I'll hold off for a day or two now until there's some clarity about whether it's the aftermarket amp or the ASD harness (or both).

[dah]

How can it be an aftermarket amp. I assume all the signal goes to the amp and then only out to the speakers. Why would the amp communicate back with the car?

[YEEZ23]

Sorry I'm a little confused and don't want to end up with a bricked car.

I just had my car coded (codemycar.com) and got all the fun stuff done.

I just purchased the Dinan S2 tune + CAI

and plan on upgrading the sound in a month or two.

Will that order of mods mess anything up? Would the dinan tune require a fresh non-coded car? (and then code it after it was installed?)

Thanks for any help.

[BMWZ4]

Your Dinan tune will be fine, your code changes probably lost, but can't speak to Zooks newly reported issue.

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by dah

How can it be an aftermarket amp. I assume all the signal goes to the amp and then only out to the speakers. Why would the amp communicate back with the car?

Apparently, and realize this is tech -> SA -> me -> forum with plenty of opportunity for misunderstanding and shading, there is some level of communication that exists between the amp and the head unit to confirm things are working properly. It can be polled, and if it doesn't respond, some section of the code for the head unit won't get written, and the process aborts.

Stupid as it sounds, there's all sorts of strange communications going on across the bus. A full fault scan of my old 335xi used to report that the wrong antenna / head unit combination had been selected, even though it was completely stock and worked perfectly well.

Originally Posted by Danny_Shadow

You would think there would be some sort of verification check before it actually starts writing to the car!?

Why anyone would design a system like this (a fail in one section aborts the entire re-write AFTER the current code is disabled) is beyond me. Yeah, my computer science degree is 25 years old, but that would have struck me as stupid practice then, and doubly so now.

It can't be written that way. There has to be something else going on here. I'm really interested in seeing how the re-program goes tomorrow.

[Zooks527]

OK, the ECU took the reflash with the OEM amp in place and with the ASD removal harness installed. So, it certainly looks as though the amp was the cause of the failure to flash.

Ugh. Fortunately, having to reflash is an uncommon event, but what a PITA.

On a side note, the car's still at the dealer as the parking sensors now aren't working. I can't blame the dealer for that, as I had a short "parking sensors unavailable" warning about a month ago. The reflash seems to have flushed out the intermittent fault.

[BentZero]

Originally Posted by Zooks527

OK, the ECU took the reflash with the OEM amp in place and with the ASD removal harness installed. So, it certainly looks as though the amp was the cause of the failure to flash.

Ugh. Fortunately, having to reflash is an uncommon event, but what a PITA.

On a side note, the car's still at the dealer as the parking sensors now aren't working. I can't blame the dealer for that, as I had a short "parking sensors unavailable" warning about a month ago. The reflash seems to have flushed out the intermittent fault.

Well that's good to know. Moral of the story: keep your stock amp after swapping it out. :/ Did you mention why your had to get the ECU flashed?

[Danny_Shadow]

Glad you got it sorted. Been playing on my mind all day.
I still can't believe it goes ahead with a flash before checking if it's possible first.

Good job you kept the stock amp!

The things we do for a good sound system eh? Lol.

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by BentZero

Did you mention why your had to get the ECU flashed?

In a thread in the general forum. The car called for an oil change, so I dropped it at the dealer for the free one. While there, they said their system came up with a "software recall" requiring the ECU to be reflashed. They did not know the contents of the software upgrade.

Cookbook repairs. The computer says "Do this", so they do it. Do they know what they're doing? Nope, dey are chust followink ohrderrrrs.

[JohnnyCanuck]

Just glad it's not the ASD bypass. Suspect there's more of those installed than third party amps ... and not just with the 2 series.

[selmeralto]

I have two reactions to Zooks's sad story. First, very sincere sympathies to Zooks and others who have invested time and money in the 3rd party amp and may now have to deal with this kind of inconvenience. I really do feel badly for those folks who may have to face this.

Second, for those who are still thinking about how to improve the sound in the 2-series, I would urge they consider the simple speaker swap and noise reduction I described in the Dr. Strangelove thread.

The only reason I can think to go in the direction of the Bimmertech and/or Bavsound (considering Bavsound distribution and quality control issues that have been reported) route(s) would be demonstrably superior sound. I could be persuaded by that argument since I really care about good sound but, unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be an easy way to compare the competing modifications. Absent that, I just can't see putting an additional $1300 (beyond the $350 cost of the Eton/JL solution) into the sound system, at least at this point.

I should say this gets to one of my original complaints about the car's audio, that the system is so closely tied to the I-controller and computer circuitry of the car, that replacing audio components is a real challenge. That's on you, BMW. You require people to pay a premium for the "premium" system but what they get is below par and then turns out to be difficult to correct. The system could have been designed with the same electronics and adequate speakers for very little more money.

OK, I guess that's three reactions. Maybe four.

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by selmeralto

OK, I guess that's three reactions. Maybe four.

NOOOOBODY EXPECTS THE SELMERALTO INQUISITION!!!!

Among our weapons are ....

[selmeralto]

Originally Posted by Zooks527

NOOOOBODY EXPECTS THE SEMERALTO INQUISITION!!!!

Among our weapons are ....

Glad you've still got a sense of humor about this. You're a better person than I!

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by selmeralto

Glad you've still got a sense of humor about this. You're a better person than I!

Eh, at least I'm driving something half decent. They've got me in a 428GC. It's a boat, but it does have most of the toys. Does remind my why I went from my E92 to the F22, though.

[BentZero]

Originally Posted by Zooks527

In a thread in the general forum. The car called for an oil change, so I dropped it at the dealer for the free one. While there, they said their system came up with a "software recall" requiring the ECU to be reflashed. They did not know the contents of the software upgrade.

Cookbook repairs. The computer says "Do this", so they do it. Do they know what they're doing? Nope, dey are chust followink ohrderrrrs.

Oh man, things like this is why I specifically asked them not to touch the ECU when I took it I'm for an oil change. Hope it gets sorted out.

[BentZero]

Originally Posted by selmeralto

I have two reactions to Zooks's sad story. First, very sincere sympathies to Zooks and others who have invested time and money in the 3rd party amp and may now have to deal with this kind of inconvenience. I really do feel badly for those folks who may have to face this.

Second, for those who are still thinking about how to improve the sound in the 2-series, I would urge they consider the simple speaker swap and noise reduction I described in the Dr. Strangelove thread.

The only reason I can think to go in the direction of the Bimmertech and/or Bavsound (considering distribution and quality control issues that have been reported) route(s) would be demonstrably superior sound. I could be persuaded by that argument since I really care about good sound but, unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be an easy way to compare the competing modifications. Absent that, I just can't see putting an additional $1300 (beyond the $350 cost of the Eton/JL solution) into the sound system, at least at this point.

I should say this gets to one of my original complaints about the car's audio, that the system is so closely tied to the I-controller and computer circuitry of the car, that replacing audio components is a real challenge. That's on you, BMW. You require people to pay a premium for the "premium" system but what they get is below par and then turns out to be difficult to correct. The system could have been designed with the same electronics and adequate speakers for very little more money.

OK, I guess that's three reactions. Maybe four.

Well, I have the hi-fi system. :/ I'm gonna do a speaker swap first to see how that goes. I disconnected the center speaker and it also made a difference like it does in the HK setup. It's good enough for now until have to drive with the windows up. Wind noise pretty much obliterates any chance of sound quality.

[djarchow]

Originally Posted by Zooks527

Why anyone would design a system like this (a fail in one section aborts the entire re-write AFTER the current code is disabled) is beyond me. Yeah, my computer science degree is 25 years old, but that would have struck me as stupid practice then, and doubly so now.

It can't be written that way. There has to be something else going on here. I'm really interested in seeing how the re-program goes tomorrow.

I work in engine embedded software and the problem is that most embedded controllers have barely enough flash memory in them to just contain the current software, not both the old and the new. So there is usually not any good way for the controller to roll back to old software unless it is supported by the programming tool. Embedded software often has a lot of challenges that you don't have when developing on other platforms because of the hardware limitations (very limited amount of storage, ram, CPU etc)

I agree that ECU shouldn't have dropped into the bootblock (most likely what happened) after the failed programming attempt, it should have just been logging a bunch of fault codes from the missing amp. That is a failure mode that should have been caught and wasn't.

[Zooks527]

Originally Posted by djarchow

I agree that ECU shouldn't have dropped into the bootblock (most likely what happened) after the failed programming attempt, it should have just been logging a bunch of fault codes from the missing amp. That is a failure mode that should have been caught and wasn't.

Yeah, the problem with having a new-ish model is just that - all the edge cases haven't been caught, and you may find yourself being one.

Still don't have my car back. It's running fine, but they still haven't been able to get the parking sensors back on line. Maybe Monday.