DA8

So the basic question I have is now that many people have fooled around with D3 audio methods to play compressed music and connect iphones for music or calls for quite a few years, what is the recommendation of the experienced people if you could do it again as the best possible available solution today?

Me: 2005 A8 4.2 Bose with Onstar, software never upgraded, original 100%


Yes, I have read all the post and searched, but it is not clear to me. I mean, did repeatable people ever get the lightning connector properly installed in the coin tray to slide in and out their iphone 5 or 6? (Joke) I mean I don't really need to do that, but I am still curious.

My bucket list that I know is unrealistic in order of priority that I am trying to achieve,

1. Get rid of the I see stupid people lawyer message at startup
2. High quality audio from iphone by Bluetooth or cable
3. Prefer automatic Bluetooth connection with iphone 5 & 6 that (in order of priority),
   -Play iphone based music with high audio quality
   -Full control from MMI as much as possible
   -Answer calls over MMI
   -Favorites in MMI to make calls from MMI
4. Open to flash memory USB audio as an option that is visible and selectable on the MMI
5. Retain use of audio quality uncompressed CDs

In addition to searching and reading all available related forums, I have spoken with audiusaparts.com Romney yesterday. It is about $800 total for software, AMI, and cables (what they have and can sell me). They aren’t willing to give much advice about what is the best solution or how to configure it. They do not know which part number I need to order the software, and tell me people just order it by part number they get off the forums. He says the AMI available for my car only has a cable for 30 pin iphone 4 and earlier. He tells me I need to use an adapter for an iphone 5 or 6, and he does not understand weather the MMI will be able to recognize iphone 5 or 6. At the same time he says there is no need to upgrade the software for the AMI, it is just plug and play. But he admits there may be a software upgrade needed to make it work with newer phones; he just doesn’t know anything about that.

Some unresolved questions I have,

1. Is it confirmed that MMI software can be upgraded direct from older versions to 4610 without intermediate upgrades?
2. What is the current part number for SW version 4610 for 2005 Onstar D3 so I can order it?
3. Is switching out the Onstar module for a Bluetooth module a realistic solution? If so where do I get this Bluetooth module? Can I order one for my model year car and do the switch out with the existing connections?
4. If I was to go the AMI route, is it possible to plug a USB Bluetooth adapter into the AMI and make it work seamlessly with the MMI so I could avoid having to plug the phone in with an adapter and avoid having cords draped across the car from the glovebox?
5. Is an aftermarket Bluetooth that I plug into the system prior to the CD player the best current option? If so what manufacturer and model (specific available model numbers please)?

So you see after triangulating multiple post I have many remaining questions about what is the best and simplest route for me. I know there have been lots of pioneers who have taken the hard risk and lumps of doing the experimental surgery to create the Frankenstein that works best or works at all. But what say the wise voices of long term results for me and to simplify things for all others who are going to endeavor this in the future?

MP4.2+6.0

Reading thru your post, seems like you get fully that AMI and Bluetooth are independent of each other as far as upgrades. At one point you mention Romney/audiusaparts--a good guy; who handles most of my stuff. One thing he is missing is to install AMI, you have to be on at least MMI 3360 software (and interrelated, also on v5 of Nav maps--you should be as a 2005 since the version number ties to model year as shipped). The "lawyer" screen got killed at 3360 BTW, so that's why it never is an issue. It still comes up/displays occasionally, but much deeper and only when you are spinnng the MMI wheel to input something. The phone related s/w improvements are buried in 4140 (especially) and then maybe in its successor 4610, but Audi never really gave a lot of details. Search my old posts if you want more there. But meanwhile, net is if you are on old MMI software as you say, you NEED an upgrade to install AMI. Even my (super early) 2006 was shipped with 2750 as I recall, so it was too early. Also as far as sourcing, I think I was literally the first to retrofit it on an A8 years ago now, but various others have just bought the parts used via Europe EBay. You basically need the drive unit, the optical + power cable, and the connector. Some kludge and just plug the drive unit in place of the CD changer, in which case you don't even need the connector. If I did it today, I might buy drive unit on EBay if available from a seller w/ decent feedback, and source the two cable components from a dealer.

Second comment. Being direct and blunt, I think a lot of people with iPhones and other supposed all in one gizmo's overthink and overdo the connection approach in an Audi. I see it a lot with the Q5 forum too. If you actually stream live or use an obscure Audi A2DP bluetooth add on, that's an exception. But normally the AMI use is basically stored music. Net, I think it is an affirmative mistake to hard plug a currently active phone into the system. It is just plain a hassle and too long a reach to open and close the glove compartment every time, and a long cable add on is just another kludge, and visible at that if it is the long cord kludge. By the fifth time you "forgot your phone" and need to go out to the car and get it yet again, or much worse, your window gets broken by a low life, it will make even more sense. Instead, either open your own or family member's drawer or get on eBay and find those old phones or iTouches. They are a dime a dozen--often literally with family or a friend--and use it as your recorded music slave player. Then you never open the glove box except once in a blue moon if you want to sync to iTunes for your latest music additions.

I just went from a 32G to 64G later iTouch that was the last w/ the old 30 pin and have by 3000+ tracks/300-ish albums at 320kbps and do fine. Switched to 64G only to avoid having to drop bit rate to no higher than 256 as my library grew again. My iPhone 5+ sits in my pocket and bluetooth connects to the car for calls, but it's my phone in the car, not my music device. It has the same music copy as my throw away player, but that's just iTunes "plumbing" that just plain works. Thus both just sync via iTunes, and my underlying music library is direct off CDs instead on the lower quality download stuff. If I built it today, I might use lossless, but the non hard drive players didn't have enough capacity at the time to go that way. Frankly, except with maybe a 128G latest iPhone 6 you couldn't fit a big lossless library if the phone is also cluttered with lots of photos and especially video. Dedicated player approach avoids all this, plus cheap, dependable and always hidden away. Also BTW, if you get to AMI and can still find it, there is a music audio (only) A2DP bluetooth connector with some software on a thumb drive where you can actually make the bluetooth connection like a newer Audi; it uses a dongle to plug into AMI to enable it. I have one, but typically don't plug it in, in favor of my dedicated player. My kids do, since their music library is w/ their phone. Technically the reason I don't use it much is you lose much of the ease of library access you get with a plugged in device and AMI. Playing a known album or playlist you want is fine/easy, but jumping around on the fly is way easier with cabled AMI instead of that A2DP dongle; the current Audi MMI shipped with newer model Audis (including D4) has cleaned this up, but the dongle is more compromised.

Answering your questions:

I did it sequentially, but the answer to your question nets to yes in this case. The 4610 Audi instructions (in a TSB) confirm that. 4140--its predecessor--is the affirmative badly flawed one--that required an intermediate upgrade. Avoid that old one. The exception case to the one version/one pass upgrade can be early build ones that start at sub 500 MMI software, or even sub 1000 maybe, that can require some other patches on top of 4610. If you check your current version as a 2005, hopefully you are beyond that earliest zone. There are TSB's that cover exception cases. (Temporary) loss of the TPMS screen is common, but you reenable it either directly with VAG COM/VCDS, or the MMI "hidden" menu which itself takes VAG COM/VCDS to enable to begin with.


Part number is consistent whether bluetooth phone or OnStar AFAIK. 4F0 998 961; a two disk set including the "clean up" disk. Only buy from dealer as you are thinking (or borrow an original from another owner); issues float around with those trying the "nothing's really free" 'free' approach of downloaded burned CD's.

Don't know but a few have done it. See if any respond, or you need to search archives. FWIW since I have no horse in that race, back when retrofitting was happening more with earlier owners, it seems like whatever the Denison solution was got good traction and decent reviews from owners. Search archives.

See above comments. One device for all is like all in one toaster ovens. Can work but mediocre or hassle prone for specific things. Thus, on music even as an iPhone 5 plus owner, I would use a dedicated player. KISS principle,--and then use a 4 or 4S or 30 pin iTouch as a dedicated player. If you must, just use the Apple 30 pin to current connector overpriced adapter and go toaster oven. Basically as long as it is any 30 pin, including way obsolete stuff or the hard drive players, it works easily in Apple world, and if its a newer unit you can sync to Mac, etc. w/ bluetooth, even though USB cable is still faster. Even if it is an old phone--with a cracked screen, crappy earpiece or microphone and battery that is crappy on charging really not mattering--and has been out of service collecting dust for some years, it really doesn't matter when it is just buried in your glove box. Yes, there is the A2DP adapter, but also be clear it is music only and isn't full function for the same access quality as a plugged in device enjoys. You need to solve OnStar separately. Also the Audi A2DP device is hard to find now from a few others' later posts, and discontinued by Audi I think. audiusaparts had it for a while, including a later round of supply after it first vanished off market.

Need others to respond who had OnStar. I am post bluetooth factory cut over and w/ AMI. Back to your core interest, yes it is a solid approach. We have the latest and greatest Audi stuff in our 2013 Q5 w/ Nav and upgraded sound. Sound quality good but no better than Audi D3 baseline Bose BTW. Only exception there is Sirius/XM seems a little better fidelity wise (less obvious compression) than the somewhat mediocre D3 sound--CD or good AMI recordings are far better fidelity wise even to my casual mid 50's ears in the D3, and the step down is still obvious in the Q5 with SAT. Frankly other than Google Maps novelty, (sort of) real time traffic mapping, and car hotspot (for the non-driver), that level of D3 electronics (Bluetooth+ AMI + Nav) is perfectly "good enough" and is all nicely packaged and integrated around MMI interface. No monthly fees on D3 approach compared to D4/Q5 and other current rev Audis with current gen MMI, Nav updates cheaper and DIY, and MMI updates way cheaper as DIY.

TSHong

I went from 1170 to 4610 in one step with no issues. My MY2005 had a bluetooth phone set up already so I just added an AMI. I just use a flash drive for my music. I was not interested in low bitrate of streaming internet music so I am not using bluetooth streaming.

Now in your case where you would have to add both a bluetooth phone module and an AMI, look at a Denison BT500. It has both in one unit. You can pair your phone and stream music withone unit that intergates with MMI.

mishar

It is not really plug and play but not difficult either. You can buy BT Module from audiusaparts.com. You also need 54 pin harness (need to swap only 5 pins from 42 pin old harness). To install it in the OnStar Module place you need few meters of fiber optic and few connectors for the same. I installed it in the trunk, left side, instead Sirius Module. Used it's MOST connection. There is also less chance for flood.

Yes, there are fairly recent treads about that. You can also park in there iPod or solid state hard drive with USB connection.

subit0

If you go with the Audi OEM bluetooth telephone module solution to replace Onstar (for voice calls only), you should run the MMI 4610 upgrade after you switch hardware modules, as 4610 upgrades the firmware on the BT telephone module (if needed).

Personally, I rarely play CDs anymore and have already installed the final 4610 upgrade. If I were to install an AMI at this point in time, I would not purchase the cable set and just plug the AMI player into the cables running to the CD player.

DA8

Thanks guys for the advice and info, especially MP4.2+6.0 for the 46.10 part number 4F0 998 961.

What I get from MP4.2+6.0 and what others are saying as a takeaway that appears to be the reality about attempting this upgrade: whatever you do it is going to be a choice of finding the best hodgepodge of components and method to suite your personal needs. There is no one fix all solution, and all have their drawbacks and limitations.

I am thinking AMI is the best bet for reliability and audio sound quality. Audio playback versatility and quality is my highest priority. I have a 64 gig iphone 5 that is due for upgrade soon to the new 6 model, then I could use the old 5 for the glovbox.

The Denison BT500 is also a very tempting competing option. However, I have reservations about its reliability and it is not exactly a cheap alternative. If using flash drive it does not accept AAC media format from iTunes so the newer music in my library would not be supported over flash drive. Means less versatility should I choose to not use iphone as player. Dennison has the advantage of a lightning connector, but not sure if it will support iphone 6 (still same would be true of AMI). My main concerns with Denison or aftermarket in general are over buggyness long term. Write-ups on Amazon indicate very poor documentation, general buggyness, and horrible customer support


I would think, but not sure, that AMI would have better interface with MMI to read, play, list tracks and tag info since it is factory.

Bluetooth, the more I think about it is not my highest concern. I was thinking it would be the simplest way to play music and podcast, but looking into it more I see it has serious limitations for audio quality where it will never be that of a wired connection. So the only real use I would have for it is telephone calls, not so much audio playback. That being said, loading music in some digital form on some playback unit or flash drive in the glovebox makes more sense.

Still the Onstar, or Sirius, switch out for the Bluetooth module sounds like a convenient option for adding telephone access. Sounds like I need to make the decision to do that before upgrading the MMI software, so the module gets updated too. Does this apply to the AMI as well?

Mishar says, “You also need 54 pin harness (need to swap only 5 pins from 42 pin old harness)” This is a bit confusing, can you please explain further? Is the 42 pin old harness the one that is in the car for Sirius module and the Bluetooth module has a 54 pin connector?

And I am assuming if the Bluetooth module is swapped out in place of the Onstar module the microphone from the Onstar can be used whereas if it goes in place of the Sirius an external mic would have to be installed?

Thinking that the Bluetooth module would give better MMI integration than aftermarket, but still it sounds like a lot of trouble. I could just do the AMI and experiment with USB dongle devices plugged into AMI for calls. Might be a lot less hassle.

One other general question, How do you determine your current software version? I could not make out any familiar numbers I know from the forum on my unit.

Here is my units display info:

SW: D3-HU 6346 06.0.0 0413
HW: D3-HU 6346 D2.0
FCSW: 02332AUFC78KOF46n
FC PS: 0020 FC HW: H42

Anyone know what they mean? I know SW=software and HW=hardware, but what of FCSW and FC PS? And what is my current software version? 0413?

Again, thank you all for your helpful advice and experience.

mishar

SW is 0600. Oldie. 42 pin harness goes to OnSter Module under your feet. 54 pin harness (God knows why 54) goes to the Bluetooth Module. You can use OnStar microphone. If you go to the trunk those are the only two wires you have to fish from underneath your carpet.

MP4.2+6.0

Many of us get tired of typing in the periods that are actually displayed when you see it on screen. Current one is technically 46.1.0.

At sub-1000 you may need a further patch on top of the cumulative 4610 update. It's in a TSB if I remember right.

DA8

So I went ahead swapping out the CD changer for AMI. I had to first update MMI software from 0600 to 3660 then to 4610. Followed instructions closely and all was success!

AMI shows up. I am trying to use cable 4F0 906 961 AB with a 30 pin to lightning adapter to connect my iPhone 5. The cable with the 30 pin old iPhone connector is the only one available for the AMI that fits this car, 4E0 057 785 F, according to Sunset Audi. So they recommend, and sell, the lightning adapter to use with lightning equipped devices.

The iphone 5 initialized and all music, playlist, and podcast even show up on MMI, but will not play from MMI when pressing center button. I can start play by pressing play on the phone itself. Then it will play and I can forward to next song pushing forward button on MMI. But I cannot select a new song. I have very limited control, if any, of iPhone 5 from MMI, yet I can see and scroll everything through MMI display. Just doesn't play when pressing MMI center button. It will go as far as loading the song or podcast in the iPhone 5, but it will not play it. I have to manually press play on the iPhone then play begins. Everything else works.

Any ideas?

I am thinking this is an issue with using the iPhone 5 and the 30 pin to lightning adapter? The adapter is the correct $30 Apple one that has the built in chip.

I searched the forums and see other people are successfully using the lightning adapters with iPhone 5s, but those were all newer cars with MMI 3G. Could this be a problem with older 2G systems and iPhone 5? Or is it something else totally I am missing?

Reason I want to use the iPhone 5 instead of buying an older ithingy is that I plan to upgrade to a iPhone 6 and keep my 64G iphone 5 for the car. This would work good because it would be no added cost and I could sync it over wifi when parked at home. so I am trying to get this setup to work with full functionality from the MMI without having to open the glovebox ever.

MP4.2+6.0

That part number (ending in AB) is a CD, not a cable per audiusapart.com site (aka Sunset Audi) when you type it in. Maybe that was one of your MMI update CD's?

Per their table, easily available here, you need 4FO 051 510 E, which apparently became L: Audi Wholesale OEM Parts | Audi Genuine Accessories | Audi Branded Collection | Audi USA Parts Online Catalog estore As a practical matter, I just pulled the cable out of mine, which I bought early on before the plethora of newer cables. It still has the parts label and is the E version. I use it with a 30 pin 64G Touch--the last one that was 30 pin before they went to Lightning. I just swapped the normal Touch out to test for you with my 5S phone and a 30 pin to (legit from Apple) Lightning connector, and it works perfectly with that Lightning adapter; same as my 30 pin native connection to the older Touch. I checked specifically to be sure I had MMI wheel control, track selection, etc.

We also have AMI in the 2013 Q5 which is basically the latest and greatest Audi set up before just getting to 4G with the new A3 class. As new as the C7 A6 set up or the later D4's (early D4's are another half step back now). For what its worth we have used that with all of 30 pin iPods, 5's and 5S's both via 30 pin and Lightning adapter tacked on to it, and then more recently with the native Lightning connector Audi has since introduced. Bopped all over the Autobahnen with it literally off the Ingolstadt floor since North America radio and Sat are worthless in Europe--I brought the AMI cable with me that I purchased ahead of time from audiusaparts, since the cable is provided only by the US dealer at time of final delivery. My kids have also used an iPhone 5 (not 5S) with my A8 and the Lightning adapter (before I found the briefly sold Bluetooth A2DP retrofit adapter), and presumably if there were any issue I would have heard. Just last night my wife was playing a podcast through the A2DP connection from her brand new iPad Air 2 while I was driving up into the Sierra snow. Basically any combination of phone generation and 30 pin or 30 pin + legit Lightning adapter works, AND literally the same phones work in my 2006 A8 where I retrofit AMI early on. That nets to this is NOT some early AMI version or cabling issue for the D3 A8 issue that you are running into.

Thus, first get your part #'s straightened out and be sure you indeed have the right AMI to iPod cable. If so, figure your phone has flaked. Probably 90 percent + of the phone sort of posts over the years seem to resolve that the phone side is where the issue typically is, not the car electronics. If not, you would presumably be down to some very low percentage chance thing with the AMI unit, the MMI software, your MMI control buttons and wheel, or that Apple Lightning adapter you think is real is either defective or counterfeit. On MMI controls, if other parts of MMI work using the buttons and wheel, you can pretty much exclude that. So, get the cable number right and then focus on your phone. Also BTW, make sure it isn't as simple as lint stuck up the Lightning connector "hole." I've seen that before on my 5S just making the basic power connection. Assuming that's okay and you sort to the right cable, sounds like you might be trading the 5 in...