gunbunny

I'm getting very frustrated with my wife's 2008 A8.

A month ago we had it in because the driver's door wouldn't lock and a few other oddities. Turned out it was a bad door latch to the tune of $835.

We also complained about another issue we've had since we bought the car a year ago: With no one in the car, with the car locked and sitting in our driveway for hours, the radio will turn on full blast and the MMI pops up all on its own. It plays for 10 minutes and shuts down. It'll do this over and over. The snotty chick at the dealership informed me about the automatic speed-adjusted volume, and when I told her that's not what I'm talking about and explained it further, she just told me about the speed-adjusted volume again. Whatever. It seemed like just an annoying issue that's putting unnecessary drain on the battery but so long as that's it I'm willing to avoid the PITA and expense of more trips to the dealer.

But here I am with a NEW batch of goofball failures:

1. Backup camera doesn't come on
2. Parking assist doesn't come on the MMI
3. Under the Car menu, a bunch of menu items are missing (i.e. ride height adjust, tire pressure monitor display, etc)
4. Bluetooth microphone stopped working. The system can still make and take calls, but it pops a message saying the mic is disabled.

No water leaks that I can tell. I tried the 3-finger salute and rebooted the MMI a few times. Any suggestions before I sell a kidney and take this back to the dealer?

dvs_dave

Buy a VCDS cable for 350 bucks, run a scan and see what's up. Electronic gremlins on A8s are impossible to diagnose otherwise. Or bend over in the dealership reception and enjoy their free coffee.

707chris

Hard to tell without VCDS. But if you would like to keep your kidney for the moment Id try a simple battery reset by disconnecting the battery for a few minutes. Additionally I would clean the mmi. Really simple to do if you have a basic Torx set, Electronic cleaner, and a hour or so. YouTube had a quick video that shows you how; 'Mmi console removal' or something like that. But that would be the easiest thing to try. But seriously, these cars are not incredibly hard to work on, just need patience for some jobs. I'd invest in the $375~ for the software and dedicate a laptop to it as well.

mishar

+2

I wouldn't do anything before VCDS scan.

Mister Bally

Wine at select dealers (DC area, Northern Virginia is one of them)

ltooz_a6_a8_q7

[QUOTE=gunbunny;24649042]I'm getting very frustrated with my wife's 2008 A8.

But here I am with a NEW batch of goofball failures:

1. Backup camera doesn't come on
2. Parking assist doesn't come on the MMI
3. Under the Car menu, a bunch of menu items are missing (i.e. ride height adjust, tire pressure monitor display, etc)
4. Bluetooth microphone stopped working. The system can still make and take calls, but it pops a message saying the mic is disabled.

Go to the trunk, on the left hand side, open a little door panel, inside, there should be all your failing components are: Backup camera controller, parking assist controller, Navigation DVD, Stereo... Take a high resolution picture, and check the cables going through these components. Try to get one of these loop termination to isolate which component causes the failure. Another one is the DVD inside the glovebox and the AMI if you have one. If your wife is using the glovebox often, she may knock some wire loose.


Since all components of the MMI connected and communicated together through MOST bus (optical) serially, therefore, 1 component in the chain hiccups, the whole system hiccups. Your troubleshooting technique will be as good as the dealer, but much cheaper and more logical. They will replace everything until they get the right one on your expense.
Most of MMI problems are caused by a simple thing. Just have to find that simple thing.

Cheers,

Louis