Dice Mediabridge: Fix or Sell

[2004_blue_zhp]

Hi all,

I have had a dice mediabridge in my car for the past 2 years and it has worked very well. When I did the initial install, I didn't clean up the cables as much as I should have so I wound up with a slight rattle behind the glovebox where the cables were bouncing around. So yesterday I opened things up with the intention of zip-tying the cables down and going from 95% happy to 100% happy with my install.

Well, about halfway through, as I was unplugging the mediabridge itself, I accidentally broke one of the ports on the unit. Specifically, I broke the USB socket that allows you to plug in an iPod or other device via USB. I can go into more detail for anyone who cares, but that's the gist.

That leaves me with a non-rattling, semi-functional mediabridge. Bluetooth still works perfectly (including steering wheel controls) for music, phone and directions, the AUX in still works perfectly. But the USB input (and the phone charging that went with it) is dead. (For reference, the USB port for firmware updates is separate and is fine.)

From here, I could go two ways.

Plan A: Order some parts from the internet and try to fix the mediabridge. It will involve opening up the device and doing some soldering. Odds of success probably 50%. And if I fail, very good chance I turn the device into a paperweight in the process.
Plan B: Go buy a new mediabridge and sell the old one to someone who would find it useful despite no longer having a functional USB input.


So I guess this has turned into a for sale thread: Would anyone have interest in buying a dice mediabridge with broken USB port? Let's say $100? (Open to revision if that sounds nuts. But as it sits, it is a 100% viable bluetooth + aux solution for anyone who wants it. Plus if you're more confident than I am in your electronics repair abilities, maybe you can fix the USB itself.)

What do you think?

[derbo]

I say carefully fix it. :) improve your solder skills along the way.

[Crickett]

+1 for fixing it; maybe consider not if the port was physically broken to the point of needing a full replacement (i.e. desoldering from the board & replacing w/a new one), but certainly DIY if it just popped a couple electrical connections loose (i.e. just adding a bit more solder to the existing part).

Or completely ignore what I just said, assume it's far beyond repair, & allow me to take it off of your hands for $2. :biggrin

[2004_blue_zhp]

Crickett...here's a shot at describing exactly what I'm dealing with...

Look at a female usb port (type A, full size). It's a metal rectangle with a plastic rectangle suspended in it. That plastic piece has metal contacts on one side of it. On my mediabridge, the plastic piece has broken off entirely leaving the metal contacts "floating free" in the middle of the metal rectangle. If I plug a USB cable in, the free-floating contacts on the female end wind up getting pushed up against the outer metal rectangle. This shorts everything out.

So I can think of 3 ways I could attempt to fix this:

Get a USB extension cord. Cut it in half. Expose the 4 wires in the cable and try to solder them to the 4 exposed pins on the female USB port on the mediabridge. (Somehow insulate them so that they don't short out.)
Find another female USB port. Dissect it to remove the plastic piece mentioned above. Try to superglue it into the existing female USB port on the mediabridge.
Get my hands on an entirely new female USB port. Open up the mediabridge and solder the new one into place. I haven't opened up the mediabridge yet, so not really sure I know what I'd be in for.


So best case scenario is that one of you guys is a bit of an electronics buff and thinks this is likely to be a 10 minute fix. If so, great.

If not, I'll take a shot at dissecting this thing next weekend and will replace it if I'm not talented enough to make the repair work.

[Crickett]

Crickett...here's a shot at describing exactly what I'm dealing with...

Look at a female usb port (type A, full size). It's a metal rectangle with a plastic rectangle suspended in it. That plastic piece has metal contacts on one side of it. On my mediabridge, the plastic piece has broken off entirely leaving the metal contacts "floating free" in the middle of the metal rectangle. If I plug a USB cable in, the free-floating contacts on the female end wind up getting pushed up against the outer metal rectangle. This shorts everything out.

So I can think of 3 ways I could attempt to fix this:

Get a USB extension cord. Cut it in half. Expose the 4 wires in the cable and try to solder them to the 4 exposed pins on the female USB port on the mediabridge. (Somehow insulate them so that they don't short out.)
Find another female USB port. Dissect it to remove the plastic piece mentioned above. Try to superglue it into the existing female USB port on the mediabridge.
Get my hands on an entirely new female USB port. Open up the mediabridge and solder the new one into place. I haven't opened up the mediabridge yet, so not really sure I know what I'd be in for.


So best case scenario is that one of you guys is a bit of an electronics buff and thinks this is likely to be a 10 minute fix. If so, great.

If not, I'll take a shot at dissecting this thing next weekend and will replace it if I'm not talented enough to make the repair work.

Option 3 would be the "correct" way to fix it &, depending on the board layout, probably not too difficult of a fix, even for a so-so solderer.


iPhone 5. Tapatalk 2. Aww yeeeah.

[JupiterBMW]

In a case like this, pictures tell a thousand words, as the ol' saying goes... My first question is, does this thing work with OEM Nav? I have the OEM aux input now, so I'd need to remove/replace that? This allows Bluetooth connectivity of a phone for phone usage? Does it then play audio commands and whatnot (GPS directions, music, other stuff) through the Bluetooth and into the car stereo as well? And what sort of steering wheel controls do you get?

Please define the way it all works and the limits of its functionality. From there, I could be interested.

[2004_blue_zhp]

Ok. Let me take those one at a time.

Does it work with OEM Nav? I believe the answer is yes. See this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3BbnphLmFU . I do not have OEM nav so I can't vouch for this myself. But the product has been advertised to work equally well with both the business CD headunit and the nav headunit.

How nicely does it play with the OEM AUX input? That's a good question, and the honest answer is "I don't know", but remember that the mediabridge provides its own AUX input that does the same thing as the OEM one. So I'm not positive if you'd need to remove the OEM AUX input (I'd actually assume not), but I do know that if you installed this unit, you'd keep that functionality either way.

This unit basically pretends to be the OEM CD CHANGER. So the way you interact with it is that you first tell your headunit to activate the CD changer by pressing the mode button. That cycles you through your car's inputs. For me that goes AM/FM->In-dash-cd->CDChanger(which is really the media bridge). If you have AUX installed, it's entirely possible that it will add AUX to that cycle. I just don't know.

What I can tell you for sure is that this device will provide the exact same functionality as the OEM AUX input. Once you select CD changer (see above) you can then use the car's stock controls to control the mediabridge. When you first select CDChanger/mediabrdige, for about 5 seconds, you're in a special mode where you can tell the mediabridge what source (of those plugged into the media bridge) you'd like to use. You do this by using the next/previous track buttons on either your steering wheel or your head unit. Pushing those buttons cycles you through the mediabridge inputs. For example: USB->Bluetooth->AUX. After you've stopped fiddling with those buttons, the medibridge goes from input-select mode to input-control mode. Once there, your stereo controls do more natural things. For example if you're in bluetooth audio mode, next/previous on both the steering wheel and the headunit do in fact skip tracks.

What does it play via bluetooth? Everything. There are lots of specific examples I can mention here, but I was really pleasantly surprised at how well the mediabridge worked via bluetooth. If you select bluetooth as the input for the media bridge, then 100% of the sounds your phone would ordinarily make get routed through your car's speakers. Music plays, and is controllable. If the music gets interrupted by a navigation program, you'll hear that too. Same goes for phone calls. You'll need to install a microphone (included) to get the most out of this. But the quality is good, and once its there, you can really do all sorts of neat stuff. For example, the "talking guy" button on your steering wheel will activate siri (if you're on an iphone). Then you can just speak commands.

Honestly like you said its a bit tough to type out all the scenarios. PM me if you'd like to discuss in more detail. I've been really happy with mine so far other than this connection breaking. There are tons of videos on youtube showing exactly what this can do, but happy to describe my own experience.

[JupiterBMW]

Hmm, ok, I'm intrigued... So, lets discuss install and questions then... Does this go in the trunk or wherever the OEM CD changer is? No physical connections to my iPhone at all correct? Do I need to go through all of those selections every time, or can I set it up once and then each time I get in my car, it'll connect via Bluetooth on its own? Once the Bluetooth is connected, can I switch over to the FM radio and still have the phone connected to Bluetooth for Nav/phone calls?

I'm sorry for all the questions, but I think this is good info for those that don't have it. I feel like I can never keep straight which setup does what.

[2004_blue_zhp]

Ok, let's give it a shot.

There are several cables that need to get hooked up to your mediabridge.

Power/Signal cable. This needs to go from the mediabridge to the spot in your trunk where a CDChanger would go.
Microphone cable. This needs to go from the mediabridge to your mic location, which is likely right next to the sunroof controls.
Aux audio cable. This goes from the mediabridge to wherever you want to plug in a 3.5mm source.
USB source cable. From the mediabridge to wherever you want to plug in your USB source (not relevant for the mediabridge I'm looking to sell since this is the busted port).
Sirius/XM. From the mediabridge to an (optional) satellite radio receiver.


Of these, the power/signal cable and the mic cable are included with the mediabridge. They are both long enough to give you some flexibility in where you can put things.

You're absolutely right that you don't need any physical connection to your iPhone at all. That said, you may choose to set up the mediabridge's 3.5mm aux audio input and you could choose to connect your iPhone that way. Pros and cons to each. BT is nice because there's no need to plug in and you will have skip/previous song control via the steering wheel or via the headunit. 3.5mm audio ditches the convenience and the control but some folks think it sounds better.

For me, the mediabridge lives behind my glovebox and my 3.5mm aux hookup and USB hookup live in my "sunglasses tray"/"front oddments tray". (The thing below the HVAC controls but above the ashtray on non-nav cars.) Based on your earlier post, it sounds like you have Nav and so don't have a space like that available on your car. Assuming you don't smoke, I'd ditch (or drill a couple holes in) your ashtray and route the audio cables right in front of your gear selector. Very convenient.

If you go that route, for this particular setup, you'd need to run 3 cables:

Power/signal cable from trunk to behind glovebox. Remove rear seat cushion. Run from driver's side trunk to passenger's side floor. Run up passenger side of car along floor to behind glovebox.
Microphone cable: run from behind glovebox up along a-pillar to roofline right where windshield meets roof. run along windshield/roof edge to rearview mirror. feed into area by sunroof controls.
3.5mm aux audio cable. Run from behind glovebox into the space behind the panel by the passenger's left knee. (This is easier than it sounds. You can pry that pastic up and get your hand between it and the carpet.) Pop out the ashtray and feed the cable up to where it used to be. Hidden when you close the ashtray cover, there when you need it.


In terms of functionality. The mediabridge remembers what its audio source between on/off cycles. So if you're listening to bluetooth audio via mediabridge (CDChanger) and then switch to FM (press mode) then drive for a while and switch back to the mediabridge (press mode) then it will already be in bluetooth audio mode.

The mediabridge only has power when you've selected the CDChanger via your headunit. So if you're listening to FM radio and you get a phone call, your phone will ring normally (not over your speakers) since the mediabridge is powered down. That said, the medibridge powers up and pairs with BT devices very quickly. So if you hear your phone ringing while listening to FM, you'd hit mode to turn on the CDchanger/mediabridge, wait a second for your phone to pair, then push "next track" to answer the call and you'd be in business. If that sounds complicated/frantic, it's not. It's 2 button pushes and you'll know exactly what I mean if you have the unit installed. That said, I'm not much of an FM/CD guy so this might annoy you more than me.

Happy to answer questions like this. As you said, it's useful to have a reference for the details. And if you or anyone else is interested in taking this one off my hands, let me know.

For what it's worth, I just ordered myself the electronics stuff necessary to attempt a repair and a new dice unit in case I botch it. My plan was to give this a try this weekend. If someone says they'll buy it before then, I won't try the repair (that way I won't break what I'm about to send). Clearly if I botch the repair and kill the unit, I'll update this thread. Not going to try to offload a broken part on someone. But I guess my point is: if you're inclined to buy this from me, please let me know before the weekend.

[323TOZHP]

This may seem like a silly question, but why do you need the USB input anyways? Doesn't the Mediabridge accept audio streaming via bluetooth? You could just have a normal charger from the lighter and have everything run bluetooth and never have to use the USB input. Not the most ideal but it could work...