rns-e buying and fitting

a4quat

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The only thing I'm short of in my car is one of these can anyone tell me which one I need because there is loads of different ones for sale on Ebay, is there any companys that will supply and fit these? And do they all have satnav/dvd/tv and are they 6 disc like the front loader I have fitted at the minute or are they single disc?
would this be the right one for my 03' S4?
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/AUDI-A4-S4-Lo...trkparms=65:12|66:2|39:1|72:1689|293:1|294:50
Woukld this be all I need or do I need to buy extra leads?
 
The leads are different i dont know where you would buy an adapter thou ,
i know theres no cd stacker but im sure they will read sd cards for mp3 format music.
 
thanks paul, ive read up a bit more on them and also found out that not all of them have dvd/tv or bluetooth, the patch leads are £35ish on Ebay too
 
none of the rns-e have dvd/tv or bluetooth built-in, they are add ons.

if you want to watch tv or dvd's you will need a tv tuner & and a dvd player, for bluetooth telephone you need to add a seperate module.

have a look around this forum: audiforum.us which has all the information you will need. there are also suppliers & fitters on that forum, the one i know is craigyb, this is his website tclsatnav.com who is based near manchester :icon_thumright:

ian
 
as 1210 (and others) have said: freeview / analogue TV, CD stacker, iPod, etc are all add-ons.... and not cheap ones either!! (bluetooth = £300-£500 fitted, freeview=£500-£700 fitted, Freeview+DVD+Kufatec control box = £700 excl fitting!!)

Don't stress about the music: RNS-E takes 2 x 4Gb SD (not SDHC) cards as standard and provides a better integrated interface than if you use the iPod adapter..... CD stacker is needed for the real music purists though since the DVD is really only for the nav-disc.... 90% of people are perfectly happy with the SD cards - mine have all the music at 320kbps through BOSE and sounds pretty decent!

The RNS-E (as per your link) was available as factory fit for the B6, so yes, that or any similar models (I think there's the *192 D and *192 E) should be fine.

Fitting depends on what unit is in there already (single / double DIN)?

Depending on what's in there already: you also need the double din conversion cage (about £30), the GPS antena (incl in that linked, but not normally there) and I think you'll also need a wiring loom for the RNS-E too...

In addition to that: remember that you'll need to cut down or replace the aircon unit with a narrower one as they need to me remounted lower in the central console where it's a bit narrower.

You'll also need to vagcom code the unit to get the DIS to show the mini-summary of the directions, track details, etc...

If you want the headache free route: All parts (incl conversion cage and aircon) supplied and fitted costs £700-£950 depending where you go / how much you negotiate.... most will give you a discount if you're getting more than the one piece of work done (i.e. while the dash is open), so if you were thinking about upgrading the steering wheel, DIS, cruise control, etc.... now is the time to do it...

Places that do the work:
VWCruise (HazzyDayz) the guys that did mine - based in Herts now, but they travel around a LOT, very good, very flexible and also offer a fitting service for £100-£200 if you think you can get the parts cheaper and just need somebody to fit it and VAG-com it, etc without breaking anything...

TCLsatnav (aka S8craig, on the forum) Seems to know his stuff - probably gives discounts for members and has seemed really helpful with guys having vagcom issues, etc (based in Manchester, I think!).

Primeprestige seemed to be the cheapest when I was looking around, but up North (no good for me); they were £650-ish <6 months ago, but prices have gone up a lot since then!
 
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one extra bit: you say the front-loader that you have now is a 6-disc?

is that a Symphony/SymphonyII? if so, then I think that it's a double-din and then the swap is a LOT more straight forward: aircon stays where it is, no new cage required, etc.... but you will lose the CD stacker as I think that's built into the headunit....

If the 6cd option you have already is the boot/glove-box CD stacker, then you can keep that CD player as the RNS-E will happilly act as a front-end for that.... or take it out and sell it as you'll have the MP3 player in the RNS-E anyway.... I normally tell people not to bother and jsut use the RNS-E's SD card MP3 player, but if it's already there and factory fitted, then you might as well leave it and just wire it in to the new head unit 'cos you're not going to get much for it 2nd hand...
 
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thx lost, its a double din (as you said) and its a front loader stacker so i will lose it, but as you say its easy enough to put everything on sd card, but is a rns-e system worth £700ish?
 
but is a rns-e system worth £700ish?
I reckon it is you get OE look navigation, a pretty decent radio, MP3 playback with track names and you can add OE Bluetooth kit too later on.

I've done the Symphony II to RNS-E swap in my last 2 Audis. With the wiring adapter and antenna adapter and access to VAG-COM I reckon it's about a 30 minute job.
 
ive found a company on Ebay that will supply and fit for £550! does that sound ok?
 
£550 sounds very good.... does that include a nav DVD?

Yours would be a bit cheaper than normal since there's less fiddling around with aircon units, din conversions, etc if you already have a double din head unit....

You said the car was fully loaded? So if that includes a multifunction wheel, then it's a no-brainer! Channel changing, volume controls, etc all at your finger tips as they should be (not possible on a lot of the aftermarket units). And there are also the directions that get displayed on the DIS (between the dials), which is very handy if you've got the voice muted and the missus decides to go surfing for her tunes....

I think it's easilly worth the money, even £700.... especially if there's din conversions to do and if you don't have access to vagcom.... granted there are some pretty flash and slightly more modern units out there (AVIC), that have the video playback included, but none of the "belong" like the RNS-E.... plus you get to pretend that's how it was spec'd to start ;)
 
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ive found a company on Ebay that will supply and fit for £550! does that sound ok?

If you do have the MFSW, then you can upgrade the firmware to enable the SDS (Speech Dialogue System) you will need firmware version 650

£550.00 does sound cheap. Ask what version it is, you maybe paying for a very old version that wont support the newer features. Get a "Q" variant RNS-E. If you do get one off ebay, you will need a Quadlock adapter. These are available from Kufatec, you will need to specify if you have Bose or not, as the adapter wiring is different.
 
i got mine off the bay and only paid £400 and fitted it myself, no way pay £700, there not fetching anywere near that, its a dodle to fit yourself, quiet a few places offering them for 550 fitted as long as the double din conversion isnt required.
 
I got my RNS-E Q version off that seller for £430 posted came with a copy of the 2009 dvd so i complained saying how it was illegal in the UK to use copied dvd's, he apologized and sent a genuine 2008 one:) I replaced a factory fitted cd based which was not so easy to do as i had to cut and shut some canbus wiring which was hidden behind the boot trim. Also the quadlock adapter from ebay was wired wrong but all the answers were on http://audiforum.us/
 
yep - that looks like the right one... worth asking which DVD is supplied.

Ah - there are the RNS-E limitations:
Since the CD/DVD slot is, in day-to-day practice at least, almost exclusively used by the map DVD, two SD card slots are available to play MP3s. Audi recommends that cards up to 256MB should be used, but cards up to 4GB work well (but note that only standard SD cards are supported and not the physically-identical SDHC card type). The cards only need formatting to Windows FAT or FAT32 format using a suitable PC reader to transfer them, while the MP3 filenames (and any folders) must not exceed 64 characters in length. There is also a 512 file/folder limit on each card (ie the total number of files added to the total number of folders must not exceed 512 or the card will not be recognised as containing any files).

Playlists in M3U format are also supported, and if not using the navigation screens, the playlist is shown with all the tracks in the display. When navigating, two Back and Next style buttons in the upper right of the fascia allow passengers to skip through tracks.