RNS510 crash (Perth-Mundaring)

[spiff]

Hi,

I wonder if anyone has experienced this in Perth. It seems like some have experienced it in the East - http://www.vwwatercooled.org.au/newf...ghlight=rns510.

I took my Jetta out for a drive (2 weeks old) and was using the Satnav in the RNS510 to navigate to Mundaring Weir about an hours drive if you include a few waypoint stops in the city area. As I turned off Great Eastern Hwy onto Hodgson heading for the roundabout that takes you onto Mundaring Weir road, my Satnav froze. It didn't track my progress anymore. The music on the radio kept playing. I switched it off and on using the on/off switch. The radio came back on, but the MFD didn't display the navigation information, and when I pressed the button for Navi, it gave a screen that said Navigation loading, but hung about halfway and then seemed to crash again.

For the next 15 minutes or so before reaching my destination at the Hills Forest Centre (Allen Road), the RNS510 kept rebooting itself. Each time, the radio would come on (I also tried it once by turning it to the SD card I had, same issue) but whenever I tried to go to the Maps or Navi, it would work for a few seconds, then crash. I was never able to get it to recalculate. It was also never able to track the progress/movement of my vehicle on the road.

After I parked my car, I continued looking and the problem didn't seem to go away. For the next 3-4 hours, I then attended a function, thinking it might have been an overheating issue or something similar.

Coming back to the car and driving back towards Perth, I encountered the same problems. It kept rebooting, trying to give me an accurate position of my vehicle. In fact, on a number of occasions, this was worse compared to the drive in. The arrow on the map would show me in bush, about 50-200m off the road. This didn't make a difference whether it was zoomed in to 25m or zoomed out to 2km.

I left it alone and the system continued to reboot itself - radio came on, it would try to get nav, then it would hang and a few seconds later, reboot. Annoying as anything! On some occasions, none of the buttons would work, so I would just wait till the system detected something was wrong, shut itself off and reboot.

Finally, when I came back out onto Great Eastern Hwy, I manually turned the system off and on..and then it started working fine again.

Does the RNS510 have an issue with being in forested areas? I would rate the forestation equivalent to what I would get often in the South-west (margaret river, walpole, pemberton, denmark areas). Is this a known issue, or should I bring it back to the dealer?

cheers,
spiff

[FJ Steve]

+1 for talking with the dealer. Was the RNS fitted during build...or pre-sale (in Australia)....just seems to be some issues with the Australian fitted ones

[cmrtig]

The satnav quality of the RNS510 leaves a lot to be desired. Although there aren't many accounts of problems in Australia, it is probably because there aren't many of them here and those who have them simply have not thoroughly tested the satnav function. Although, my satnav does not crash it is extremely inaccurate in places and at other times it is okay. My dealer told me last week that V2 maps, which I had for a while, have many bugs and he indicated that they are installing V1 maps on all cars now because in certain areas V2 maps just go funny in terms of accuracy and satellite reception!

[spiff]

cheers. i might speak to the dealer then.
mine was installed either at factory or at dealer, not aftermarket.

do you lose any features or functionality with moving from v2 back to v1?

[tinto]

I've had mine freak out on me near Toodyay.
It was starting to calculate the route (which I knew was simple, just testing it out) then just rebooted on its own.

When it came back to life, the GPS ended up placing my car on the streets around my house, even though i was about 50km away, and clearly not driving down Canning Hwy...

Irritating as I've only had the issues WHEN I NEED THE MAPS - around town it has been flawless when calculating specific routes.

mine was a factory install.
I'll chat to the dealer about it - they still haven't supplied me with my initial DVD...

[esc]

Hey Spiff,

I had the same problem as well and guess what it was on a drive to Mundaring and back as well. Took it back to the dealer (OP) and got it upgraded (SW 1100). I haven't had the chance to re test it though so I don't know if this has fixed the problem. I've got V2 maps as well.

Are we supposed to get the map DVD with the RNS510 if factory installed?

[spiff]

hey esc.. mine was from OP too. what's sw1100 and how do you check what version you have? i'll take a look at mine and see what version i've got.

i didn't get the disc when i picked my car up. they just said i could come by .. and while they normally charge for upgrades, they would probably not charge me for mine.. just pop in and get the upgrade if there's one. they said maybe once a year.

[esc]

Spiff,

Depending on the version you have, it's either

a)reboot by holding down the '<'+'>'+'i' keys, then as it reboots hold the 'setup' button until the test screen appears or

b)hold down the setup button until it test menu appears (after the radio test menu)

[spiff]

hmm.. tried both, didn't seem to work.
b definitely didn't work. i just ended up at the test screen with am, fm and dab tuner. held it for a minute.

will try a again tomorrow. reboot and hold. when i held it earlier after the reboot, it went into system starting.. then to the radio and did nothing after.

[Maverick]

hmm.. tried both, didn't seem to work.
b definitely didn't work. i just ended up at the test screen with am, fm and dab tuner. held it for a minute.

will try a again tomorrow. reboot and hold. when i held it earlier after the reboot, it went into system starting.. then to the radio and did nothing after.

You can't get into the setup on firmware 1100 without using Vagcom/VCDS.

Instructions on how to do it are here.

http://www.my-gti.com/1078/entering-setup-on-the-rns-510-with-recent-firmware

[Maverick]

The satnav quality of the RNS510 leaves a lot to be desired. Although there aren't many accounts of problems in Australia, it is probably because there aren't many of them here and those who have them simply have not thoroughly tested the satnav function. Although, my satnav does not crash it is extremely inaccurate in places and at other times it is okay. My dealer told me last week that V2 maps, which I had for a while, have many bugs and he indicated that they are installing V1 maps on all cars now because in certain areas V2 maps just go funny in terms of accuracy and satellite reception!

You're basing the satnav quality of the RNS 510 on what exactly? The satnav is easily the best factory fitted satnav on the market and is miles in front of many of the vw knockoff units being sold out of China. Take a look at the number of problems that those units suffer from and you might change your mind.

Mapping issues exist with all the satnav units, the maps used in Australia are sourced from Sensis/Telstra and I'd be the first to admit that they're poor but the V2 maps are far better than the V1 maps and I doubt there are any major errors compared to version 1 so I'd be ignoring the dealer's comment as they won't be based on facts. It's possible that they haven't loaded the latest firmware on the units before upgrading to version 2.

I've yet to have any problems with inaccuracy in all different conditions on both V1 and V2 maps. This has included drives down to NSW (Port Macquarie) and around SEQ and many others have no problems either.

There could be many factors behind your inaccuracy problem and without you posting all the details (factory fitted/antenna type/location/firmware etc) it's impossible to ascertain what the problem could be.

[cmrtig]

theoretically it may well be the best unit and it certainly looks the goods, but there have been many people with problems where by the unit crashes and or can't find where it is!

as i posted before my unit was purchased from europe and installed by the dealer and upgraded to the latest firmware and maps. the dealer indicated last week that they are changing up to 3-5 units per week and by that i mean replacing them or downgrading to version 1 maps. i was also told by the dealer that it had nothing to do with the firmware. thus theoretically it is a good unit when it works, but it does not seem to be 100% reliable with australian maps and that is a fact!

[Maverick]

theoretically it may well be the best unit and it certainly looks the goods, but there have been many people with problems where by the unit crashes and or can't find where it is!

There have been a few people, not many people. How many people own RNS 510's and have no problems at all?

as i posted before my unit was purchased from europe and installed by the dealer and upgraded to the latest firmware and maps. the dealer indicated last week that they are changing up to 3-5 units per week and by that i mean replacing them or downgrading to version 1 maps. i was also told by the dealer that it had nothing to do with the firmware. thus theoretically it is a good unit when it works, but it does not seem to be 100% reliable with australian maps and that is a fact!

Was your unit new or a refurbished unit, there are a lot of refurbished units on the market and they're hard to tell apart. The date of manufacture is a good place to start. Has the GPS antenna been installed correctly and tested in diagnostics mode to see if it's working correctly?

The firmware updates have fixed many small bugs so the firmware can affect the operation of the unit.

Seeing as the majority of units work fine with the Australian maps it appears that units can be 100% reliable.

[cmrtig]

Maverick my unit is second hand but not refurbished and only about 6 months old. given that my dealer installed it i assume he would know where to place the antenna. i have not seen any evidence to suggest that the majority are working as they should. to the contrary the only statistic that i have had is from the dealer indicating that they are fixing between 3-5 of these units per week. if your RNS works, of course it is reliable, but what i meant is that on average it is not 100% reliable and until someone produces evidence to the contrary i will hold that view.

[Maverick]

Maverick my unit is second hand but not refurbished and only about 6 months old. given that my dealer installed it i assume he would know where to place the antenna. i have not seen any evidence to suggest that the majority are working as they should. to the contrary the only statistic that i have had is from the dealer indicating that they are fixing between 3-5 of these units per week. if your RNS works, of course it is reliable, but what i meant is that on average it is not 100% reliable and until someone produces evidence to the contrary i will hold that view.

There are no indicators to show that a unit is refurbished, you have a second hand unit from Europe with an unknown quality antenna, an unknown install location (and this can cause a lot of problems) and with unknown coding and I assume firmware version.

Don't assume that your dealer has fitted the antenna properly, nor that the gps antenna is even working correctly, nor that they have flashed the latest firmware or that your unit does not have an obscure hardware fault (hence why it was sold - was this an ebay cheapy?)

Other then a few people with problems there are very FEW posts on the forums about the RNS 510. The fact is that the vast majority are working fine with no problems, take a look at the number of the units sold worldwide and there are very few complaints on any of the forums.

But if it makes you feel batter to think that there are massive widespread problems with the majority of the RNS 510's being faulty than do that but sooner or later you will have to look at the possibility that your unit or the install or the antenna is faulty.