Expensive DSP Stereo Problems In A Vogue?... Aftermarket Unit....IT CAN BE DONE!!

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Silvogue

New Member
Posts
9
Back at the beginnig of March this year the sound from the stereo and satnav in my 02 L322 Vogue packed up. This was diagnosed as the DSP amp in the boot had failed and was US. A couple of weeks later the satnav packed up quickly followed by the in dash screen. Now as all us Rangey lovers know they're great but Land Rover a theiving b*****ds when they go wrong. They want £700 or more for an amp, £1200 or more for a new screen and I didn't even ask about the sat nav but it's £150 to have it fixed if it's fixable and it's completely out of date anyway. Granted you can get these units used on Ebay but it's very hit and miss if they will work, the amp has to be the right one, satnav compatible and even then may still have to go to LR to be re-programmed.

The best solution is to replace all of this stuff with an aftermarket unit, now in an HSE this is easily done, but a new unit stick it the dash wire it up..job done. In a Vogue things are not nearly that simple because everything entertainment oriented runs through that pesky complicated DSP amp in the boot. I have been told by a Range Rover "expert" on the internet who shall remain namless but they are POWERFUL people ;) that it is not possible to integrate an aftermarket head unit into an L322 Vogue because of the complexity of the amp and speakers.. ladies an gentlemen this is not true if you have a good auto electrician and in car entertainments intaller who knows what they are doing. IT CAN BE DONE!

I had the DSP amp, Satnav unit, and radio unit removed from the boot and the screen removed from the front of the car. I then replaced all of this with a MEOS-MC401B single DIN head unit. This unit is great, it has bang up to date Satnav, Freeview Digital Mobile TV, obviously FM AM Radio will play CD, DVD, MP3, WMA, any movie or sound file from SD card. USB input front and rear, aux audio and video input front and rear integrated iPod cable, plug your Ipod in throw it in the glove box and all your Ipod music is displayed on the head unit screen, you can selcet and play all tracks from the head unit. The head unit is entirely touch screen operated and has a remote control. It is a high out put 70w x 4 unit and sounds amazing through the original Rangey speakers every bit as good as the Harmon Kardon system, but if that's not enough for you then it can of course be hooked up to an additional amp. The cost of his unit.......£239!!

A superb auto electical company in St Neots Cambridgeshire called The Biz installed the sysem for me including remodelling the dash to accept the single DIN unit for £350. I then replaced the gear selector, ash tray, gear selector surround and heater control panel surrounds with gloss Piano Black ones to match. Granted I no longer have the onboard computer screen but I never used it anyway and that information I ocassionaly did glance at such as fuel tank range and consumption is still displayed on my dash read out.

Have a look at the photos, it looks good and sounds fantastic all for £589 installed, £111 cheaper than a new amp alone and way less than half the price of a new amp and screen.

My sincere thanks to Senior Members Manchester Mozz and Matt Stevenson for all their help and advice, to Joe at Emmotts of Colne for all his help and to Neil and Al at The Biz in St Neots.

I'm not a photgrapher and unfortunately the pictures do not do the finished job or the unit justice but you get the idea!

DSC040171.jpg


DSC040191.jpg


DSC04023.jpg


DSC04022.jpg
 
One thing I forgot to mention, this head unit is a full Bluetooth Phone function on it and is able to store all your numbers. If you have your phone with you and have intitailly paired the phone with the unit the head unit will automatically connect with your phone as soon as you switch it on an get in the car. There is a tiny microphone and alll cars can be heard throgh the car speakers.
 
Back at the beginnig of March this year the sound from the stereo and satnav in my 02 L322 Vogue packed up. This was diagnosed as the DSP amp in the boot had failed and was US. A couple of weeks later the satnav packed up quickly followed by the in dash screen. Now as all us Rangey lovers know they're great but Land Rover a theiving b*****ds when they go wrong. They want £700 or more for an amp, £1200 or more for a new screen and I didn't even ask about the sat nav but it's £150 to have it fixed if it's fixable and it's completely out of date anyway. Granted you can get these units used on Ebay but it's very hit and miss if they will work, the amp has to be the right one, satnav compatible and even then may still have to go to LR to be re-programmed.

The best solution is to replace all of this stuff with an aftermarket unit, now in an HSE this is easily done, but a new unit stick it the dash wire it up..job done. In a Vogue things are not nearly that simple because everything entertainment oriented runs through that pesky complicated DSP amp in the boot. I have been told by a Range Rover "expert" on the internet who shall remain namless but they are POWERFUL people ;) that it is not possible to integrate an aftermarket head unit into an L322 Vogue because of the complexity of the amp and speakers.. ladies an gentlemen this is not true if you have a good auto electrician and in car entertainments intaller who knows what they are doing. IT CAN BE DONE!

I had the DSP amp, Satnav unit, and radio unit removed from the boot and the screen removed from the front of the car. I then replaced all of this with a MEOS-MC401B single DIN head unit. This unit is great, it has bang up to date Satnav, Freeview Digital Mobile TV, obviously FM AM Radio will play CD, DVD, MP3, WMA, any movie or sound file from SD card. USB input front and rear, aux audio and video input front and rear integrated iPod cable, plug your Ipod in throw it in the glove box and all your Ipod music is displayed on the head unit screen, you can selcet and play all tracks from the head unit. The head unit is entirely touch screen operated and has a remote control. It is a high out put 70w x 4 unit and sounds amazing through the original Rangey speakers every bit as good as the Harmon Kardon system, but if that's not enough for you then it can of course be hooked up to an additional amp. The cost of his unit.......£239!!

A superb auto electical company in St Neots Cambridgeshire called The Biz installed the sysem for me including remodelling the dash to accept the single DIN unit for £350. I then replaced the gear selector, ash tray, gear selector surround and heater control panel surrounds with gloss Piano Black ones to match. Granted I no longer have the onboard computer screen but I never used it anyway and that information I ocassionaly did glance at such as fuel tank range and consumption is still displayed on my dash read out.

Have a look at the photos, it looks good and sounds fantastic all for £589 installed, £111 cheaper than a new amp alone and way less than half the price of a new amp and screen.

My sincere thanks to Senior Members Manchester Mozz and Matt Stevenson for all their help and advice, to Joe at Emmotts of Colne for all his help and to Neil and Al at The Biz in St Neots.

I'm not a photgrapher and unfortunately the pictures do not do the finished job or the unit justice but you get the idea!

DSC040171.jpg


DSC040191.jpg


DSC04023.jpg


DSC04022.jpg

Agree completely - you can replace original ICE kit, in part or in whole, if you know what you're doing (or know someone who does) - I do it for P38s. I don't know intricate details of the L322 setup, like actual wiring diagrams or colours, etc... But almost £600??? THAT is seriously steep... If it is anything like the P38's setup, you could have done it yourself for well less than half that price. The setup in the E38 BMW 7-series (with which I believe the L322 shares most of it's electrics?) IS similar to the P38, and I did a very similar thing in the one I used to own.

The key, as you allude to, is a competent ICE installer... Many of them really don't know that much about these complicated setups!
 
hi, many thanks for your comments. im well pleased that you got it sorted ,well done ,ive recently spent £540..on buying an original sat,nav and all ancillarys etc fitted to my 2000 vogue and now i wish i hadn't ,so i will sell the whole set up and retro fit something along the same lines as yourself , cos its a nightmare to use and with no touch screen or bluetooth facility , it looks good but totally impractical ,,,am looking around manchester area to get myself sorted ...anyway well done and good luck its nice to see a satisfied rangie owner whos gives us updates on their achievments ...kind regards MOZZ :):):)
 
I have the exact same head unit, but i had issues with getting it to work with the amp. Eventually hard wired the amp control to one of the amp wires which had power, but now it drains the battery when rr not used. How did you prevent this from happening in yours???
 
I have the exact same head unit, but i had issues with getting it to work with the amp. Eventually hard wired the amp control to one of the amp wires which had power, but now it drains the battery when rr not used. How did you prevent this from happening in yours???

The amp has both a permanent feed and a switched ignition feed. Sounds like you have wired into the permanent, hence you getting a flat battery.

Why have you had to wire stuff into the amp cables ?

I had to make no modifications to get the amp to work.

As the amp should automatically turn on when the ignition is on.

All depends on what system you have fitted. There were quite a few variants fitted.

Need more info !
 
A common problem with the DSP (Power amp/audio effects processor) is that it is subject to moisture back in the left hand rear compartment. It is common that there is some water ingress from the rear quarter window so electrical connectors can suffer. In my Vogue 2003 the power supply +12V supply pin corroded and broke so the DSP amp lost its power.

I was able to disassemble it and find a cure.
Check out this post: http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/1468257-post18.html

I did a bypass operation by soldering a heavy duty cable onto a +12V circuit board foil and routed that cable out to the power supply wiring. It would be a shame to try to replace the DSP with some aftermarket power amp. The DSP and other audio modules communicate over the BMW "ibus" serial instrumentation bus and is navigated from the central console navigation screen. Any aftermarket amp is not going to be able to integrate as intended with the existing components, frankly it will just be something that will continue to remind the owner of the flawed setup.
:rolly:

I recommend trying to resurrect or replace the DSP. It´s worth it. I could assist with some DIY advice if anyone care about this.
 
Gunnar- I want to keep my dsp. Can you tell me on how to connect my L322 with DSp with an after market Head Unit? i have power ;) But no Sound. everything else work except no sound. THe DSP when i unplug it i can hear the charge int he speakers.

Any Help ;(

Thx
 
Gunnar- I want to keep my dsp. Can you tell me on how to connect my L322 with DSp with an after market Head Unit? i have power ;) But no Sound. everything else work except no sound. THe DSP when i unplug it i can hear the charge int he speakers.

Any Help ;(

Thx
I am very curious about the solution thereof. today i also built-in system like that and the same result. I suspect that the cables are not wright. the new Android system has only antenna, power supply and speakers needed. The supplied cables, 6mtr, in my opinion not entirely correct. IT Neede modification. Who has the answer ???
 
Help!!!!!! I've recently bought a 2003 vogue, there are some issues with the radio which I knew about so I was going to replace the lot with a new 9 inch android screen that has Bluetooth, satnav etc. But after getting the screen and finding out I needed some extension cables to go to the front I have now found out it won't do any sound because it's not going through the amp. Could anyone help? I'm happy to do it all myself but need some advice on how to remove the old parts and what needs removing for it all to work
 
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