So after countless hours searching forum after forum, I've come here hoping someone will know how to fix my problem.

After having the ribbon issue on the stock Bose headunit, I finally decided to go ahead and buy a replacement. Was a bit budget-conscious, so I went with a relatively cheap JVC unit on eBay (JVC KWHDR720)

I've wired plenty of stereo equipment before, so I figured I'd do the install myself. I'd read that to keep the factory speaker setup, I'd have to buy a special harness, which I did.

Now, to my knowledge, I've wired everything correctly. When it didn't work, I re-wired.. and re-wired. Still no hope.

Here's what perplexes me: The unit's face will not light-up. No LED, anything; face is completely dead. However, when I hit the reset button on the front, or the disc eject button, the motor buzzes. I stuck a disc it, in auto-accepts it, and will spit it out when I eject.

Anyone have any godly idea just what the hell I'm doing wrong? All the colors match, I followed the PAC instructions and the receiver instructions to make sure each connection was correct. The ones that threw me for a loop were the power antenna and amp switch, but according to the manufacturer installation instructions, they both get wired to the PAC amp switch. I only used the high +, and left the low + unused. Both grounds were grounded, in 2 different ways when the first failed to work. Is it possible the unit is just bad?

Help!

 

you might want to get the radio bench tested at a car audio shop to see if everything powers up and works fine. if not you will know it's a bad radio.

 

Sounds like your experiencing some faulty equipment

 

You should be able to connect power (switched and constant) and ground to the radio and test. Disconnect everything else.

I would go straight to the battery with some 16 or even 18 gauge speaker wire if I was in doubt about the factory harness.

 

Time to bench test the H/U. If you don't want to pull the H/U, disconnect it from the car's power and connect it to a 12v converter. --Spike

 

I figured it was most likely the unit. I have a friend who works at a dealership whom I'll be bringing the car to this week to check it out. You guys are awesome, I'll let everyone know as soon as I have an answer.

I actually pulled the stock radio and attempted to perform the fix for the ribbon (which is essentially stripping the CD player half out and pulling the ribbon from the player to the daughterboard out a bit further so that the clamp has a new piece to clamp down on, since the original location tends to get bent and lose its connection on the left side.) It worked for all of 20 seconds, so I'm back to troubleshooting the replacement HU whilst half of my dash is still out and I'm stuck with right-speaker-only music.

 

There was a short in my car. Turns out, previous owner had run a DVD touchscreen already, and didn't fix what was spliced before.

Thanks for all the help guys, new stereo sounds great!

 

Thanks for the update. I’m glad to hear you have it working.

One thing I do before installing electronic gear in my car is run a bench test. I have a 12v converter and use this to connect and power the device before going to all the work of an installation. This way I know if the device is functioning properly. If you just install the equipment and connect to the car’s power, and it doesn’t work, you cannot be certain if the equipment is faulty or the problem is caused by the car’s wiring/power.

--Spike

 

I like to turn the equipment on and play music while I put everything back together.

If the music ever stops, I know to back up one step.

 

Good advice. I was actually in the process of converting an old PSU into a bench supply, to avoid anything like this in the future!