Perpetual Novice

While replacing the radiator yesterday, I had the radio on and apparently I pulled the battery low enough that when she cranked I put the radio in safe mode.

I heard a rumor that the radio will reset itself after a period of time as long as its in the same car...perhaps its just wishful thinking. but has anyone had this happen to them? Otherwise I'm dealer bound

audinutt

It won't reset itself, what you heard is if you input the wrong code 3 times, then you have to leave the key on for an hour with the radio on to try again.

-Richard

DynamicA8

You may be able to just pull the radio out & it may have the security code written on the top of the radio. I just bought my A8 (2 days ago) and had to replace the battery before I drove it away. No radio for an 11 hour ride! Speaking with an Audi Tech, he said he always wrote the code on the top of the radio. Sure enough, I pulled it out and it was written right there. Hope this helps.

Perpetual Novice

I just spoke with the service manager at Momentum Audi. He went into a lon spiel about how he needs to VAG the car, and pull the radio code and the vin to send to audi. i'll need an appt...blarg.

Stock brain says go do it...Mod Brain says time for RNS-D...

Perpetual Novice

WOW ECS sells the headunit for 37 bucks! that's less than the dealer would charge to pull the code.

Thats looking like the best option. I think I'll also get a set of radio removal tools, because when I was inserting the nail files I usually use for this, I heard a loud POP from the radio and it went dead...oops.

Perpetual Novice

UPDATE In case anyone is idiotic enough to do what I did, bear in mind that the 8D0035195A head that ECS tuning sells is for the A4/S4. ours is the 4D0035195A. I dunno how I got mixed up

With that said, there are only 2 differences I can see:
1) the faceplate is different. Remove 4 screws, carefully pry off the faceplates and switch

2)the A4/S4 head has 2 little ears on the back heatsink. I had to grind them off. Before you do, I recommend you wrap the head in saran wrap, you don't want aluminum filings bouncing around in your head unit.

silverd2

May not help much, but VERY much on the same subject. When I bought a bargain price re-manufactured Symphony radio from ECS, that was advertised as an A8 replacement, turned out to be an A6 unit. When I saw the difference(S), I called. They had no direct swap available and said to only switch the front trim and it would slip right in.....NOT quite.

At the price, I kept it...and it works perfectly...but here's what I had to do >>>>

http://forums.quattroworld.com/a8/msgs/43078.phtml

Perpetual Novice

Luckily my front panel was still in good shape, so I swapped the whole front panel on and it works fine. Using your guide, I think I'll tear down my spare and replace the capacitor I fried, then I will pick the code and have a garage radio