the 7series FAQ at Roadfly details how to determine version, etc. with a few assorted clicks and whirls that may well work on the 5er... if not, the sequence will sometime be discovered, you can be sure

What intrigues me is word that bluetooth is pre-wired: if so, is it only a soft switch to enable it? now THAT would be a worthy hack... and, after all, doesn't the BMW service centre hook up to the car via bluetooth?

the real pity is that not too many pimply 15 year old anorak technoid hacker/virus creator/etc own BMWs with iDrive or else it would have been hacked long ago!

 

I've bought a car with a single Cd ...due budget ! . I'm therefore spending time watching for an aftermarket hack to integrate an ipod .
As you say -its a pity not more youngsters are working on i drive hacks - and BMW get to charge the earth for things that should really be standard on a car of this price ( Mine is ?36K )

 

Stu

The changer costs ?270 and the dealer fitted it for nothing!

N

 

That does indeed sound very tempting.. Let's home some nice engineer working for BMW visits the board and imparts his/her knowledge!

 

I wonder if anyone was able to connect a DVD player into the IDRIVe screeen to watch movies . I have seen some people building some converters to tap into it like in the Acura forums and LExus the use the Navigation screen to play DVDs.

Who wants to be the guineea pig and try?

 

The DVD idea may not work. I was told that the LCD screen only displays 256 colours (at least on the business NaV display)

 

Don Juan I was thinking along the same lines as you, I have the professional nav I-drive with the TV tuner option installed, so the display should be fine to run DVD movies as its able to display normal TV channels.

The question I have for you all is, Is there any way to use the DVD player which reads the navigation DVD to play DVD movies on the professional I-Drive?

Any help would be much appreciated!

 

Technically... The DVD drive should be able to read DVD's, but the software (in this case) doesn't support it. So, currently you can't use it for DVD's, except the nav DVD. The CCC is able to convert the regular video signal into a RGB signal, so, if you have the CCC, you CAN display DVD's on the screen, IF (!!) the software tells the CCC that those video signals coming from the DVD slot are to be displayed on the CID. Since BMW engineers seem to be too lazy or unwilling to program the software, so that it allows the use of the DVD drive for regular movie DVD's, we have to wait or find aftermarket solutions what allways will override the screen and never integrate into idrive.

 

You are VERY correct sir You still can have a thirdparty input but its going to look like crap---so I hear. But who cares, its the cool factor that counts.

 

YOU CAN USE IT AS SECOND CD DRIVE, IT WORK FINE READING MUSIC CD.