Palmo

I recently experienced an iDrive failure on my new 525d (4 weeks old). This has now happened twice, the first time was about a week ago when the car was only 3 weeks old.

Basically, started the car and began to drive and noticed iDrive screen was blank. Tried pressing menu button but nothing worked iDrive related including the stereo and also the mileage trip meter was switching between miles & km's - strange. After 5 minutes or so, the screen went into a cycle where it would appear before dimming and fading away - still iDrive had no functionality. Anyway, contacted BMW assistance who told me to disconnect the battery for 10 mins and reconnect which should have the effect of 're-setting' the system. Did this and it worked fine for approx. 4 days.

In the mean time went back to the dealers and asked for the car to be checked and was told a fault had been logged which requires the car to be re-programmed and so had to re-book car in for this. The next day the iDrive system crashed for the 2nd time. This time I just left the car parked for approx. 1.5 hours. When I came back it was working fine.

Today the car is in the dealers being 're-programmed'. But I now have a few concerns following my conversations with the dealers.

1. I guess the reprogramming means a CIP / PROGMAN update. This sounds strange to me as surely a 4 week old car has the latest software, or is that too simple to presume?
2. They said that the reprogramming will 99% likely fix the problem, but there is an outside chance following that they may need to fit a new part depending on what happens following the reprogramming. They referred to the potential need to replace the 'Master Unit' and said if it needs this there will be a 1 week lead time to get the part? Again, surely not a faulty part on a 4 week old car (costing in the region of ?36k).
3. Has anyone had similar problems and if so were these effectively fixed with a software update?
4. Anyone with such problems, did these reoccurr or were the problems fixed for good?

I am particularly concerned as I am due to make a long trip into France (Le Mans) in just over a few weeks time and don't what the hassle of faults while I am away. I must say I an not particularly impressed with such a failure within one month from brand new!

cobradav

Yes, several including myself, have experienced a hard failure of either the CID (iDrive monitor or Central Information Display). Other parts may exhibit this "infant" failure issue such as engines, tranny, other electronics. Random, happens in the best of cars, and USUALLY, once repaired never happens again. I would expect a part failure - either your CID or a CCC. The dealer is taking the cautions less expensive route first.

Palmo

UPDATE:

Cobradav, you are indeed right in your comments above relating to hardware failure. I have been contacted by my dealer who have said that the 'Radio Control Unit' is faulty and needs replacing. Problem is that it keeps randomly performing it's own re-sets which has been the cause of the iDrive problems.

Problem is this Control Unit is on back order and not available from stock in the UK & Germany and needs sourcing from the Manufacturer (who ever that is). Could take 10 days or more for my dealer to get a replacement part. I managed to speak to the technician who worked on my car today attempting to update the software when I went to collect the car. He told me he tried re-loading the latest version of software (25.02 - is this the latest version?) which my car already has installed, but this kept on locking up so far through referring to the Control Unit being faulty. When I spoke to the technician further he hinted that this is by no means the first one of these to go faulty and the fact this part is on back order tells a story on it's own. He reckons there may be a design fault in some of these units which is being corrected when the next batch released.

The annoying thing for me is that I do a lot of miles per week and the thing could 'crash' at any time without warning - although it's working fine at the moment. I am also off to France (Le Mans) on 14th June and my dealer cannot guarantee at this stage they will have the part in time to fit and re-programme before I go - this is becoming very annoying!

I guess I am even more concerned that this is going to be one of those re-occurring faults that never gets sorted - I really hope not!

Hawkwing

My 530d is 14 months old (42k miles), never a problem with iDrive until the software was upgraded to v25 a month back; iDrive has failed to boot up circa 12 times (I've stop counting) since then. The very first iDrive failure happened when attempting to start the car at the dealers post being re-programmed to cure other faults! The let the car rest and close down approach has to-date allowed the system boot up, around 30 minutes seems to be sufficient.

My car is due to be re-programmed this week. One hopes this cures the problem, however the component failure you've been informed of is interesting! From my perspective it's a hell of a co-incidence that the iDrive problem started post v25 upgade, perhaps the re-program has 'disturbed' the control units to error, who knows! - Given there are circa 60 control units on my car there is plenty of opportunity for failure!

Palmo

Strange! I guess mine must be a different cause i.e. hardware failure to yours though as my car had v25.xx installed to begin with as it is a new LCI which I believe all come installed with this version? Our symptoms appear very similar though so I guess this doesn't rule out a common bug in this version software?

Which part of the UK are you from?

Hawkwing

My car could have a hardware/controller failure, however all systems are operational once boot up has completed - any hardware failure would be relative to the iDrive initialise sequence you'd think. I've tried different shut down instances i.e. turn off radio, set iDrive to main menu etc., this too establish whether their relative states had any affect to the iDrive failure to boot up - todate this has not informed of any contribution to boot fialure.

The incidence of reported iDrive failures has been higher since v25 according to comments made to me via several dealers here and in the US - no science here, just comment and this may be a red herring - there have been a significant number of cars upgraded with v25 though (as this was a watershed update); as you state this is the start point in the LCI version.

When in the country - East Anglia

Palmo

Again, a lot of your comments are similar to mine, i.e. all systems are operational once boot up has completed - it's the boot up that seems to be the problem. Anyway, in my case the dealer is sure it's this particular Cotrol Unit and had no success at re-programming with v25 - the theory of doing this being that some portion of the programme maybe corrupt - but to no avail as it stops part way through, presenting an error message relating to a faulty Control Unit.

Anyway, time will tell, just want the problem sorting one way or the other now and to ensure I don't have on going reliability issues! To say I am gutted with the car being new is an understatement. I've had ongoing electrical issues on previous cars and don't want to go there again. Buying new should be one way of ensuring this kind of thing doesn't happen! Oh well.....

dubbers

Palmo - Glad I found this thread! Have exactly the same problem

My LCI 535d was built 11th April 2007. Just come back from a 1500 mile round trip to SW France and on the way back got a complete white screen on the i-Drive for almost the entire return journey (12 hrs!). For me, the i-Drive only returned after the 35 minute break during the Eurotunnel - and I witnessed the i-Drive static that it interfered with PA system on the Eurotunnel train :eek (maybe/maybe not but certainly a coincidence).

Was bitterly disappointed that i-Drive crashes and there was no easy way to reboot the system (where's control-alt-delete??). Like you I may venture to the dealer to see what he can do, but I might first harrang my contacts on BMW UK first.

Palmo

Interesting to hear that mine is not the only one - and yours is an LCI too! I too am going to France in a few weeks and your experience is exactly what I'm trying to avoid. That said, I do know that parking the car for 30 - 60 mins or disconnecting the battery for 10 mins cures the problem (albeit temporarily). Would be interesting to see if your fault has the same cause as mine.

I would certainly advise getting it down to the dealers ASAP. Mine had a fault code stored. From this there is then a specific diagnostic process to follow.....do this....then if this do this.....and so on. This has ultimately led to my dealer now diagnosing the cause being a faulty Control Unit - will be interesting to see if this does cure the problem. I will be very annoyed if it doesn't after waiting for 10+ days for the part.

Let me know how you get on.....

How are you finding the new car.....is it an M Sport? I would have liked to have had the 535d but couldn't stretch that far - hence 525d, at least it now has the 3.0d engine, just some what down on power to yours I guess!

gpt

Hmmm... I just updated to 25.xx.xx and had the same problem yesterday, had never had an issue before. The sad part was that I had someone in the car for his first time, allegedly showing him how cool the car was. I'm not sure he was totally impressed to the point he will run out and buy one.