When I drive my 2005 545i this morning, the Idrive monitor seems to be stuck such that it did not respond to the "mouse" control at all. Even PDC was not activiated in Reverse. And the date and time appeared to be like "/// //" and Voice command didn't beep after I push it. After a short drive to my work I turned off the engine and turn it on again. Nothing changed.
So I thought that I would stop by dealership this afternoon. But when I drive it again this afternoon every fucntion became normal. IDrive works fine and PDC works okay. Since I can't reproduce it in dealership now I don't know what's wrong with it.
Has anyone had a similar experience?

Thank you.

 

Not quite the same problems as yours, but in my two Idrive related issues with mine, the problems have gone away after the car was off and locked for a few hours. It was explained to me that after 20 minutes with the engine off and the car locked, the car performs a software reset and any software related glitches will disappear. Furthermore, my SA just advised me to get used to this because I will be seeing plenty of this because of the complexity of the E60. A little sombering, but I guess I can learn to live with it.

 

I've not had a problem like that, but if the car is still under warranty I'd be tempted to take it in anyway and ask them to see if there are any stored errors.

 

iDrive does have "boot" issues that may cause system hang ups on starting cold. It takes 20minutes between car lock and alarm activation to reset the s/w. If the problem persists, take it into your dealer to check the CCC. A reprogram may help but ultimately, it may be hardware that needs to be changed out. Traditionally, iDrive errors are not stored as ONB or flash EPROM codes....so there's no way to dig this out unless the problem recurs and you can show it to your dealer...

Keep a digital camera handy the next time it happens so you can get a few pix for your SA...

 

I had a problem where the steering wheel would not lower back to my preferred position, neither the driver's nor passenger front seat could be adjusted and the rear screen would not operate. The next morning everything worked fins and has done so since. Like the OP tried, turning the car off then back on, stopping for 15-20 minutes at a McDonald's didn't change anything. Like others have said, I think there is a software reset that takes place or these cars are so good they are self-healing at times!