DO NOT BUY PIONEER

[mattyfich]

Heres a helpful tip to all of you who are thinking about buying any sound equipment: Do not use Pioneer electronics. This has been one of the worst experiences i have ever been through. To start off, they advertised this 700$ head unit as iPhone compatible and that you could use your apps through it. It forgot to mention the extra 100$ cable you had to buy (that was poorly manufactured and crapped out after less than a year of use). So thats 200$ extra to make it work properly. But once you update to the new iPhone connector, not only do you need an entire new cord (not the iPhone converter that you can buy for 40$) you need a new even more expensive cable. So now we are 400$ extra in the hole for this 700$ purchase. But wait! Now to use the iPhone 5 with the new cable, you need to update the entire firmware which you can do yourself with these "easy instructions" or you can pay us another 60$ plus shipping and handling for us to do it for you. But wait, when you follow the instructions exactly word for word, we are going to fry the bluetooth capability rendering your unit useless so that you send it in for guess what, an undisclosed charge! They need to reevaluate it and figure out what is wrong PLUS SHIPPING AND HANDLING BOTH WAYS. Or you can take it to the local "service shop" and its 185$ charge plus shipping and handling! And they won't even update it when they are fixing their mistake. But after waiting on hold for collectively over an hour and a half now, they basically tell me I'm on my own unless i want to pay the price. So F*** pioneer and F*** their unethical business practices you have lost me and a lot of other customers for sure.

[mattyfich]

Heres a helpful tip to all of you who are thinking about buying any sound equipment: Do not use Pioneer electronics. This has been one of the worst experiences i have ever been through. To start off, they advertised this 700$ head unit as iPhone compatible and that you could use your apps through it. It forgot to mention the extra 100$ cable you had to buy (that was poorly manufactured and crapped out after less than a year of use). So thats 200$ extra to make it work properly. But once you update to the new iPhone connector, not only do you need an entire new cord (not the iPhone converter that you can buy for 40$) you need a new even more expensive cable. So now we are 400$ extra in the hole for this 700$ purchase. But wait! Now to use the iPhone 5 with the new cable, you need to update the entire firmware which you can do yourself with these "easy instructions" or you can pay us another 60$ plus shipping and handling for us to do it for you. But wait, when you follow the instructions exactly word for word, we are going to fry the bluetooth capability rendering your unit useless so that you send it in for guess what, an undisclosed charge! They need to reevaluate it and figure out what is wrong PLUS SHIPPING AND HANDLING BOTH WAYS. Or you can take it to the local "service shop" and its 185$ charge plus shipping and handling! And they won't even update it when they are fixing their mistake. But after waiting on hold for collectively over an hour and a half now, they basically tell me I'm on my own unless i want to pay the price. So F*** pioneer and F*** their unethical business practices you have lost me and a lot of other customers for sure.

[CoupeVQ35CVT]

Wow. Sounds like their design/marketing department went a little too "let's accessorize" crazy and quality control went on vacation.

[WDRacing]

I didn't read the majority of your rant. Why? Because I've had probably 8 Pioneer stereo's in various cars as well as 3 different receivers in my home. All of which worked exactly as advertised. So saying don't buy Pioneer because you had one bad experience is fairly silly.

I suggest you research a bit more before dumping 700 bucks on something. If you didn't know you needed an extra cable to make things work, it's because you didn't ask. My current Pioneer home stereo is Blue Tooth capable, but you have to buy a special receiver thing to actually use that function. But I knew that before I made the purchase...cause I did a little due diligence.

WD

[mattyfich]

Well through your "skipping the rant" you basically missed the whole point of the article. Its because Pioneers business practices and customer service are screwing people out of money and all these cables which are only specially made by pioneer just try to increase their profit margin by a gross amount. Next time do a little "due diligence" and please read the whole story before you add a sassy remark

[mattyfich]

I posted this to serve as a warning. If you want to buy pioneer feel free. Im sure if nothing goes wrong with the unit you should be A ok. But from my experience with the company itself, don't bother. Your just adding unnecessary stress to your life.

[WDRacing]

Well through your "skipping the rant" you basically missed the whole point of the article. Its because Pioneers business practices and customer service are screwing people out of money and all these cables which are only specially made by pioneer just try to increase their profit margin by a gross amount. Next time do a little "due diligence" and please read the whole story before you add a sassy remark

Selling accessories is a common business practice exercised by ALL manufacturers. The due diligence comment wasn't meant to be sassy, it was meant for other readers. Read about the product you're buying before you buy it. Read reviews, ask questions etc.

Like I said, trashing a company because you had one bad experience is silly. I was just trying to offset your obvious bias.

WD

[SanoSuKe]

My experience with them was pretty good. So far everything is working fine and compatible, didn't even need a new cable for the iPhone 5.

[DAAN.]

I'm a fan of their clean interface to the point of having 3 double din head units over the years
AND my experience reflects Sano's, as no cable was needed for the 5

[mattyfich]

The unit was great i loved it (AVH-p8400bh) But once i got to the point that i couldn't use my iPhone 5 without a cord and special update and it ended up screwing me over is the problem. And the part that pissed me off was dealing with their customer support.

[superbad]

Well through your "skipping the rant" you basically missed the whole point of the article. Its because Pioneers business practices and customer service are screwing people out of money and all these cables which are only specially made by pioneer just try to increase their profit margin by a gross amount. Next time do a little "due diligence" and please read the whole story before you add a sassy remark

This is every company. Why do you think when you buy a new phone your old charger doesn't work on it. It's for the company to make money. It's how it is and always will be. Companies make there profits on accessories. Look at game consules. They make nothing on the consul itself. It's all in accessories and games. That's why you usually only get one controller.
Pioneer is a great company and I always bought there HU when I was into audio and never ever had any issues.

[Rogue One]

[pgvega77]

Well lets start from the beginning and go through this. I feel your pain my man, but alot of this is not pioneer. They screwed the pooch on the custy service in the end but the technical shiz is not really their fault.

"To start off, they advertised this 700$ head unit as iPhone compatible and that you could use your apps through it."

Pioneer is at the mercy of apple here. The ability to use apps was something that everyone has been wanting and Pioneer was simply the first to jump in the water and with all "firsts" problems arise.

"It forgot to mention the extra 100$ cable you had to buy"
"But wait! Now to use the iPhone 5 with the new cable, you need to update the entire firmware"

They were told that the 30 pin connector will be around for a while and then they were also told that the new lighting connector would be a apple only product and they wouldn't license it out to anyone. Basically apple lied to Pioneer twice and it all was around this particular product.

Pioneer is doing the best they can just not on the customer service side of it. Many people are all over the app radio and the "advanced app mode" functionality and it works great. Unfortunately there are a decent amount that have also ran into the problems of the software incompatibility, which is mainly apple's fault, that requires all kinds of firmware upgrades and the such. The appradio is a cool product but its an overreach in advertising. Many problems with it are with apple's constant reworking of their protocols and being very opaque about it.

Pioneer is a fantastic company and is propelling the mobile audio industry forward in many ways that the old big names stopped doing due to shrinking margins and ***holes who think that as long as they can get something cheap online then supporting local shops is pointless. I have had many pioneer products and have loved most. I feel your pain, as an installer I almost always steer people away from any form of appradio, but I would recommend Pioneer to almost anyone.

[telcoman]

The unit was great i loved it (AVH-p8400bh) But once i got to the point that i couldn't use my iPhone 5 without a cord and special update and it ended up screwing me over is the problem. And the part that pissed me off was dealing with their customer support.

It is common knowledge that the cable for an I Phone 5 is different from earlier I Phone cables.

As others have mentioned you failed to do your due diligence.

Telcoman

[00pathyse]

Your Ithingy is the problem.

[mjiacik]

First sorry to hear you have these issues. I bought a Pioneer head unit recently and had it installed by a professional. They found all the harness kits/adapters I needed for iPhone and steering wheel adapters all for around $100. Installed! The head unit wire harness , hands fee setup. I am very happy with all the features everything works as expected. Pandora interface with separate blue tooth input for my Spotifly. They installed a separate USB cable I stash in cubby hole . Also an interface cable to hook the iPhone hard wired. But never have had to use it because Bluetooth worked so well. I have. Been quite happy with Pioneer but I also know a trustworthy stereo installer is a must.

I installed a complete system with sub woofers separate amp for it. 6 pairs of Infinity speakers, back up camera, dual DVD headrests for my grand kids, bypass switch so I am able to view DVD in front seats while car is running. Sound proofing matting in all the doors. All if this $1500 cheaper than Car Toys.