Where is this guy when you need him? When I posted this photo of Audi's electronics test bench for the Q7 it was as a curiosty, but it turned out to be a little prophetic. Mike Schmidt first encountered the Q7's repeated 17-seconds ON, then 4-seconds OFF of sound (regardless of the audio source) and blogged about it here. After one positively maddening drive home on Friday, I was determined to find a fix.
I had a whole weekend to play around with the Audi's audio system and hoped I'd find a clue as to what was going on. I discovered a page within the MMI menu which would indicate a system-wide reset was possible.
The next page lists all the possible resets, so I selected them all and confirmed reset to factory settings.
No sooner had I performed the reset when the 17/4 audio cutout reared its ugly head again. Okay, that didn't work, but I was determined to find the cause. When the system goes silent, it's as if it's turning the volume down to listen for a command or is about to provide navigation-route info, so I tried the voice-control button on the steering wheel: it still worked fine. Delving further into the audio settings, I found this screen with all the volume settings:
This photo was taken just as the audio cut out, and you'll notice all the volume settings are straight up, but the speech dialogue option greyed out. A moment later, the telephone volume option completely disappears, and all the volume levels drop to zero:
When the audio finally comes back on, all these settings return to their original levels. It looks like we'll need the service tech to figure it out after all.
Chief Road Test Editor, Chris Walton @ 20,550 miles
actualsize says:
09:36 AM, 11/13/07
Ctrl-Alt-Delete, and then kick it really hard.
z479 says:
10:10 AM, 11/13/07
lol, that is one major software glitch. I wonder if Audi tested the system before putting it in the vehicle, or just did a good job of taking pictures which imply that they are.
redliner says:
10:16 AM, 11/13/07
I wonder if Ford will have problems with its Sync system. It is Microsoft based, you know.
The manual will probably read somthing like this: "In case of malfunction, turn the car on and off repeatedly until the fault corrects itself."
cwalton1 says:
10:24 AM, 11/13/07
To redliner's comment, I tried the often-used off-on-off-on-off-on-off-on ignition technique to no avail. Funny story to go along with the 17/4-second seizure: My wife asked me why I kept switching stations, and my 3-year old daughter turned it into a ryhming game -- filling in the four seconds of silence with her own lyrics. Cute.
--Chris Walton
opfreak says:
11:40 AM, 11/13/07
reboot the whole car, just pull the neg end off the battery.
greenpony says:
12:21 PM, 11/13/07
Maybe Audi should have called the MMI "HAL 9000".
estreka says:
01:40 PM, 11/13/07
Here you go.
2002blksle says:
01:57 PM, 11/13/07
Everytime I see that photo of the electronics test bench, I get flashbacks to the TV show "Lost in Space."
Warning Will Robinson, Warning!
mr_bots says:
10:01 PM, 11/13/07
For one last resort before taking it in, try unhooking the negative terminal on the battery and let it sit for 10+ minutes. The equivalent of restarting a computer. Turning the ignition off doesn't really reset anything, just puts all the various modules in a vehicle in stand-by. Sometimes a good ol' reboot is in order. Sounds bad, but with all the eletronics in cars these days this exercise is becoming more common and can fix all sorts of electrical problems.