Chinese Android Head Unit and Steering wheel controls

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jdwis

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Joined
Sep 16, 2018
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Location
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Car
W211 - E220 CDi
Hi guys

A friend of mine who is not technical, wanted to go for an Android Head Unit, I did some research and advised him Xonrich, so he went and bought it from AliExpress.
Head unit specs: Brand name - XONRICH, 2GB + 32GB, 7", Android ver 9, RDS, GPS.. No CANbus Box, SD Card slot.. and some extras, nothing so specifically special.

First of all I tried testing the unit, making sure all functionality works as it should be.
Apart from few gotchas, I narrowed it down and now it has 2 major problems.

1 - SD Card is not working any more. It did work as I checked and played the songs through the SD Card, it also showed to Eject message (if i wanted to) but don’t know when it stopped working, doesn’t show any Eject message or not even recognising the presence of the card, neither any File Manager recognises the card as well. - Starting another thread for this as I do not want to mix 2 issues together.

2 - Steering Wheel Controls: Now this is higher priority to fix it as there is still some argument going on with the seller but I don’t think seller is going to agree to anything. The seller showed in the advert that CANbux Box is provided with the unit, so I thought it would be easy to hook it up and shouldn’t be any issue. But seller didn’t send one and he argues that he is not going to, so the dispute is ongoing anyway.
Regardless, I explained my friend that he would need one anyways to use Steering Wheel Control. He already has one in his car from Connetcs2 so I thought we could use that for time being.
Now I am not very savvy in fixing SWC with its adapter/decoder whatever we call it, so here I am for your help.
The car is Merc, current 1 Din stereo is Alpine with SWC Stalk Control Adapter, which is Connects2 (CTSMC004.2). All SWC buttons working fine as expected.

The following I tried to make it work with this bl**dy Chinese head unit and it just doesn’t want to give up.
Connects2 (CTSMC004.2) unit comes with a Patch Lead as well for altering the connection as per specific stereo (including Chinese models)
As per the manual (Patch Lead pic attached), I made sure Orange, Green & Purple are all connected to its specific pins.
There comes 3 wires from head unit - Key-1, Key2 & GND
Connected those to match it with Patch Lead - Key-1, Key-2 & GND.
Now in the Factory settings (Head unit) there is an option for CANbus, which was set as NO (meaning no inbuilt CANbus?? Or No CANbus attached?? - No idea), I left this NO option as it is to begin with.
The keys on the steering I could use are - Vol +, Vol -, Phone ON, Phone Off, Next & Prev (total 6 buttons)
Using the app came with the unit - WheelKey Study - I tried to assign the steering wheel keys, but whenever I press any key e.g. Vol+, the program (WheelKey Study) would register that key, then trying to assign 2nd key, the program would overwrite the first assigned key, though I never SAVED the studied material, still trying to add the new assignments, but the prog would pick only 1 key, and not consider to go for 2nd key.
No matter how many times I save and open and try to add 2nd assignment, the prog would just keep only last assigned option.
I tried changing the CanBus option in Factory Setting and changed to different Merc model but still issue persists.

E.g. per pics in sequence, even before SAVE or RESET:
1-Vol+.jpg
2-Vol+ assigned.jpg
3-Vol-.jpg
4-Vol- assigned.jpg

Can anyone please help on this?
 

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Can you return it, as faulty?
If the unit is specific to the car it should be plug and play.
You really want the 4gig ram,
the 9" screen is better also.
 
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As above. Return it and get one specific for the car.

Octacore CPU, 4Gb ram and 32 Gb storage.

Good makes I’ve used are Erisin, Xtrons and Seicane.
 
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Oh man
I wish I knew this before
Cant return it now, on top of it I am still fighting with that aliexpress seller
Seriously guys please dont buy anything from there, it is way difficult to return, as per their rules they would ask the buyer to pay for the postage to China, I guess Ebay is much better than ALiexpress.
And like Ebay, there is a team of Aliexpress who would look into dsputes, and they are big time crap as well...
aaahhh.. now it looks like money wasted on this :(
 
Oh man
I wish I knew this before
Cant return it now, on top of it I am still fighting with that aliexpress seller
Seriously guys please dont buy anything from there, it is way difficult to return, as per their rules they would ask the buyer to pay for the postage to China, I guess Ebay is much better than ALiexpress.
And like Ebay, there is a team of Aliexpress who would look into dsputes, and they are big time crap as well...
aaahhh.. now it looks like money wasted on this :(

Hi,
We buy loads on AliExpress.
If you have a problem - simply raise a complaint with AliExpress - they will intervene and if seller is in the wrong they will often sort out a refund.
We have only had good experience with their intervention.
Cheers
Steve
 
Some of these units have a built in canbus controller, but it sounds like your HU is generic so that is unlikely.
If it were a Mercedes specific model it 'may' have had the controller built in.

To my mind the SD reader is necessary. I use it to transfer media to the internal memory, I haven't considered doing this by BT so don't know if that's possible.

Anyway your unit is likely to be old stock and the newer ones have better hardware and software, so run more reliably.
Do what you can to return it, it is faulty.
I've no experience of Aliexpress but often raising a case is time limited. At least give it a go.

Any comms with the seller should be through the sites own systems, so Aliexpress (or whoever) can see you have attempted to resolve directly with the seller.

Personally I wouldn't waste more time with this unit as a specific HU with the better spec, as suggested above, would be a far better experience anyway.
But assuming you go through Erisin or Xtrons remember Chinese stuff comes with a health warning. It may well give out after your 'protection' period has elapsed and you now have the stress of dealing with the unrelaible unit and the Chinese.

Don't import, have it delivered from the UK, from a common warehouse facility near Heathrow is common.
That way you only need return to Heathrow and there is no risk of import duties.
 
How did you pay? If Credit card and it's faulty I'd claim through your card provider. I think it's called section 75. They should refund straight away while investigating, and may ask for copies of communication. Well that's what happeded for me. Good luck.
 
Hi,
We buy loads on AliExpress.
If you have a problem - simply raise a complaint with AliExpress - they will intervene and if seller is in the wrong they will often sort out a refund.
We have only had good experience with their intervention.
Cheers
Steve
Yes mate, I also bought quite many things but only small value items and had no issues, its just sometimes things go wrong...

How much did you pay for it ? Just curious. Was postage to you free ?
It was somewhere around 105.. inc postage of some 36

Some of these units have a built in canbus controller, but it sounds like your HU is generic so that is unlikely.
...
To my mind the SD reader is necessary....

Do what you can to return it, it is faulty...
Any comms with the seller should be through the sites own systems, so Aliexpress (or whoever) can see you have attempted to resolve directly with the seller...

Don't import, have it delivered from the UK, from a common warehouse facility near Heathrow is common.
That way you only need return to Heathrow and there is no risk of import duties.
Yes, seems lil older model (PX3), it does have an SD card..
All comms are through aliexpress site and legit way..
Next time I will keep in mind for UK land items..


How did you pay? If Credit card and it's faulty I'd claim through your card provider. I think it's called section 75. They should refund straight away while investigating, and may ask for copies of communication. Well that's what happeded for me. Good luck.
Didnt know I could do this, thx
Now spoken to CC company, gonna wait and see ...

The only thing is, relying on AliExpress dispute team, but it loks like they are taking micky out, I have clearly posted all the pics, they can see the seller has agreed in the chat that mentioning of Providing CANbus Box is his negligence, but Aliexpress dispute team doesnt seem to care and offering me 10 as refund, where the CANbus Box is not there and a GPS adapter is not there.
I cold have returned this, but the postage is 22 and has to go from my own pocket.
THere does not seem any discretion from Aliexpress in regards to Buyer... at least for me, even though all evidence are provided and posted on their site.

Never mind, when things go wrong u cant stop it :)

I was thinking of somehting else as well.
Though the stereo sound quality is not too bad, ya it does have some high pitch noise issue, but I guess I will look for the solution and could be some power section filter issue...
Regardless, it any of you, if good technical enough and if possible, could please export the android "apk" file for Steering Wheel Key assignment program, then I would try installing on this stereo and see if that works instead of the onecame with the unit.

I really appreciate all your help and advice and it makes sense..
Thanks guys :)
 
Do you pay AliExpress or the product supplier? If your contract is with aliExpress then section 75 is not valid.

If the cost of the product was only £105 then I think you got away with it personally, just put this down to experience.
 
Don't guess. Let the cc provider decide.
 
For what its worth I fitted an Erisin Android HU to the other half's car yesterday and had almost the same setup as the one you have. Process was as simple as going to wheelControl setup, press stalk option then select the action from the HU options, on pressing the 2nd, 3rd 4th etc key it just kept adding to the screen so something is clearly up with the one you have.
 

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