RNS version A

[Lyons]

I know this has been covered thousands of times before and I know the answer but just can't remember, but I can't bear trawling through all the old threads when I'm sure someone can help me!

I'm looking at a version A unit, but the guy doesn't know what firmware it is.

Are all A units free from battery drain regardless of firmware, or is it only up to 1100- anything over that on an A will still drain it?

[Richn83]

I believe the A's are all free from battery drain as 1100 is B territory as thats when the visual display for the fader and balance kicks in.  Having said that I have voice control on my B unit without battery drain through Joshi's cooked firmware files so with an A I think you will be fine.  if not you can always downgrade the firmware.

[Lyons]

Can you not upgrade an A to 2600 or other higher than 1100? If you can, are they still free from battery drain or is it actually the firmware that causes it, as opposed to the unit itself?

[danishmkvgti]

drain is firmware related not hardwarerelated 

[Richn83]

When you do a firmware update on an RNS part of the process is updating the way it interacts with the can gateway on firmware newer than 1200 this stops the gateway from powering down the RNS so it stays running in sleep mode draining your battery. 

There are edited firmware versions by Josi off of VW-Navi that he has cooked so that 1200 can firmware is parcelled inside the newer firmware releases, allowing you to use newer firmware with an older gateway.

I have now used 1300 cooked firmware and just recently a newer one that allows voice control, both without any battery drain issues and I have an F gateway.  So it can be done, one other issue with updating the firmware on a A unit is the inability for it to store your last GPS location, hence why it always defaults to germany, there are firmwares which allow it to update quicker but still for the first 5 minutes the nav wont know where you are.