cool, cheers again Chicken......where does that name come from anyway 'chicken eyebrow' sounds as if it has hidden meaning

think the issues is the standard vag wiring arrangement means that if you plug in an aftermarket stereo it can send 12V onto the k-line used for diagnostics - not good!

Correct , so if you plug an eBay special VAG-COM lead into the car bye bye laptop

Or you can remove the glovebox to get your hand to the back of the stereo that way.

This is a good tip as sometimes you cannot get the radio all the way into the dash (because of the wires at the rear) but by removing the glovebox you can gently move the wires to where they need to go whilst pushing the radio into place

I used SWMBO's nail file and released one side at a time. Took a bit wiggling but was out within a minute

As for the wires pretty much all new HU's have bullet connectors on the red and yellow wires (permanent live and switched live) and these will just need swapping over. Also I was told in these cars to cut the remote power/electric aerial wire (blue with white stripe) as it can cause problems by sending a pulse to the ecu or something to do with diagnostics although I'm not sure how true it is.

HTH

Matt

Correct! Think it's pin 16 pop the wire out and replace with the aerial booster wire iirc

The problem is with plug in diagnostic tools it can send a hard 12 Volts down the 'K-Line' and short the diagnostic tools.. can't do much to do with the car mind you.

It's all to do with having the CD player storing/reading some aspect of faults.

f'ken modern cars do my head in. So after reading this have I got it right that if I'm to take out the standard HU that not only will I need to swap round wires, my radio reception will be pants too, and have to fit an 'injector' and even if all thats done it may send a signal to the ECU to say there is a fault?? WTF? what happened to the days of happily splicing wires together and covering in insulating tape.Job done.

All I want to do is have a 3.5mm aux socket for my mp3/ipods like I have on another HU but dont think I can be ar$£d with all that.

theres not enough room to do the spliceing no more :( it stresses the twisted joints to much ) however i got an iso conversion block that the wires were already the right way around to fit my mk1 octy so the permanent and ignition live had already been swapped around for me .... i have fitted an alpine cda 9812rb old but still a great head unit works with my ipod classic and i have no faults with radio signal it works fine