Well after 6 weeks and several trips back-wards and for-wards to skoda dealer with slow starting Columbus last Tuesday had a brand new one fitted.

This morning started the car the Columbus screen says ( starting up) on the screen and it stayed like that till i arrived at the skoda dealer i hour later.they take the car into the workshop 40 minuets later the fitter comes out says the Columbus has turned into a brick and they will have to replace the Columbus again .

NOT HAPPY

has anyone else had a similar problem with there Columbus unit.

bill

I had the Columbus unit fail in my car when less than 3 weeks old!

My last two Skoda's went through 3 units. The first failure was 3 years ago in what is now my wif'e's Octavia and the first replacement unit took weeks to arrive, when it proved to be faulty out of the box the second one arrived in a week. the unit in my last Superb failed last year and the dealer got a unit for the next day!! they now know it is a common fault and seem to stock spare units in the UK.

what worries me if they are failing when they are new what are they going to be like when 3 years old and out off warranty,bit off a worry i think at £1600 each.

bill

My unit froze today for the second time (first was two days ago but it reset quite quickly).

Went onto the tv preset channels and while it stayed on that channel I could not see the (tennis) screen only the preset channels. It would not change to anything else, no radio, map, phone etc.

Anyone had that happen? I will be talking to the dealers on Monday.

I have some mixed feelings with Columbus.

It works really well from day to day, and it covers the needs of most people.

But it freeze on occasions and is very slow.

The Columbus (RNS) software is very mature, but (i suspect) also very poorly written.

My Columbus died today. Splash screen shows for a bit, then goes off, then comes back and so on. Can't turn it off, it just keeps doing it all the time the ignition is on. From what I can see this indicates a hard drive failure meaning the unit has to be replaced. A new one from Skoda is £2,048 + VAT! I can get cheaper ones on eBay but not sure I want another Columbus as they seem to be rather unreliable!

how old is the unit skoda might replace under goodwill.have you tried reloading the maps and firmware.

bill

Ours freezes on a regular basis but switching the car off and back on usually clears it, according to VCDS there is an intermittant fault with signal from the gps antenna , so happens more when its raining so not good at the moment

Car booked in for diagnostics on Friday. I suspect a dead hard drive.

i have just bought Superb 2008 and the previous owner told me that columbus sometimes turns off, but nothing more serious. I accepted it and now, two weeks later, it stopped showing rear parking sensors (at least these beep), no air-con, left remotes on steering wheel stopped working, but what is bothering me the most is - it basically goes off whenever it wants to with not always going back on afterwards. Took it to Skoda dealer in Colchester and they told me that there is probably an assembly fault within the head unit and needs replacing. Obviously, being out of warranty - lots of money!!!! I am just furious! We are going to Slovakia in August and I will try to take it to Skoda there as I have my reservations about garages here!!! But this could be only my wish!!! If no luck there, I might consider used unit from e-bay or downgrading to Bolero!!! For the price difference, I could get 2 brand new TOM TOMs. Anyway, is there any alternative for Columbus but still with sat-nav? Thank you guys

have a look at http://www.kenwood-e...roducts/car/vw/

cheaper than a Columbus but I don't know if it supports all features

More details of the Kenwood system here:

http://www.accessories.skoda.co.uk/productdetail.aspx?p_no=ZGB000035523

thank you for your messages and advice!!!

i have just bought Superb 2008 and the previous owner told me that columbus sometimes turns off, but nothing more serious. I accepted it and now, two weeks later, it stopped showing rear parking sensors (at least these beep), no air-con, left remotes on steering wheel stopped working, but what is bothering me the most is - it basically goes off whenever it wants to with not always going back on afterwards. Took it to Skoda dealer in Colchester and they told me that there is probably an assembly fault within the head unit and needs replacing. Obviously, being out of warranty - lots of money!!!! I am just furious! We are going to Slovakia in August and I will try to take it to Skoda there as I have my reservations about garages here!!! But this could be only my wish!!! If no luck there, I might consider used unit from e-bay or downgrading to Bolero!!! For the price difference, I could get 2 brand new TOM TOMs. Anyway, is there any alternative for Columbus but still with sat-nav? Thank you guys

UPDATE: whilst still in the UK, my columbus started turning these functions (as described above) on and off. My wife advised to fix it good old Czech way - give it a kick!!! So I did - it started working, but turned off and on and off..... we are now in Croatia and beleleive it or not, when the temperature rises above 35 C, it all works!!!! I am more and more convinced that I am dealing with some sort of cabling issue/ connection, rather than a completely broken unit...I will probably take it apart, when back home in the UK and I will check it myself...

i had a ford denso satnav in my mondeo always struggled to start in the winter would start working when it had been on 10- 15 minuets or once the temperature was above 10 c it would be fine.did i read some wear that the Columbus was made by denso

bill