Bulb failure warning light.

[J.R.]

I had a weird yellow warning light appear on the speedo last night, it went out when I cycled the ignition, on searching google it turns out to be the indicator for the bulb monitoring system. On my MK2 Octavia it set off a bong and the maxidot display showed whicg bulb had (not) failed, after stopping to find the bulb working normally I found that cycling the ignition made the false alarm go away hence my reaction last night.

 

I know that VCDS will have logged the fault code but its a big work up using it and its very cold here, should the Maxidot not tell me what bulb is supposed to have failed? And yes I know a visual check which I frequently do anyway would reveal it but its more likely to be corrosion at the contact points as I had checked the lights a couple of days before.

[varooom]

It might be on your radio, but depends on spec.

[J.R.]

Very good point, the radio was removed for a Chinese head unit but it did have a very narrow ribbon LCD screen probably for the Bluetooth pairing etc, I can recall it showing some guff about trying to connect to the presumably previous owners phones before I ditched it.

 

I'm just surprised that it is not on the Maxidot like the MK2 Octavia or thought maybe I had disabled it. Surprised there was not a warning bong buy maybe they had complaints about that.

[varooom]

I think mine bongs up, and appears on the dash (or at least indicates as such) we have crusty connection on rear left lights, needs whack to remind it to work.

[J.R.]

That was timely, I ran VCDS today, and guess what!

 

Intermittent bulb failure warning left rear tail light, logged 4 times.

 

I tried testing it using output tests but they had so many meaningless names for the bulbs nothing resembling rear tail lights aside from perhaps "Parking lights" & then I realised I was being stupid & should use a MK1 Eyeball (soon to be upgraded to MK2 👍) and the bumlb was shining bright.

 

Next time that I get a "bong!" I will pull the cluster, its been out before & I recall the loom is too short to get the unit out enough to remove the connector without a fight.

 

While I think of it, an unrelated VCDS observation, I restarted the computer today and it prompted me to download the latest version which I did, then it asks for the dongle to be plugged in and the "test" routine run from the "Options" menu, it will not do this without it being plugged into the (or perhaps any) vehicle as it needs power to the Can line, it does not tell you this until you try without.

 

So you lug the computer out to the car, connect it all up & run the routine & only then does it tell you that you still need the internet connection, but by then I am out of range of my ADSL router, luckily here I dont have one and have a smartphone for a wi-fi hotspot so could take that to the car but back at the hôtel I have to park close to the building and use the guest wi-fi signal.

 

If I lived in a flat then I would be left with a non functioning VCDS after accepting the latest upgrade which is usually my experience with any software mise à jour, how do others get on in this regard?

 

It strikes me as being badly thought out for a system that relys on a computer & not a smartphone & normally works at the vehicle without any need for an internet connection.

 

[Trevor M]

JR, I may be wrong (it has been known before,) or your VCDS may be a different version to mine (HEX-V2 USB interface,) but I am pretty sure my dongle has updated via the USB port without being connected to the car. I guess if your dongle works via a wireless interface rather than USB it would need power from somewhere to update, hence the need to plug it into the car.

[J.R.]

No its a USB dongle.

 

It appears to say that it is successfully updated until you go to the vehicle and connect at which point it requests an internet connection to complete whetever it is supposed to have done.

[Trevor M]

In that case mine may have done the same; as my car is parked within wifi range of the hub I may not have noticed the connection request to complete, or as it was in range this could have happened automatically.

[shilling]

21 hours ago, J.R. said:

how do others get on in this regard?

I've had the device connected to laptop, by USB inside the house, and it has updated the firmware, after which I've plugged into car, and it works.

 

This seems to be confirmed by the video on this page (2nd video, not the registration one).

 

The firmware is updated without needing to have it plugged into car.

A very remote possibility is that the USB port on your computer isn't supplying enough power to the entire dongle? Is it a USB 3, and fairly modern computer?

 

[J.R.]

Very old computer.

 

I wont lose any sleep over not knowing why, most IT things end up a cluster***k for me, I just thought it odd  that someone living say in an upper floor flat without a smartphone (although that probably is an impossibility 🤣) could accept a software upgrade which rendered their VCDS inoperative.

[J.R.]

59 minutes ago, shilling said:

This seems to be confirmed by the video on this page (2nd video, not the registration one).

 

There was only one video on the page, looked to be simply an overview.

[shilling]

15 hours ago, J.R. said:

 

There was only one video on the page, looked to be simply an overview.

The page is tabbed, which is why it shows only one video. There's a tab called "Software Update", and within that are two videos.

The one I was referring to is: