Mrconwaytwitty

Nice write up mate glad you got it installed. Re your sound issue I personally use the lexus Bluetooth audio as seems to work fine and I haven't tried the vline one. If your after a different launcher I made a quick YouTube video which gives a little demo of it, excuse the cables in car lol

Haha cheers mate It looks pink but that's just the light it's red to match interior trim just to my own taste. The charging cables are a neccassary evil, FAST charger for mobile USB type C, charger for vape pen my mini USB, interior mirror dash cam cable and I have a external battery charger running so yeah no choice lol

I have a 2009 Lexus IS220D with factory navigation and rear camera etc. So I ordered the GROM VLINE 2 LEX5 model Friday from carputershop website which is the UK distributor of GROM. obviously ordering Friday meant Saturday and Sunday plus Bank Holiday Monday prevented my order being processed and dispatched, however it was sent Tuesday and I got it today wed 29.5.19. Now let me tell you I'm no mechanic and definitely thought the installation of this was beyond me and I couldn't find a local audio fitter who was familiar with the product and none could guarantee me they would be able to fit it successfully or place the various peripherals (mic, GPS antenna, unit housing) in any specific place so I could of ended up with it being stuck under footwell (no good with car heater blasting down on it during winter). So decided to take the plunge and do it myself. To be fair it was fairly straightforward taking apart the centre console, removing the air vents where a bit tricky but came away eventually, the hardest part was figuring out where to place the vline unit for housing and accessibility and even though I have lost my storage space for mouth wash, owner manual and various other crap I decided to clear out the glove box. I also ripped the shelf out on the left hand side which is near the cabin filter housing so I had a full rectangle space to work with. Once I did this I got my torch and looked for any gaps, there aren't any apart from one square piece of plastic which I didn't know what it's use was but turns out it just had a led light attached for the glove box. So I ripped the led from the plastic cover and set them both to one side, this now provided me with perfect access to seat the unit in the glove box and feed through the wires into the back of the stereo unit. Thank god for that otherwise it would have been a nightmare. Actually connecting the wires into the back of the stereo unit was difficult for me, no matter how many times I watched the grom installation video on YouTube I couldn't figure out as there so close up the angle frazzled my mind, that might just be me being a bit brain dead, so connected what I thought was right fired it up and nothing happened apart from my hazards lights where on and wouldn't go off. Clearly that wasn't right then. So disconnected again and what threw me was that both the power cables and the video cables have male connectors to plug in but also female connecter to re attach what you pull out. This was fine for the blue video cable but there was no power cord to unplug that would plug back into the female socket, in the end I found an empty port unused and just plugged the make into it and left the female return wire hanging, give it another start up and presto we are in business! So while everything was still pulled apart I decided to set it up a bit before putting everything back together to prevent repeating the process. First thing I did was connect to my home WiFi with no problems, then straight into system and check for updates, both software and firmware updates where available so I pressed update firmware over the air, once pressed screen went black with lines (see pic) and full thing died. Waited and waited then turned off ignition and turned back on several times.... Nothing. Felt like crying 😢 £515 just bricked, or so I thought. Rang the carputershop but the tech guy wasn't available til tomorrow, I thought I can't just leave my car in bits all night so decided to try and fix it myself as although my manual mechanical/audio hardware skills are fairly **** I am a qualified IT pro from my college days so software is quite easy for me. So after some Internet searching various YouTube vids and forum posts I managed to gather some information relating to downloading a single file from the grom website which you put into a USB stick formatted to FAT32 and put the solitary file on it. Disconnected the unit from mains and video, put USB into it, then plugged just the power cord in, waited few seconds and USB light went off, apparently this resets to factory. So then removed USB stick and plugged all back in, cycled ignition and boom, it was back from the dead like Jon Snow. My initial concerns where though that the download file for the reset on the official GROM website only says for VLINE 1, but mine was a VLINE 2 so I was curious if this would make a difference to what software version I would be getting. Anyway once back alive I decided try again but this time I updated the system software FIRST before the firmware, not sure if this made much difference but this time both updated over the air via WiFi with no issues and after checking the info in the system im running android 8.1 fully up to date. Phew! Next then was routing antenna and mic, this was easier than expected. Using plastic prying tools I pulled off the plastic trim to the left of the glove box and traced the antenna wire through that up into the side felt material window pillar and mounted on top of dash near bottom of window pillar, the wire is wedged tightly so didn't even need to stick it down as its quite rigid. The mic wire I went the same route only this time going further up past the bottom of the pillar where the antenna sat and upto the roof prying as I went, along the roof felt trim right over to the driver side pillar and just left it to hang/sit at the top of my driver side felt pillar, again the wire is tucked tight so remains in place quite rigid (see pic) . After that I replaced the plastic trim to the left of the glove box (see pic) and shut glove box with the two wires causing no obstruction to the closure and opening of the glove box. I couldn't get that bit of plastic I ripped from the top of the glove box back in place but wanted it there to prevent any excess heat from the heater leaking in and over heating the unit, so I just used a screw to re attach it to the top of the glove box with enough play to allow the wiring to feed through unharmed. Once done I re assembled all the main components, air vent, Ash tray, head unit, and I must say everything looks near enough factory fitted, you wouldn't know anything was there. I'm really proud of myself I never thought I had it in me. I even have some red trim which goes around the unit which I managed to wedge back in, so yeah very pleased. Now next then onto using it, at first was bit temperamental as I downloaded Google apps or gapps as they call them, and the first installation something went wrong and after I created a new Google account especially for the lexus it kept saying Google services needs updating before you can use Google apps, trouble is it wouldn't let me sign into Google play store to update services so eventually after pressing system reboot in settings it landed me on a recovery screen with options to install, reboot, factory reset and something else I can't remember. After trying reboot a few times to no avail I went for factory reset. Luckily it resets back to 8.1 with all updates intact. So I then went back to the download gapps section and this time it seemed to take longer and download differently, which from experience I know is a good sign. Plus once installed instead of creating a new account I just signed in with the one that I had created before the crash. And now it all seems to be working fine, YouTube works, chrome, even a dodgy live sports streaming app I use works perfectly. So after teething problems I'm delighted with it, but it's only been a few hours so I can't pass judgement just yet let's see how it performs. I wrote this reply to possibly help others who may have experienced the same issues and rather then sending the box back can do the reset method I did. I will help anyone who asks as best I can and if anyone would like any pictures other than the ones I have posted or a short YouTube video showing inside the glove box and the wiring feed I used I can produce upon request if it helps anyone. Also I'm based in Doncaster South Yorkshire so if you need a helping hand and I'm free hit me up. For those who already have this installed however might I ask has anyone used the agama car launcher without problems? I'm considering purchasing that as opposed to the standard launcher and it looks like a kids tablet rather than a sophisticated piece of car tech.

Looks great

Thanks for replys guys, i know road safety is important and not blinding fellow drivers and I don't intend to but really my factory low beams where just crap. Anyway I bit the bullet and bought a pair off ebay, very similar to the ones Lee kindly advised, fan on etc (£24.99) yeah I'm guessing there not certified as road legal like the £150 ones but I installed them very easily everything fits inside compartment and no errors or problems so far so good. I did also get a friend to have a drive with me in his car and go past me to check for angle and brightness, he said they where brighter than my old ones but weren't dazzling in anyway or overly bright, which granted isn't the most scientific of tests but it will do for me. The difference is not massive but so much easier to see the road now compared to the old ones, im really pleased. So the low beams are H11s on is220d, anyone know what the high beam code name is please? Looks a bit daft having white lows and yellow highs so I wanna swap them also but haven't had them out before so not sure what type fit they are?? If anyone would like the link to the ones I bought I can link the ebay listing, by sounds of it though I'm guessing not lol. In either case thanks for your feedback appreciated

Thank you for your reply and the information. I'm not so much worried about the MOT specifications as i could always swap them before hand if they are indeed "plug and play" and as easy as a normal bulb replacement. I'm more concerned that they may throw up a error message or some other compatability issue. I really would just like to know if there are any that will work well with a is220d

Just wondering if anyone has had any experience with fitting LED bulbs into the is220d? I have a 2009 model I believe the low beams are H11 bulbs ane high beams are different, but my question is there are plenty of H11 LED plug and play bulbs on ebay they seem fairly straightforward to fit, but I'm curious has anyone actually tried them and if so have you encountered any error codes or lights on the dash? Resistor errors or whatever? Also any recommendations that will go straight into my car model without too much headache?

Thank you very much, I appreciate your help. And yeah I mean I understand its not something people condone or encourage but it's hardly crime of the century, I always take due care and attention while driving. Appreciate the concerns though guys it is noted 🙂 Once again thank Texas / Paul

I take your point bavianni and understand the potential ramifications of my actions but I if had a pound every time someone replied stating the obvious I would be rich. I have my reasons and it's not for my viewing pleasure it's for my son, I don't care if its illegal. Thank you for your reply I appreciate the input and advice but all the same any answer more specific to to my question would be appreciated.

Glad you managed to get your DVD MP3 disc working in the Lexus. I used to have a dvd player in an old car and I would download the music videos off YouTube and covert then to avi files, put all the latest on a DVD and play it in the car for passengers to watch while driving, was pretty cool. So my question is, does anyone know how to heck the lexus Mark Levinson system so it plays DVD while the cars in motion? Seems like a great feature of the car I never use due to this reason :(

Thanks, yeah I did a bit of searching about online as ya do to learn more and as you say the bottom is separate so I'm going to double check all fuses first, then if still no good I will get the bottom piece removed and checked over. Worst case scenario i will replace it. Just hoping it's something simple

Basically I got banned for 9 months and the car was sat on the drive for the duration, battery ended up dying totally and I had to buy a new battery and disconnected old one before replacing with new to get it started. Once started all major functions worked fine but the head unit wasn't working, checked fuses underneath passenger foot well and found bust fuse, replaced it and the screen came on, navigation works, climate / heaters work etc but the bottom row of buttons CD/AUX/AM/FM are all unlit and unresponsive. When I press the audio button it just shows a screen saying AUDIO OFF and I cannot change that no matter what I press, on off button does nothing, AUX does nothing, neither do am, fm or cd, all totally dead and back lights unlit. My mobile phone connects to Bluetooth but when I accept a call there's no sound through speakers. Was working fine up until I changed battery I'm hoping maybe this is more fuse related than anything else but just wondered if anyone else experienced this and if so which fuse or how did they fix it? Cant live without some kind of audio :( Thanks

I'm in the same boat. I have 09 is220d and been trying to get a decent manual replacement knob for ages, still not found anything decent. If anyone does find any please post a link

That's actually a fantastic idea and looks great without all the wiring mess around. Where did you get them from I would like a couple too? Thanks