Ok, here is the deal. Been a Chevy (please don;t throw things at me) person for all of my life. I decided to go with a Dodge Grand Caravan only because it got better ratings, it was available, blah blah blah...

Personally, 4 weeks into owning it... I LOVE IT !!!!!!
I honestly love the Dodge Grand Caravan !


But, it came with the MyGig with Navigation (RER version) system.

This thing (mygig) is a piece of junk and Dodge should be ashamed of themselves because of this.

1) Loaded it with music... lost audio controls. They go intermittant occasionally where you get NO sound, no volume controls ETC.
You have to let it sit for over 12 hours OR yank the fuse to get the radio to reset. it does this whenever it wants for no apparent reason! Its a royal pain! Took it to the dealer... .they could not get it to reproduce it and checked the codes.. everything looks fine! ARRG!

2) Dodge refuses to allow typing on the screen for a lookup and/or new destination into the Navigation/GPS WITHOUT first stopping the car. They say "its a safety feature". BULL-O-KNEE ! Anyone who has this system knows it is JUST as distracting to search for the music you want to hear, much less try and find a radio station ESPECIALLY on the Sirius Radio ! Besides, if you had a passenger in the front seat, THEY could type it in while driving.. Lots of complaints about this! (yeah i know 3rd party device... nope Shoudl be able to be set by dealer the way I want).

3) The display is supposed to "automatically" dim at night... HA! You have to manually go into the "display settings" and dim it down. Dang bright at night! Talk about distracting! told dealer.... nope.. everything checks out ok on this.

4) Loaded it with music, no way to edit or remove single songs or albums. Playlists? HA! No way to create new ones or add to. They seem to be created automatically and in WEIRD ways!

5) As the vehicle is driving, you are NOT allowed to play a DVD on the unit (no other screens in the back). Dodge says "too distracting, safety feature". I say, I paid the bucks for this luxury and I want the passenger OR people in the back to be able to watch something while I drive... it should work.. nope.. refuse to give out the codes to change it. BUT I can BUY an after market device for $350 .. umm excuse me Dodge I paid good moolah to buy this vehicle an dequipment... I want it to work the way *I* want it to work. Not the way you are limiting me to.
And besides, do I need to go out and buy a 3rd party device everytime your "safety features" kick in? puh-leeze!

6) Loaded it with music originally, everything plays nicely... went to load more onto the 20 gig hd.. WHAM ! It loaded fine, then I see it... ERASED all music, playlists, pictures, addressbooks... AHHHRRGGG!!!! Now I have to dig up all of my tunes and do this ALL OVER AGAIN!

7) Pictures. you can only load 8 photos onto the system. umm ok... then why can't I VIEW from my camera more photos? Nope, can;t do.


As far as I am concerned, this MyGig is a waste of good money. Some say its because its a NEW item and still working the bugs out of it. Well then they can PAY ME to troubleshoot this junk ! You put something out there that is "not ready for prime time" and expect us to swallow it ? puh-leeeeze!


Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE the vehicle. Some weirdness's to it here and there, but again its NEW and I am still breaking the car in and myself to a New Ride.

Weirdness :
There is no memory on the front drivers seat. Memory as in the ability to store 2 settings that is available on some models. Its not an installed feature on this vehicle. With that being said... the seat must be haunted then! I can set the seat up the way I am comfortable in it (8 way electric woo hoo!) come back to it to drive off somewhere and (this does not happen all the time) I find that the chair's back is upright, chair raised all the way up and all the way forward ! I didn;t leave it like that!
No one else drives vehicle.. no one else has the car keys... no seat memory.. but there it goes all the way back to an "little old lady driver" position. Took it to a dealer "must be a bad switch or something".. huh ? I set and forget never to touch switch again... and there goes the seat all by itself !! I swear the seat is haunted then !!


well enough ranting and all... honestly.. I really LOVE this vehicle.. just wish it was NOT completely electronic!


N

 

The mygig radio has a 20 gig hard drive, but only take 8 gigs of information. The other 12 gig have use up with the nav unit and pictures. Also just so you know, if have the mygig radio replaced you need to leave it at the dealer to remove your music and address book. You use the starscan to remove the information.

 

Thanks for the response.

ok..12 gig for the maps and navigation.. ok...
leaving 8gig on system... ok

When I do a check for HD space.. its reporting 17 gig open. Is it possible I have a larger HD than 20 gig ?

Or is it possible that they didn;t load the Nav right at the dealer ?


let me ask one other question.

If they say 18 local and 23 highway... how true are these chip enhancements that are being sold that boast 12+ mpg improvement?

geez, 12 more on top of 23 ??? 35mpg on this van ? I'd LOVE it... but are they honest and true with these enhancements ?


thanks again for the post !

N

 

Yes. But chysler won't tell you that. Its the same HD as a PC.

 

thanks again for the response!

I deal with Computers on various levels and I can tell you its a special HD. yes its similar to a typic PC HD, but thats where the commonality stops. The HD is a special high impact / shock resistant HD. Expensive to buy on your own. People in other forums have complained and want to gain access to it, but they don;t want to shell out the big $$$ for this kind of HD.

like any HD's there is an infant mortality rate on them. I've read that just like a regular PC, its a hit or miss scenario. While the HDs are built to specs and meet them.. sometimes the gremlin shows up and fries the HD. <shrugs> Welcome to the computer world!

Yes you can replace it if you want... voiding warranty and all and the worst part is that the std HD you will replace (Laptop HD) will die due to the vibration and temp extremes that comes std with the HD from factory. Lots of people want to hack the heck out of this unit. I don't blame them! its a computer with an OS that does a secific job.
I've heard of some people trying to replace the MyGig OS with somethign else... ok.. whatever floats your boat. and I am sure that SOMEONE will come up with an alternative that's free and easily downloaded... they always do.
It will be interesting the alternative OS's that start showing up.

personally... I want a starscan ! But not at $5k !! heheh

thanks again!!

 

On our 2008 Grand Carivan the Mygig system does not have the GPS. But I have a way to watch the DVD player while in motion. When the vehicle is running and in park start watching the movie. Then go into the audio screen, then put the vehicle in Drive. Your audio screen should still be open, then push the done button at the bottom right of the screen. Your movie should still be playing while driving. This works every time on our van. Hope it works for you.


Brian

 

From what I understand, and I have tried this on my 2008 MyGIG RER, it does not work, but thanks anyway. I know it works on the REC (?) version.

oh well. I'm lodging a formal complaint with Dodge. Why should they limit my abilities ? so far... I love the car.. but I'm starting to think I might have made a mistake buying this.

 

Well, here is the latest.

I called up Customer Assistance on this.

I spent a few minutes punching in VIN numbers and other information only to be asked to repeat it all again when I got a "customer support rep".

I Explained that this radio from what I have seen and researched, comes with many features turned on and its Crysler/Dodge that disables these abilities for "safety concerns".

So I asked, if its a safety concern, then how come you don't disable the whole radio?
1) Fumbling around trying to find music is much more of a safety concern than keying in a destination or spot to go as you are driving.
2) Having the radio not be able to detect whether its day or night and continuously flash bright and low as you are driving during the day and night is dangerous and distracting.
3) While driving, having the radio LOSE "audio controls" all of a sudden is distracting and annoying. Focus is playing with this radio not with driving. Ultimately, I had to pull the fuse to reset the radio. Why did it lose audio controls...? I was told by Customer Assistance "you were told by the dealer that te radio was functioning normally" REALLY ??!!!

"we disable these features as a safety concern"... oh really? You disable the audio controls as a safety feature? oh puh-leeeze!
"oh no sir, we disabled a lot on this vehicle as safety features"... really???!!

I was told by the "specialist" that if I dared to modify the radio, that the warranty on the vehicle would
become null and void ... WHAT ???!!!!

"Installing a third party device to override your radio safety features will voice your vehicle warranty"

EXCUSE ME ????

This to me sounded like a threat!

So I asked to speak to the supervisor... nope.. not allowed to speak to her. WHAT!!!????

I'm fast becoming disillusioned with Dodge and fast becoming sorry I purchased this vehicle.

Its now moving away from a "safety feature" to pure arrogance towards customers.

 

Wow, lots of complaints. I have an RER MyGIG (nav) in my Sebring. I *thought* it had several bugs. It turns out that many of the bugs were caused y the way I was doing various things.

For instance, if I turn MyGIG on in SAT mode and switch to a different mode before the audio is heard it causes the volume to mute. Pressing the scan up/dn fixes it or turning the key off for a few seconds resets it.

I have no problem creating playlists, I just wasn't doing it the way it was supposed to be at first.

Having the keyboard disabled while in motion is a safety feature, along with the video screen blanked out when you shift out of park. I recently installed a MyGIG Lockpickthat gets around these problems. For $289 it's a great add-on. If you do a search there's even a $30discount group buy code.

Several other things.

There are a few things I'd like to see changed, such as when I'm copying a music CD to the HDD I have to press the Radio Media button to get to a status screen to see what it is actually doing. It should go there automatically when it starts copying.

Go to the forum listed below and do a search for "mygig". It's a Nitro forum but lots of greatstuff about MyGIG.

Dodge Nitro

 

I thought the 2008 mygig's had 30GB hard drives. I have 16+GB of music on mine and I have 3+GB free. I do have the RER (Nav Unit) and haven't noticed any of the issues you are having. What version is your software? Mine is at 9.561.