Well, it is noted in other places in this thread that with the Metra 70-1787 harness it is straight plug and play from the RCA plugs on the receiver, via the Metra plug which mates to the yellow C-plug, to the amplifier.
This makes sense to me if I use the amplifier in the receiver and not the one already in the car. However, it does not make sense to me to go from RCA plugs to the amplifier. I think I should cut the RCA plugs off the Metra harness and instead connect it to the line-out wires from the Pioneer head unit.

Does anyone have directions for me?

BTW: Where is the amplifier located?

TIA,
Ola

 

Back from a great weekend at Daytona, and helped by this thread, I thought I'd reward my -01 with the install of iPad Mini and Pioneer DEH-X9600BHS, leaving the factory amp in place. I add a couple of comments and a picture since I have not seen too many installs with the old type, 3-part horseshoe.

A. I apologize for my confused question of yesterday. The Metra 70-1787 speaker wire adapter is plug-and-play from RCA outputs on radio to the yellow C1 connector.
B. The Metra power plug is slightly tricky to feed behind the console, and the wires need to be extended when connecting to the power cable from the radio (I learned the hard way and had to redo the connections).
C. Scosche Vwa-Kb Volkswagen Antenna Adapter Kit makes the antenna plug right in.
D. I have been reluctant to cut into my leather covered plastic parts. However, in the end I think the leather makes it easier as it hides my cut edges. I just peeled it back, made my cuts per directions in this thread, and glued the leather back over the cut edges.

Next I need to figure out the nuances of jail breaking etc...

 

So I decided to go for it! I have been studying this thread for a while now to give myself the best chance possible to successfully install the iPad mini in my car. I must say it was a little nerve racking to think about cutting up the dash but I finally got the courage to go for it. All in all it was pretty easy. I just really took my time and made sure that I stayed totally focused and kept a steady hand. The final product is all that I hoped it would be. The only thing I'm waiting on now is the new head unit. I decided to go with the Pioneer DEH-80PRS. The car already has a very high end stereo system in it but it was done in 2002 so the technology has obviously changed a lot. I think all components that I have will do even better with the new head unit. I am not experienced in doing installs like this at all, so if anyone is considering this mid to their own car but aren't really confident they can do it, I say go for it and just take your time. I took a few pictures throughout the process. Hopefully it helps someone but the pics aren't the best quality.

I also did the jailbreak on the iPad so that I can set commands for the iPad to lock and unlock when I turn the car on or off and when the iPad stops receiving usb power it automatically goes to airplane mode and goes back to normal when the power comes back on. The other things I did was set a command for a three finger pinch or spread to turn volume up or down since the volume buttons aren't accessible. Same with the sleep button, I made a long press of the home button act as the sleep button.

After all said and done it looks like the car came with the iPad installed from the factory. Very happy with the project, and it was actually kind of fun to do.

Thank you to everyone who gave their input on this topic, I couldn't have done it without the knowledge I gained from this forum.

 

I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong but I tried to upload a few pictures and it only posted one of the ones I originally uploaded when I was posting my reply.

 

Looks good!

I've recently started using Apple Music (with subscription) instead of Pandora, endless streams or downloads of commercial-free music that matches my tastes. Glad I have an ancient/grandfathered unlimited ATT data plan.

 

Hi guys -

I am struggling to keep the iPad Mini Charged. It is an iPad mini 2 without the finger print scanner. I have a Pioneer MVH-X560BT. When I am driving the pioneer will run the iPad and slightly charge it. I have turned off a lot of the iCloud sync stuff etc. I may also do the whole airplane mode thing via activator too, but I do like having the iPad always connected.

My question: is anyone having better luck with a headhunt other than the Pioneers that puts out more amperage via USB? Is there an inline USB booster?

 

Ipad mini retina needs more power. The best, IMHO, is to put a powerbank between Pioneer and Ipad.

 

Thanks! Will the powerbank still allow the USB integration with the pioneer to work and pass that through? Do you have a power bank you would recommend?

 

I'm also having issues with battery drain. During the winter I took my car of the road for a few months. I removed the iPad and did an experiment. I charged it fully, put it into airplane mode, and closed the cover (which I believe puts it to sleep). After one full month it still had about 50% of the battery life left.

A few weeks ago I reinstalled the iPad. It's set to go into airplane mode and sleep when the car is switched off. It seems to work fine in that when I turn the car off the screen goes black. When I turn it back on, airplane mode is automatically disabled (as indicated by a screen message) and I am back in business.

But after about a week of no use, the battery drained from 100% to less than 10%. I can't figure it out. I suspect it's not fully asleep like it was when it was out of the car and the cover closed.

I am reluctant to use a power bank because won't that just continue to provide power to the iPad even when the car is turned off, thereby keeping the iPad on?

Thoughts?

 

Have you tried rebooting your iPad (hold power and home buttons at the same time until the Apple logo appears)? You can also go into settings to see which app(s) are using the most battery.

 

Has anyone tried this mod with an Android device? Specifically the Samsung Galaxy S2 8.0 as it for all intents and purposes is the same dimensions as the IPad Mini.

I just unintentionally updated my Ipad Mini original to 9.3.1, trying to fix a intermittent crashing of Waze. Hating it as it's sloooow now. Not to mention that it's not yet jailbroken-able.

The S2 seems to be a fair bit brighter AND it's and Android! GPS is built into the wifi version for those of you wondering.

 

So I took my own advice and am trying the Samsung S2 8.0 tablet....and the jury's still out.

FIT:
Fits just fine! Though the power input is just off center requiring that I trim a bit off the dummy button above my cigarette lighter. So if you have an actual button there, it won't work. Orienting it so the power cord is to the driver won't work as well as it fouls a button there.

POWER:
This tablet sucks down power! My Pioneer 80PRS was able to charge my ipad mini just fine with tablet on full brightness (1 amp USB). The S2 sucks down the power on full brightness (AMOLED display) such that I'm LOSING power in use. Grr. Possibly can be rectified with a hardwired 2 amp USB adapter. Also, in sleep state, this sucker does not seem to have good standby ability, having depleted itself in 3 days with wifi and bluetooth on. There might be a software solution, but so far...no good.

INTEGRATION:
This may be my deal breaker. My Pioneer 80PRS only has IOS device integration over USB. Does not support Android unless I use Bluetooth. Which sucks, cause I've loved the apple device on USB, as this allows maximum audio quality, to take advantage of my 3x burr brown DACS in my 80PRS headunit. Also, there is a slight delay on startup while I wait for bluetooth to connect, and I don't like that!

SPEED:
Wow this sucker is fast compared to my dog slow IOS 9 Ipad Mini original. Too bad, cause I liked the ipad just fine on IOS 6.

SOFTWARE:
I haven't completely figured this one out yet. Oddities with volume going back to 70%. I was hoping split view would work with both WAZE and spotify, but WAZE doesn't support it yet. And there's no convenient ACTIVATOR software equivilent... Trying to figure out how to get gestures set to, for example shut down the device without the hard button.

SCREEN:
She's a beauty. I was worried case the screen was rated just under the same brightness as the IPAD Mini 1. But OLED as a direct emitting technology, really helps here with the off axis viewing. Colors are sooo punchy and nice. And the psychological advantage of it being .1" bigger (8.0" to 7.9") =P


CONCLUSION:
There's several deal breakers on my specific setup with my Pioneer 80PRS lack of USB integration with Android. And the high power use issues that I've not fully resolved. IPAD 4 mini on order.

 

No one must be looking at this thread anymore. For posterities sake...

I'm back in an IPad Mini. Though an Mini 4 now.

The Samsung S2 8.0 was a no go in the end because of the power draw. It would lose charge WHILE charging (@1.2 amps). This is due to the AMOLED screen and WAZE, as a largely white picture causes huge power draw.

IPad Mini 4 is nice and fast! I'm back in my happy place. The IPad mini 4 is brighter than the Ipad original I had. Though at full brightness, it will only just retain and add charge barely. With the brightness at 80%, it will charge nicely. Though this is not really an issue cause of it's excellent standby ability. I have Activator putting the IPAD to airplane mode and sleep upon power disconnect.

I was hoping to have split screen working on both Android and IPad mini4 setups. Funny thing is that the Android version of spotify did not support split screen. On the IOS side, it was Waze that did not support split screen. Hope they will get their softwares updated shortly.

 

I'm still here! I've been thinking about eventually upgrading my original iPad mini with a newer generation. Someday!

 

I posted this mod three cars ago! :-)

Still use iDevices in all my cars, some fully integrated, some RAM mounted, some with magnetic mounts. Waze everyday.