[Android Head-Units] donaldta:
Gotcha.

Yeah, I've seen the 3.5mm and 4-pin iDatalink connection before on other head units and alarm systems. It is actually not limited to Maestro (Ford Sync) there's a lot of cars which use this connector for Keyless entry, Security interconnects, and so on. But, I was actually referring to the beige connector to the left of them that is partially hidden by an opaque piece of tape.

:good:

Seriously? The Android portion in this head unit is one of the cheapest implementations I've seen so far. This Telechips TCC8801 single core processor that was released

three

years ago. One would hope that they would at least update it to a dual core processor so that it can keep up with the newer Android Versions past Ice Cream Sandwich.

I mean common, instead of actually putting in a flash memory chip on the board, some Kenwood Engineer literally designed a mini SD Card slot to be INSIDE radio with no outside access whatsoever. That's the biggest problem with these "name" brand companies, they have rested on the laurels for so long that they have become complacent in their offerings are becoming irrelevant in the automotive infotainment. And then people just buy into them because they do not know any better.

Sure, back in the 90's these guys kept on pushing the envelope but I've seen them all fail to keep up with technology. Now all they offer is overrated, overpriced, outdated systems. Clarion is doing the same thing with AX-1 head unit in Malaysia with a 800Mhz ARM Cortex-A8 processor. Apparently, they are testing it there before going international. It is disgusting how much these companies get away with when you realize the lack luster in the components and effort that they actually put into their products.

That may be something you have seen in the past since the Chinese car audio manufacturers have been doing ever since WinCE was released. Hell, they were the first ones to get Android 2.2 Froyo onto a car audio systems four years ago. So, they got a lot more experiencing pushing infotainment. In fact, they seem to be the leaders in pushing the technology into cars these days. There recently have been great dual core and now quad core systems coming out of China being pushed out with Android 4.1 and later at 1/3 to 1/4 the price of these name brands. And literally, people posting messages in these XDA threads; like, "I had Pioneer or Alpine before but this blows them away."

There was a guy in the Parrot Asteroid Smart thread, that claimed the stock Alpine that came with his Lotus Evora was garbage compared to head unit he replaced it with. And although that head unit was French by design is made by the Chinese and over a year old.

The best way to identify the USB OTG port is actually by measuring the pair of grounding wires of the USB cables OR their grounding pins on the board. There will be a short or resistor between the ground pairs forcing the USB Host controller to present it as USB host ports. Without the short or resistor, it should change into a USB peripheral port. Hopefully this is done in the cable because it is much easier to just disconnect a wire from the socket then try and find solder pads before this occurs.