Hello from Dallas. Tom here. As you can see, this is my first post. I have had a 2006 XLR-V - black with shale - since the first of the year. Obviously, I like it a lot. I tend to drive in a rather conservative manner but it is nice to have the car throw me back in the seat from time to time. It's significantly quicker than I thought it would be. Living in the middle of a big city as I do, the opportunities I have to run the car at anywhere near it's potential are, unfortunately, severely limited.


It's a great car but here are two things that I'm not so happy about.

The nav disc thing. I hate to appear petty about this - nevertheless - I'm having a lot of difficulty paying $200 for a DVD. Simply put, $200 seems quite excessive for what it is. I do realize that I am not paying for a piece of DVD media, I am paying for the information that is on the disc. Still, $200 seems WAY too much for software for this dated system. My car came to me with only an Eastern USA disc. No Western disc. Of course, the Eastern disc is no good for me in Dallas. eBay hasn't helped. Is there any way I can obtain a nav disc that covers my area without buying a new disc from GM? If this were a regular car, so to speak, I would buy something like a Garmin or Tom-Tom piece. I could have a more modern, easy to update, better GPS product for the same money, or less, than the GM disc. That's the logical thing to do but, for this car, I much prefer not to have aftermarket products, and their attendant wires, hanging inside my XLR. I am reasonably computer literate and I regularly use CloneDVD to burn video DVDs. If I had access to either a disc, or just the data, I assume that CloneDVD could be used to make a nav disc? I don't care as much about having the latest updated disc as much as simply having a disc that allows the nav system to work. Sorry about seeming so cheap about this but here we are!

Speaking of DVDs....It would be nice if I could use the DVD player when the car is in motion. From what I have read, this is not going to be possible on my car. Entering the codes does nothing. I have written to Coastal/LockPick and they have nothing. I make DVD-A discs (high quality DVD based audio discs) and, when the car is in motion, I can't access the program and menu buttons I need to navigate these discs. This effectively means that I can't play any of my DVD-As in the car as there is usually no point to my sitting in a parked car listening to music. I guess that I will just have to live with this?


I've enjoyed surfing through the forum and I have found it very informative.


Thanks for all.

Tom

DVD NAV--You should be able to change the zone to the one you are either operating in or traveling in. There are instructions your owners manual.

If you can't locate it let us know.



Regards

Jerry

Last Oct when I bought my 07 XLR I sent an email to the Disk replacement center and gave them my VIN # and asked if my car had ever been issued the updates that the Window sticker said would be provided. They sent me the updated 2 disk set. I live in Ft Worth and I have found that both the east & west disk will work. I also tried to make a back up copy of the disks using the Fab 8 DVD copy program and so far have not been able to do it.
Even with the new disks I am not very happy with the stock GPS unit in the XLY. In daylight it is very hard to see (yes I have changed the adjustment to day then to automatic and it still is hard to see). The dealership has checked it and said nothing is wrong with it.

GM has stopped updating nav disks for us, so the latest disk you can get is the increasingly-obsolete 2008 version.

If you would like updated maps, at the cost of losing voice directions, use a Toyota/Lexus Gen 2/3 disk. Latest version is 10.1, which is 2010 maps.

I've found that the free ImgBurn program works well for copying DVD's. The DVD drive in the XLR is a bit picky, but Memorex DVD+R DL disks seem to satisfy it when burned with ImgBurn.

While I too don't like the attendant wire, the free lifetime maps and free lifetime traffic on my TomTom 540XXL make up for it. New maps 4x a year, far far better graphics, and the traffic reporting and re-routing have already gotten used on I-4 and I-95. And the "safety camera" data seems to get updated almost daily.

Jerry - I rechecked the owners manual and I don't think that I can change the region to a zone that is not on the disc that is inserted in the player. When the Eastern disc is in the player, only the Eastern areas of the country are highlighted. The lower number zones, such as 5 for Texas, do not have the individual region numbers marked for selection like the Eastern zone higher numbers. I cannot select any of the western area zones. If I have missed something I'd certainly want to know. It would be too easy if I could just set it to where I am. I can get a local map showing my current location in real time. I assume this info comes from GPS and not the DVD? Sometimes I like to drive with the map on. It makes it seem like the world is spinning around me as I drive.

Don - Fort Worth? We're neighbors! Unfortunately, getting an upgrade disc for free from the disc center is a no-go. When you say both Eastern and Western discs work, do you mean that you can use the Eastern disc for Texas? As you can see from what I wrote above, I haven't been able to make my system work locally from the Eastern disc.

Bought - I completely agree that the XLR nav system is dated - at very best. In my 2006 case, it's 5 year old technology but it's really at least 7 year old technology. Obviously, 7 technology years = an eternity. I'm not really that concerned about the dated maps as I don't think I'd use the nav all that much. It's more that when you reach a certain level of a vehicle, the stuff on the car should be maintained to at least function properly. It appears that a new Lexus/Toyota disc would cost essentially the same as the GM disc. It is very good to know that there is another, better supported option. I can be sure that any Toyota/Lexus Gen 2 3 disc will work? Thanks for the ImgBurn info.

I hope I don't seem to be too cheap here. I just continue to have a lot of problems with paying $200 for an old technology DVD disc. I fully expected the parts and service for this car to be substantial but I also truly feel that the way GM handles buying a replacement disc is outrageous.

Thanks to all

Tom

Tom - I've used memorex copies of the toyota/lexus gen 2-3 disk versions 7.1 and 10.1 with no problem, but of course I could not guarantee anything. I was trying to build a hybrid 7.1 disk that would include the voice prompts, but once I bought the TomTom I abandoned that effort. Toyota gen4 and gen5 disks will NOT work, as they are for newer hardware. Toyota/Lexus went to gen5 for the 2006 or 2007 model years (depending on vehicle), which will give you a notion of how old our gen3 Denso systems are.

By the way, the Toyota disks have all regions on 1 disk -- I didn't try to figure out why GM needed 2. As I recall, the complete set of maps is on both east and west gm disks, it's just the poi's and address tables that are split. That's why you can see where you are with either disk in place. Each region has its own poi and address tables, so with some tinkering you can create a blended GM disk containing all your nearby areas.

BTW, we also use the TomTom in our Lexus RX400h, since it's built-in nav isn't feature-wise much better than the XLR's.

As the history on this subject will reflect very few members were happy with the NAV technology.

We beat the Cadillac marketing and engineers up at the Bowling Green Rallies on this subject. Finally we got to the system in the 2008 and 2009 XLR's. Then of course the car was dropped by GM.

Many of us were not going to spend the $200 per NAV disk fee. It doesn't make any sense to pay that much. So the defection to Tom, Tom and other units started and we are where we are today.

One thing that we should have done is to set up a "Pay It Forward" section here so that those who wanted to could forward their unwanted disks on to other members.

If there is any interest, we can still set it up.

Thoughts??

When I bought the car it only had one disk for eyerything then the updated set came in and had 2 disks. I have tried both and they both seem to work. The car is in the shop now awaiting parts for the seat cooling system. They had it for 2 and a half weeks getting parts to reseal the engine so do not know how long this will take. I live in Southwest Fort Worth and my son lives in Coppell so I go over there a lot. I bought my car in Lewisville at the Chev Dealer.

FWIW, I recently acquired the build sheet and window sticker from the Corvette Museum for my '06 V and noticed the "two free upgrades" mentioned on the sticker. I called the Nav Disc people and, although they confirmed the upgrade program ceased in '08, offered to send me the latest upgrade at no charge since I called to request it. I should receive it within 2 - 3 weeks. I'd give it a shot... 877.628.3472 (877.NAV.DISC)

I'm new to the forum and just bought an 06 XLR. I complained to the GPS Nav group at GM and they sent me the '09 nav disc at no charge. I understand that as the last year the car was made this would be the last version of maps. Hope that helps.

Welcome CSI.

Your model year was entitled to 2 NAV Disk updates which is tied into your VIN or serial number not the owner.

You may just have the last NAV disk release made for the XLR.

Regards

Jerry