[seaweedsalad]

So I did purchased 5th gen impreza. I liked it at first, but there are quite a problem I already encountered.

First my media player is glitchy. Whenever I use USB to listen to the music (both flashdrive and phone) it constantly disconnect or won't recognize the device at the start.

Secondary my cruise control freezes in middle of use.

It's been about a month and these issues are showing up way too often. Is impreza suppose to be this bad?

 

[cnoevl21]

I haven't used cruise control yet (had the car 5 days) so I can't speak on that. But as far as media goes, i have the same issue with usb. When I start the car and plug in the usb drive to listen to music, it plays fine. But then I turn the car off and when i come back and turn it on again, teh usb drive gets stuck on "loading media". I then have to unplug the usb drive (which automatically changes it to radio), plug the usb drive back in, switch to media, switch to usb, and hit play.
This is way too many steps to have to do 5+ times a day. Its ridiculous! I spoke to my dealership and they said the problem is known about but there is no timeline on a fix. I then messaged subaru directly and got this as a response:

"Thank you for contacting Subaru of America, Inc. We appreciate you taking time out of your day to contact us.

What you are describing is actually considered normal USB operation on the new head-units found in the 2017 Impreza models.

It's also not recommended to leave a flash drive plugged in to the USB socket when not in use due to concerns with overheating.

I checked, and at the current time we don't have any updates to change the USB operation parameters.

In the meantime I will gladly pass on your comments to our engineering department, for consideration."

So basically its not a big enough issue for them to care about. If i had known about it, I may not have purchased this car, to be honest.

 

[seaweedsalad]

I haven't used cruise control yet (had the car 5 days) so I can't speak on that. But as far as media goes, i have the same issue with usb. When I start the car and plug in the usb drive to listen to music, it plays fine. But then I turn the car off and when i come back and turn it on again, teh usb drive gets stuck on "loading media". I then have to unplug the usb drive (which automatically changes it to radio), plug the usb drive back in, switch to media, switch to usb, and hit play.
This is way too many steps to have to do 5+ times a day. Its ridiculous! I spoke to my dealership and they said the problem is known about but there is no timeline on a fix. I then messaged subaru directly and got this as a response:

"Thank you for contacting Subaru of America, Inc. We appreciate you taking time out of your day to contact us.

What you are describing is actually considered normal USB operation on the new head-units found in the 2017 Impreza models.

It's also not recommended to leave a flash drive plugged in to the USB socket when not in use due to concerns with overheating.

I checked, and at the current time we don't have any updates to change the USB operation parameters.

In the meantime I will gladly pass on your comments to our engineering department, for consideration."

So basically its not a big enough issue for them to care about. If i had known about it, I may not have purchased this car, to be honest.

Thanks for giving me a good heads up!
In terms of being a "feature" that's a complete lie. I had 2017 impreza rental car from dealership and it never had problem like that.

 

[C J]

"It's also not recommended to leave a flash drive plugged in to the USB socket when not in use due to concerns with overheating."

Very, very odd. I leave my usb in the reader of the car ALL of the time, I think I may have taken it out once.

Just strange stuff.

 

[seaweedsalad]

"It's also not recommended to leave a flash drive plugged in to the USB socket when not in use due to concerns with overheating."

Very, very odd. I leave my usb in the reader of the car ALL of the time, I think I may have taken it out once.

Just strange stuff.

Coming from official, to lie about such thing, makes me wonder about future whether to buy Subaru or not. Since the purchase of impreza faith toward Subaru has been going downhill.

 

[C J]

Coming from official, to lie about such thing, makes me wonder about future whether to buy Subaru or not. Since the purchase of impreza faith toward Subaru has been going downhill.

Subaru used to be a low volume car maker, I think in the past two years they have tripled their sales.

They might be going through some growth problems.

 

[seaweedsalad]

Subaru used to be a low volume car maker, I think in the past two years they have tripled their sales.

They might be going through some growth problems.

As long as they are being honest about it I probably wouldn't be upset, but to add dealer's ridicule excuses, it's just losing trust with their customer. My mom has Nissan, and they handled situation better than this.

 

[seaweedsalad]

Hey guys, it's been a while and wanted to update on my issues. My dealer have replaced the USB unit, but both USB drive and cables to Android will contantly disconnects, or not recognized by radio unit, especially when I turn off the car.

I also noticed that the radio is very sluggish compare to the rental car they let me used. Any suggestion? Should I ask the dealer to replace my radio? My car is only 2 months old so it should still be covered.

 

[C J]

Hey guys, it's been a while and wanted to update on my issues. My dealer have replaced the USB unit, but both USB drive and cables to Android will contantly disconnects, or not recognized by radio unit, especially when I turn off the car.

I also noticed that the radio is very sluggish compare to the rental car they let me used. Any suggestion? Should I ask the dealer to replace my radio? My car is only 2 months old so it should still be covered.

Did the radio have the same unit? I don't remember people with the smaller units having problems, just the 8" unit.

 

[seaweedsalad]

Did the radio have the same unit? I don't remember people with the smaller units having problems, just the 8" unit.

Yes, I have the 8" unit. It's sluggish and slow, disconnect USB everytime I turn off the car.

I'm trying disconnecting the fuse trick. See if that works. So far I restored to factory, disconnected the battery, something I could find on this forum. No luck so far.

Edit:Nevermind it didn't do a thing.

 

[impreza54NT]

Hello, everyone! I bought an Island Blue Impreza August 30, and have had lots of problems with the media, battery, and remote. The battery they replaced, the remote only had an issue once (I could not replicate the problem), and the media is crazy-inconsistant. I am going to speak to the dealer to see if there are any new solutions. I'm getting similar problems - USB loads when I start, but if I plug in my phone sometimes Car Media works fine, other times it freezes the display and won't play anything. Sometimes it just plays the radio. Very annoying.

 

[seaweedsalad]

Good to know that I am not alone in this. I wonder if I could get my radio replaces, because the rental car they let me used didn't have problem like it, and media player itself moved much smoother than what I have (mine sometime takes 5 seconds to respond anything)

 

[tripswitch]

I had problem like most of what everyone mentions. Media won't load upon starting the car.

Turns out there's a software update. I got the update. No more problems. ( I don't know the version off hand) But I have the 8" screen. I leave my 128gb stick in all the time. Unless I need to add to it. No problems with over heating or what not.

 

[DeanGibson]

Everyone in this thread who has the Harman Kardon audio, check the firmware version (in Settings). If it doesn't match what you see in my signature below, get the dealer to perform a Subaru firmware update, or do it yourself (see the related thread).

 

[robzz]

I haven't used cruise control yet (had the car 5 days) so I can't speak on that. But as far as media goes, i have the same issue with usb. When I start the car and plug in the usb drive to listen to music, it plays fine. But then I turn the car off and when i come back and turn it on again, teh usb drive gets stuck on "loading media". I then have to unplug the usb drive (which automatically changes it to radio), plug the usb drive back in, switch to media, switch to usb, and hit play.

You don't have to unplug/plug the usb drive. Just hit the Play button on the bottom/center of the screen. Mine does the exact same thing and when I hit play, it does start.

But the point is, the radio should just start on it's own. The need to hit any button to start playing is ridiculous.

I feel Subaru is getting a lot of calls because basic QA have been skipped. That's unfortunate.

 

[18 Blue Impreza Dude]

Everyone in this thread who has the Harman Kardon audio, check the firmware version (in Settings). If it doesn't match what you see in my signature below, get the dealer to perform a Subaru firmware update, or do it yourself (see the related thread).

Dean, if I buy a 2018 Subaru Impreza 2.0i 5-speed, am I getting the Harmon Karman audio head? Looking at the type of Impreza you bought, it looks like I would be also getting the Harman Karman audio. So you can just download the update and do it yourself? I wonder if the 2018 models have already done this update. While at the dealer I will certainly ask about it and probably just have them do it before I pick up my Impreza. The audio system and Android Auto is one of my favorite things about getting this car and I will not be happy if I have all of the issues stated in this thread.

Thanks for your post above, it is an actual solution to the problem. A prime reason why we come to websites like this - to see if other owners are coming up against any potention glitches, then getting solutions posted online so we all don't have to keep smacking our heads against the wall!

 

[C J]

I am trying to get Subaru owners on several forums to contact harman kardon to let them know what you think about their stereo systems.

https://www.harmankardon.com/support-contact.html

 

[DeanGibson]

Nothing is certain

Dean, if I buy a 2018 Subaru Impreza 2.0i 5-speed, am I getting the Harmon Karman audio head?

I have no way of knowing for certain.

I would guess that firmware current as of the summer of 2017 would be installed on 2018 models as a matter of production.

 

[seaweedsalad]

Just to give an update. I called Subaru today because 3 weeks ago they told me they'll report it and shouldn't take 2 weeks for Subaru to respond and didn't hear anything. "I haven't got anything back" they replied, "Please wait, there might be an software update"

I told them, "Look, I've been told to wait for 4 months now, since the first day of purchase. You guys told me that I'm the only one who has this issue, so do you really believe that the software update would fix it? I mean, did you search if there are any reports like that? What have you guys done in this 4 months, besides telling me to wait?"

Literally, the tech service told me, "Don't be angry at me. It's not fair. I'm only doing my job, tech service said they did everything they could and can't do anything to fix it, so we called Subaru to wait their decision. What you want us to do? We're not computer people and can't fix that"

I replied, "well, replace the infotaiment system? I've been suggesting that and I'm sure you guys haven't done that."

"Tech service thinks it's not the infotaiment system, so he won't do it because it's waste of time if samething goes back in there"

I was about to say that if they aren't the computer people how the **** did they figure out that replacing infotaiment won't fix it. Plus why would they put back the same thing, if I'm telling them that I'm suspicious that this may be an hardware issue. Excuses after excuses. Are all Subaru dealership like that?
But then, I finally realized, or awakened.

They are not Subaru. They are the dealership that sells subaru. They don't even know what's inside of the car. They are likely as clueless as consumers.

Instead, I told them that I'll contact Subaru myself because I'm tired of waiting. I wish I could give reports about tech service, but funny, Subaru's survey only cares about how they sold it.

So, I sent message about the car issues on Subaru website. I'm waiting to see what they say. Hopefully, it won't take another month to respond…

 

[C J]

Good luck man.