September 29, 2020
Sony MEX-N5000BT
I bought one of these for my 2000 Tacoma.
I hate it with a passion.
The problem is that it is Sony, so it is built with quality and will
last forever. If only they had better people do the design work on
the unit so it was pleasant to use (or useful at all).
My main motivation in buying it was to be able to plug in USB sticks and play audio files.
It does do that. It also offers a bluetooth link to my Android Phone.
It also has an Aux jack (that I have never used).
I hate the unit.
It is extremely difficult to operate.
I have to believe that it must by now have been the cause of countless vehicle collisions.
I don't know how anyone can operate it while at the same time driving a vehicle, without
extensive practice with the vehicle parked and with the manual in hand.
Demo mode
The vital thing here is to turn it off.
I just replaced a battery and it is back in demo mode.
You want to do two things.
Turn off demo mode and cancel the beep.
Park the vehicle, turn the engine off, then turn the key to turn the dash and radio on.
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should say "Set General"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob until you see "Set Beep"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob counterclockwise to get "beep off"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should exit the menu system
Now for demo mode:
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should say "Set General"
- Do not press the knob to enter "Set General"
- Rotate the knob until you see "Set Display"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob until you see "Set Demo"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob counterclockwise to get "demo off"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should exit the menu system
You will also want to set the display color, otherwise it will cycle through
all the different colors, which is distracting to say the least
- Press Menu (at lower left). It will probably say "Set Display"
- (it remembers this from the demo mode business above).
- Rotate the knob until you see "Set Display" if needed
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob until you see "Set Color"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob counterclockwise to pick a color
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should exit the menu system
The other thing you may want to do is to set the time.
You should be an expert by now, so the following is a bit abbreviated.
- Press Menu (at lower left).
- get to "Set General"
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob until you see "Clk Adj" or some such
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob to set the hour
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Rotate the knob to set the minutes
- Press the knob to say, "yes, this is what I want to to do".
- Press Menu (at lower left). It should exit the menu system
Turn the key off and then back on again to verify.
You should not longer hear a bunch of beeps when you turn the car off.
Have any comments? Questions?
Drop me a line!
Tom's Tacoma pages / tom@mmto.org