Hope to have seen the last of the infotainment issue on my Octavia

Despite being told the issue has been solved, my numerous visits to the service centre have left me sceptical.

BHPian mah45 recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Hi All,

As many of you following this thread might know, I have been facing recurring issues with the Infotainment system in my Skoda Octavia Mk 4. It all started during one of my trips to Coimbatore last year. (just a few months after purchasing the car). While the car was parked and locked, all of a sudden while we unlocked it to get in, there was a huge noise and it took me a while to figure out where this noise was coming from.

This continued for almost a minute and automatically stopped.

And it never came back during that entire trip.

Post this, I encountered this issue of Infotainment restart very rarely during the first year of ownership. The symptoms used to be - while driving the car, all of a sudden the Infotainment keeps restarting from scratch and gets into a non-stop loop. And this continues even when the car is locked and the ignition is off.

This used to continue for 2 days and then it "heals" itself automatically on the 3rd day.

I had reported this during the first Service last August 23 and I was told since it was very intermittent and since they had no precedence, all they could do was download and install the latest Software updates available at that time.

The situation got worse by Dec last year(2023). The number of such restarts became more frequent. And by Jan/Feb, an additional symptom started occurring which is when the Volume also starts increasing on its own. This was a deadly combination.

Imagine, your car is parked in your parking, the Infotainment gets started by itself middle of the night, and the FM starts singing at the maximum volume. I really had sleepless nights during that time.

In February, the car was at the Service centre for almost 10 days where the latest updates were installed (1941 version) along with I was told, a customized update for the BCM, Airbag and Infotainment together. But after taking delivery of the car, within a few days, the Issue started reappearing.

By April, a situation once again became unbearable - while driving the volume all of a sudden starts blaring which could become dangerous while driving. Or while parked, the system kept restarting and was sometimes disturbing the neighbours as well.

Once again in April, the car spent a week at the Service centre during which time I was told since all Updates were already installed, they had raised approvals to Skoda for the controller unit replacement.

The part arrived a week or so later and by the end of April, and another 1 week for fixing the control unit, the car was returned by early May.

Within a week, the Issue started appearing again, and by 12th May it got so worse that by the time I tried to start the vehicle the next morning, the battery had completely died down, i.e., on 11th and 12th May, due to continuous Infotainment restarts for almost 24 hours, while the car was parked, the battery got drained completely.

Had to call up RSA for a jumpstart, and the car was taken to the Service centre on Monday 13th. By this time, my mental agony had become too much, and I really started getting nightmares. I used to wake up in the middle of the night and get worried whether the car was singing on its own at the top of its volume.

I escalated the Issue to Skoda management and was told the display unit would also be replaced. I have repeatedly asked whether this will be the final solution to which I was answered in the affirmative.

By 17th May, the car was returned after the Display unit change. So far, haven't faced this issue Post that replacement.

But having gone through so much pain due to this, and that too with multiple runs to the service centre, I am still sceptical.

I did see the post from TBhp-ian @Ambust where he was mentioning about Heat management issues. And I tend to feel this could be true.

I am from Chennai, and I do have a covered car parking. But when you travel or when you shop, it does get parked outside and exposed to heat. However, if the unit cannot withstand this, I feel this is a pure QA problem.

I have however ordered an Autocraftz windshield sunshade now at Amazon and will start using it while the car is parked outside. Another trigger I feel is Android Auto.

Even now while I am writing this, I went outside twice to check whether the Infotainment is Off.

I sincerely hope I have seen the last of this Issue.

Fingers crossed.

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