So it turns out that I needed to use the red "cam-line" on the extra harness that contains the external microphone. Weird spot to put that and I'm not sure why initially I overlooked it but nonetheless that was the ticket.
What I did was de-pinned the white connector I was questioning in the posts above (as I obviously didn't need it since I don't have a factory backup camera). I attempted to then pin the Android HU with that wire to match up with the reverse trigger wire - again, remember my Android HU was not pinned in this spot - but turns out the pin I got from the backup camera connector was too large and would not fit into the factory harness. I figured the Android HU used almost all the same pin sizes, and they looked the same, but the pin I tried to use was just barely too thick and kept getting pushed out when I'd plug the two connectors together.
So what I decided to do was similar to what
@Hisma mentioned in one of these threads. I didn't have that fancy push pin deal he used so I just pressed the pin into the back of the reverse trigger wire harness and then used a bullet connector (from one of the extra Android HU wires I wasn't going to use) and taped it securely to the factory loom so that it doesn't move around or pull out.
The backup camera I bought from Alibaba replaces one of my factory license plate lights and I decided to buy a wireless kit. I regretted this after doing some research on wireless backup camera interference. I didn't want to spend more money so I just cut the wireless transmitter off and stripped the sheathing to get to the power and ground. I hardwired these to my reverse light wiring. White/black wire at the reverse light is positive, and black/yellow is ground. Thankfully I had two side taps laying around:
I had a 25 foot set of RCA's and just stripped the yellow one off to run up to the HU. This was kind of a pain, I ran it down along with the factory trunk lid loom, under the driver back seat, across the lower door sills, up through the fuse box area and then above the steering column to the HU area. Surprisingly, with the 25 foot length I really didn't have but maybe a foot or so of extra length I had to tie up. Here's my line after running it to the HU area:
I also installed the external microphone. I dropped the map light assembly and used (what I figure to be - not certain as I don't have factory Bluetooth setup) the stock microphone spot. The mic kind of just tucked right into a little nook by the driver map light that had a grille cutout deal. Then I tucked the wire into the headliner, down the passenger B pillar, behind the glove box, and up to the HU area.
As far as the fit, it looks like I was initially mistaken. My fit is just as bad as
@Habaku. That first night in the dark when I was messing with it it seemed like it pushed in better but nope, mine sticks out at the top just like his.
I messed around with it for a long time today trying to get it to fit. I unscrewed the two lower screws on both sides where the screen portion attaches and slightly loosened the uppers. I was hoping for this to allow the upper screws to act as a hinge and allow the rear casing of the Android HU to rest higher inside the dash and thus allow it to sit flush on the outside screen side. This was a no-go.
This current version of the Android HU as it’s being manufactured right now just flat does not fit properly without modification. No bones about it.
I ended up completely removing the six screws that hold the front screen portion to the HU. The front end is just connected via three ribbon cables.
I disconnected the ribble cables so that I could set the HU inside the dash and then also attach the outer screen portion separately. Be very careful doing this as it’s very fiddly trying to hold both together. The outer screen portion DOES fit factory flush into the dash opening and clicks in perfectly when it’s not being impeded by the HU itself.
The fitment issue is definitely due to the angle/positioning of the HU itself with respect to the outer screen portion. I’ll skip the descriptions of all my frustrating fitment trial and error and skip to my final outcome of what I had to do. Unfortunately, this may be a deal breaker for some of you guys that may not be comfortable modifying/fabricating on this unit.
I decided to basically sacrifice my ability to play CD’s and to separately attach the screen and the HU itself. I removed all six screws that hold the screen on. This allows the screen to sit flush in the dash.
As far as the HU side, the back end (firewall side) of my HU needed to sit HIGHER than the mounting bracket allows. I had to take the mounting bracket off and weld on two extensions. Thankfully I had some sheet metal laying around that I cut off a project car just the other day that was almost perfect thickness.
Here it is welded up and ground smooth:
I also had to bend a little bit of an angle into the bracket. Without doing this, it won’t sit flush against the stock mounting point but also more importantly this allows the HU to sit a little deeper into the dash:
Here it is in place. You can see the back of the HU is ABOVE that plastic piece that these units seem to bottom out against. After seeing this picture of it mounted in place, it seems you MIGHT be able to do it without lengthening the bracket and instead merely cutting the bottom of the bracket out (making it a slot, like mine) and then using a very oversized washer to try to grab the bracket:
I managed to drop the stock mounting bolt all the way down inside the dash somewhere. Womp. Thankfully those 10mm bolts that are found all over older Hondas fits perfect. I have a gazillion of those laying around so I used the Honda bolt and added a large washer just to give a larger surface area:
After doing this, you can still somewhat secure the screen and the HU itself together. The “tabs” on the back of the screen that sit into the case itself - the part where the 3 screws per side go in - you can still line those up and it kind of holds it together. Unfortunately you can’t just screw it in because the screw holes don’t line up any longer - not even the top one. If there were space to access the sides somehow while it was all in place you could likely use self tapping screws to screw the screen to the HU casing in its new proper orientation but alas there is no space to do that. If you could somehow hold it all in place and remove it you could do that off the car, but obviously if you remove it then the positioning gets all screwed up and there is zero way to replicate the positioning outside of the car.
Anyway - all this done, it finally fits the dash flush. I would still prefer to have it screwed together but I prefer the flush cosmetic fit more. The sticking out at the top stuff is definitely a no-go for me and this looks great cosmetically. Like I said, I had to sacrifice the use of my CD player though. With this new positioning, the CD player opening and the unit itself don’t line up properly any longer. I don’t actually own any CD’s anymore anyway so this is unimportant to me. The only issue for me going forward would be to make sure somebody doesn’t shove a CD in there. Everything else still works perfectly because again the screen is just connected via flexible ribbon cables. They are very fiddly to get attached again so don’t say I didn’t warn you if you unattach them lol.
Backup cam works perfectly:
Homescreen:
Navigation works (no don't worry about my privacy, this is not my home address - I went out for a drive):
Nice and flush:
I was also able to thankfully make the buttons light up white instead of red. You must go into settings -> general -> extra settings -> 123456 -> panel light color. Color 1 is red, color 2 is white, and color 3 is no light. Very relieved that one of my two color options is white. I would’ve been very annoyed if my only options were red and blue or something like that lol.
So all said and done I’m pleased. I wasn’t anticipating having to do this much work though. I think I might try to open a dispute for a partial refund or something on Alibaba. I’m not sure how feasible that is, but I think it might be worth a try seeing as how this needs to be modified to fit properly and plus you lose the use of the CD player.
Everything else on the unit seems to be working great. Although when I’m playing music via Bluetooth, I seem to have some interference/static/scratchy type sound on the higher notes. Now that I’ve notice it it’s definitely bugging me. I listen to music via Bluetooth probably 95% of the time in the car so this is annoying. I wonder if some of those unused RCA’s on the back end are touching or causing the issue somehow.
After my novel here (sorry), I DO have a couple of questions for any of you guys who own these units.
1) How in the world do I set a radio preset!? I literally cannot figure it out. The manual does not mention it at all. It does tell me how to change the display name of one of the presets but not how to actually create the preset. Intuitively, I just long pressed each preset icon but all this does is lets you change the display text.
2) I hooked up the USB extension to the “DVD USB” dongle and ran the extension into my glove box. It works as a charger, but how do I enable it to “read”? As in, what setting do I need to be in on the HU?