Impressed with the unit for the value. Still fiddling with all of the settings. Screen is great and very responsive to touch when using it. Install is seamless and looks factory!The Android OS comes with some apps (youtube, netflix, etc) installed and you can add extras from the Play Store too. After the first startupboot, subsequent starts are very quick and changing to backup camera when put in reverse is also quick. Only had this for a couple of days so will update review if system is flaky, but initial impressions are very positive.
The rear camera quality is very good. Very clear. The fatter parking guide lines on by default seemed "off" to me but turned them off in the settings and enabled a thinner overlay which looks much better.
When in Carplay (via ZLINK5 app) the volume (eg. Siri's voice) is very quiet compared to the system volume (eg. radio app) to the point of being impossible to hear. Turn the radio off and crank the volume and all is good for Siri navigation. I haven't found a way to adjust this yet. Radio reception is not the greatest - some local stations have some static. Scanning for stations also doesn't seem to work well (antenna issuemaybe?) but manually setting known stations is easy, just have to manually find them. If planning to use spotifyor other audio app, this won't be an issue.
Head unit installed easily (see youtube install videos for steps). The rear camera required a bit more work (see youtube again) and I found the 12V & GND leads provided were too short to get to the place I wanted to tap power from (harness up in driver side wall of trunk) so I had to add extensions. Recommend ordering wire taps (t-taps) to tap on to existing wires easily at that harness. Most of the trim in the Mazda 3 pops off quite easily to run the wires. Managed to run everything with no wires visible anywhere for a nice clean install. I put the GPS antenna up in the front/left corner of the dash and it works fine there. The external mic I ran through a small seam on the lower/right side of the instrument cluster - no need to drill holes and it works great while basically being invisible. I ran the dashcam down the passenger pillar, behind glove box. This proved to be a bit tricky to fish the cable from the passenger wheel well so would recommend sticking with drivers wheel well if it works for you (fished the mic and rear cam there and was easy).
There's 3 USB's (with 1 being for wired carplay). I used the 3rd USB for the dashcam. The other two I wired to where the cigarette lighter is, replacing the factory cigarette lighter with this product: "QIANRENON Dual USB C to USB 3.0 Threaded Flush Mount Waterproof Cable Adapter, 2 USB 3.0 Male to 2 USB C Female Panel Mount Extension Cable". Again thanks to "Sparky Spear" channel on youtube for this tip and install video. Very easy to do. The USB-C ports are visible in the attached photo and the data (eg. wired carplay) works fine with it.
Not all steering wheel buttons seem to get picked up by the unit - just mode, volume up/down, and prev/next. The mic & phone buttons don't seem to be mappable. Car knows when it is in reverse without using the trigger wire and the screen dimming (based on headlights) works well, including having headlights on auto. The OS takes some getting used to, and aside form the very low Apple/Siri volume, pretty happy overall.
| Product Dimensions | 28.1 x 23.7 x 15.3 cm; 1.86 kg |
|---|---|
| Item model number | M3BLA13 |
| Display size | 9 Inches |
| Warranty | 2 year warranty |
| Voice command | Touchscreen |
| Manufacturer | Eonon |
| Place of Business | Eonon |
| ASIN | B0CZ7421JJ |
