radio issue?

Well my first issue has developed. I turn on the radio this morning, and I get no sound. I try the mute button, nope not that. I turn the volume up, not that. Turn of and on and even restart the car a couple of times, no go. Try to make a call using the bluetooth, and it works fine, so the speakers are ok, and with the iPod using the AUX cable (non PCM system) i get normal sound. Every AM and FM station will not come in, the display does show what song is playing from the stations that have this, but I cannot get any sound to play with the AM or FM. I can't find anything similar on this in the forums, seems a lot of stuff about the CD player messing up or something, but nothing with just the Radio not working, but the ipod thing working. Dealer call is in order I'd guess, but if anyone has any quick pearls to fix this myself, as its a holiday weekend, it'd be appreciated. Not that listening to the engine is a bad thing. Thanks

Pull the fuse? This sometimes clears the radio ghosts.

Thankyou for writing this up as I very occasionally get this problem. I found if I switch to radio then back to CD then everything works as normal. Because it happens very rarely & I've found a simple solution I haven't bothered taking it to the dealer. Also I prefer the sound of the engine.

Try this: 1) Shut radio off 2) Lock car 3) Unlock car 4) Turn radio back on Really - it used to happen all the time with the CDR-23 in my 986S and it's happened once with the CDR-24 in my Cayman S . I think every so often the security code doesn't sync between the radio and dash, and it requires a lock/unlock cycle with the radio off to resync.

BillK: tried that after seeing it on another post about a similar problem: didn't work. Pulled fuse, didn't work. Same thing kept happening. I resigned myself to listening to the engine for a couple of days, (again, not a bad thing, I just sometimes like to listen to talk or games or news, not so much the music) Then when I started it this am leaving the hospital after an emergency case, it worked normally. Weird. Will just have to keep an eye (or ear) on it, and see if it becomes an ongoing issue or a strange one time thing.

mine has done it 3 times or so,it returns usualy after a restart. i rarely lock my car

I've had this problem before with my cdr-24. It would always work fine after I restarted the car. However it happened again last week so I restarted my car as usual but then the display stopped working on the head unit but everything else works fine. Its weird

OK been to the dealer twice, and then everything worked normally. Of course. And the next day, same thing. No AM or FM, AUX works fine, bluetooth works fine, and I even have a CD in there now and that works fine. For some reason AM/FM are not working selectively. But of course, every time I go to dealer, it works. This sucks. Even on my first car ever (a 1500 dollar piece of junk,) the AM and FM worked till the day i scrapped it. Seems sucky that a 70k car the radio won't work right and they don't believe me when I tell em. Why would I lie about that? Do they think I like going to the dealer every day.

I am stuck with radio problems as well (CDR 30), When I bought the car new 2.5 months ago they changed the radio before delivery because it no longer worked. A few weeks later I tried a cd and none worked and it gave me a message of invalid CD so now the dealer just ordered another radio! Car is 2.5 months old and soon will have its 3rd radio! Might have to go aftermarket.....much prefer to have radio issues than something on the car more serious so I am not complaining to much...lol,

Agreed! But still seems bad that something that seems so simple is giving us so much hassle.

Ok been about 3 weeks since this last happened. No problems with the radio since. I didn't do anything to fix it. It just sort of "healed." Of course now that I said this next time I start the car I'm sure that it will happen again.

My radio has gone bad on my 2009 I have a 2009 Boxster and every so often the radio would lose reception. The same thing happened with my previous 2003 Boxster. In any event, this week the screen went off, it cleared all of my presets, and my bluetooth disappeared. Although I now have radio reception restored, the bluetooth function is gone and the volume has three settings- mute, loud, and louder. I hope to get it to the dealer this week.

Yeah mine works mostly, Once in a while, maybe one in 25 starts, it does the same thing as i noted above. I found the fix is to turn off the car, get out, lock it, walk away (I guess getting the key out of range,) come back and restart. It usually works. Every time ive been to the dealer to check on it, it works fine, and they say they dont find anything to fix. Its a minor problem, mostly. Although at a PCA event the guy had a transmitter to give us instructions over a radio station, and it was frustrating not to be able to hear this. Im almost due for my 1 year so gonna have them look at it again, but i suspect it will not ever be fixed unless i happen to be at the dealer when it occurs.

Any updates on this issue? My 2011 Cayman is 6 months old now, and the CDR-30 is acting up. Sometimes when I turn on the radio after starting the car, all FM and AM stations are fuzzy. Nothing I've tried seems to work in getting them to clear up. CD player and AUX work fine. When I come back to the car after work, everything is fine. Seems kind of random. I suspect, as others have experienced, that the radio will behave while at the dealer. Any quick fixes out there?

Ditto. I have a 2011 Cayman 7 months old with a CDR-30 . One time the radio would not work and another time the radio stations had poor reception with fuzzy sound. I don't get it. Why? :crazy:

I had this exact problem with my 2010 Boxster S . Dealer replaced the head unit. Has never happened since. Seems to be a common problem.

I have to use tweezers to pull out my CDs on my $65,000 Cayman S . while my headliner is hanging in my face.

This was a topic this weekend. Dead radio. A Porsche tech said after all was checked out and nothing worked he removed the battery cables from the battery . Both Positive and Negative. He then touched the cable ends together discharging all the gremlins and capacitors. Then re-attache the battery cables to the battery and all will be ok. DO NOT TOUCH THE CABLES TOGETHER ON THE BATTERY . Be sure they are not connected to the battery . I have yet to have the dead radio issue. A customer in Mexico had this several times and it seems the battery cable thing was a solution.

Looks like I'm not alone. Thanks for the replies. I'll have to remember to not turn the key too quickly and see if that helps. It kind of makes sense to me that the car needs to initialize properly - the reason I say that is when I first noticed this fuzziness problem, it seemed to occur when I turned on the radio after starting the car in an underground parking lot where the reception was understandably bad. The reception wouldn't improve after driving above ground, and I assumed that it had something to do with the radio "locking in" the bad reception it had upon startup. The problem has of course since happened without being underground at all, which is why I posted here; I do think the relaxed ignition procedure is worth trying though.

I have a different radio problem. 2002 boxster cdr220 radio will "freeze". It is on, playing the most recent station at the volume it was on before the car was turned off. None of the buttons work, cannot change the volume or chanel, or even turn it off. Eventually it works again, not sure why. I tried some of the above suggestions with locking with the remote, etc... but nothing seems to make a difference. Have not tried to "short" the battery cables together.:helpme:

Just seeing if there are any updates on this. Had this happen to me today and could not figure out what was wrong. Exactly as described here....like the antenna was disconnected, couldn't scan for any FM or AM station.

Here too. Exactly as described. No FM or AM. Everything else is fine. Next day everything working normally. I bought the car CPO two weeks ago and it has occured 3 times. I will try the lock, walk away , return trick. Good to know I'm not alone. If I have to try and get it fixed, at least this thread will help to document that I am not imagining it. Thanks for posting it. Update---- The "lock with the remote, walk away, return," unlock procedure worked just now and radio sound is back. Odd--- reminds me of some of my Audis peculiarities

I tried to come up with some procedure(like being OCD): Get in, insert key, wait for radio, start car, buckle seat belt, wait for idle to drop, drive off. But I still get a few times where the radio doesn't want to come on. Then last weekend the opposite happened. The radio came on by itself when I opened the door with no key in the ignition! Strange...

My CDR-24 radio buttons froze two weeks ago. Removing the radio fuse restored operation.

I bought a 2010 a couple of months ago radio kept loosing the presets, radio replaced under CPO, had replaced about 1-month ago, today no sound, I thought I was getting a better radio than was in my 08, I guess not.