Short in with stereo system - help

I�m the recent owner of a 2001 c4 and also recently attempted to replace the old pioneer radio in the car. It has a radio receiver and a cd changer. I was able to remove the receiver the other night, but after seeing all the wires, decided to leave it for another day. I had completely unplugged the receiver, but nothing more and then reinstalled. The previous owner also noted that the cd changer did not work. I was just driving down to Oregon from Seattle and noticed the dash lights coming on and the voltage meter dropping. I pulled into the nearest AutoZone and have since been trying to figure out the issue. The cd changer has been constantly flashing as if it�s trying to turn on for the last two hours. I�ve tried to remove it, but there is a cable plugged in the back, that I believe is the ground and I can�t unplug it because it�s too tight. Can�t even get the changer out of the slot. Now the battery is almost dead, car won�t even try to turnover, and when I close either door, the auto window thing goes crazy trying to raise and lower the small bit it does when you close the door. I�d like to at least be able to jump the car to get it home so I can deal with this problem later, but I don�t even know if the battery will charge with this cd player going crazy and the windows doing what they�re doing. does anyone have any ideas for what I can do to disconnect all power to the stereo while still making the car drivable? I think if I can do that, I should be able to start the car and drive it, but electrical issues are all a mystery to me. thoughts? cd player in question black wire preventing me to pull the cd player out

Update: pulled the fuse for the radio and info system and was able to get the cd changer to stop freaking out. Then jumped the car and drove home. The voltage meter was still hovering around 11, despite around 25 min of driving, much of which was around 4000 rpm. Might still be a parasitic drain somewhere or the alternator could be bad, but I doubt that because the car was fine before I started messing with the radio. Will update once I�m able to work on it again.

Update: It's possible that the battery is bad which is preventing me from jumping the car for now. I have it on a trickle charger and will test it once it's back to fully charged. As for the radio, a previous owner had a lot of wiring done, which I have since undone. The black cable that was preventing me from pulling out the cd changer was cut. It went directly into the CD changer with a bracket. I think whoever installed just threaded the cable through the slot in the dash and then inserted the CD Changer and made the cable taut. Not really sure of its purpose, but because I was removing the CD changer anyways, I just cut it. I removed the full front fascia of the center console to get more space and then started tracking down all of the wiring. The twist in the above image that is red, green, blue, yellow was going to some phone thing that was under the center console. Clipped those wires and tossed that in the trash. These were all tapped into the radio wires. The yellow, red, pink twist of wires was actually wiring for the radar detector. There was only a detector on the back of the car, but it seemed to be wired for the front as well. Given that if I'm getting radared from the back, it's already too late, I decided I would ditch that as well. These wires were tapped into the radio wires as well. I also found an abysmal ground that was self tapped into the styrofoam of in the center console and wasn't doing anything. Removed this as well. We tracked down the stereo wires up to the amp in the front. There is an RCA monster cable going into the inputs of the amp that then go back to the old receiver. Two of the RCA jacks were being used (RR and FL) and then the other ends had been split and then connected into the old receivers wiring harness (normal speaker wires). Ultimately, I have wired the Metra harness with the harness of the new receiver. This will connect the factory wires (taped in rough black tape) to the new receiver. I also removed a few of the RCA jacks that I received when ordering the head unit from Crutchfield and then spliced those into the RCA wires going to the amp. I removed all taps and spliced wires from the previous wiring. The blue wire from the factory harness will connect to the amp and should power that on. I haven't actually connected or tested any of the wiring yet because the battery has been having issues. If I happened to just lose the battery on a whim (seems to be something newer batteries might do, especially after being fully drained), then replacing the battery should allow me to test and *hopefully* have a working stereo and car again.

Here is what the wiring situation looked like

What a mess. No surprise getting shorts with that setup. I recall when I did mine that there was no switched power on the factory harness. If a constant was used instead perhaps the amp or something is being left on? I have some notes on how I adapted the metra harness here https://rennlist.com/forums/996-turb...face-long.html . I also found a good short-run ground point noted in there somewhere.

I realized that I removed the alarm/info system fuse in an effort to prevent unwanted draw from the battery in my original situation. Once I put that back in, I was able to start the vehicle. I now don't think that the battery is bad because it was reading 12.4V when I just tested it while off. Once I started the car and tested again, voltage was dropping, so now I'm thinking the alternator might be bad. I can't be sure if there is some other draw on the battery yet, but will keep doing research and tests. I was also able to get the radio working for the most part in tests. I still need to do final wiring, but got most of the speakers working. It's not perfect, but it's good enough I think. The sub isn't helping the case, but after playing with the levels the sound is decent enough. All I really want is to drive around and have some tunes and it's good enough for that. Will get it fully hooked up eventually, but want to make sure the main electric works.

Brave soul lol....I will be attemping this as well with so many you tube videos and posts here....I feel I can do it even with my Bose system. I need to get apple play in the car ASAP the stock system is just bad for a $87k car in 2004 lol

Ended up narrowing the issues I experienced down to the voltage regulator on the alternator. I think the weird electrical things that originally happened were just from super low voltage. After replacing the voltage regulator, I am now getting 14V pretty constantly while driving. Easy fix, but a lot of research was needed to get to the diagnosis. Glad it was just a $35 part.