Hi Everybody! (and already a question)

Hi. Just thought to introduce myself and see what it's all about. If any of you read Candlepower Forums or Blade Forums, I am that same guy. Haven't posted in those forums in quite a long while though.

I just got my Prius on 15th Jan. Funnily, it wasn't because I wanted the mileage. I got pretty good mileage on my Toyota Altis/Corolla (around 15km/L or 35MPG. It was almost all highway driving, though it with the caveat that it is just a little before full-on peak hour traffic in Singapore. I was thinking of just replacing the old with a newer version of the Altis.

However, the open market value price, in comparison with the actual sales price, was so far beyond all the other cars I was considering, that it just made good sense to get it. For those in the know about Singapore cars, a high OMV price equates to likely better resale value and definitely higher scrap price. Maintenance costs didn't seem to differ too much from the other contenders.

The only little problem was that it was a parallel import from Japan, so the MFD is in Japanese. Not too difficult as I only have the basic package and so the screens were easy to figure out.

Nice car and I hope it proves as good and reliable and cheap to maintain as all my previous Toyotas.

I do have some questions regarding the reversing camera. I didn't know there was one. The sales guy didn't know there was one either. He was going to install an after market unit, but we couldn't figure a suitable place to put the screen, so we dropped the idea and just used regular ultrasonic sensors.

When I picked up my car, I opened the boot to load up some stuff, only to find a camera staring at me. It hangs down, just next to the licence plate lights, in a proper little plastic housing. There is definitely a camera in there. But it doesn't come on when I put the car in reverse and there are no screens or buttons I can find to switch it on.

Has anyone heard of this happening, where a camera is installed but not connected? Or perhaps the workshop accidentally unhooked it when they were installing the sensors? Does anyone think the camera could be hooked up, assuming I have the most basic Prius package? (Thinking about the case of the EV button where the system is capable of it but the button is not installed in the US cars).

Also, does anyone know if it might be possible to change the MFD language to English?

Thanks.

 

*sigh* I seem to always be the wall flower at all these forums. I only get a few reply posts in threads I start, if I get any at all. Probably because I ask really difficult questions.

 

Hi Ken,
No Navi option. It seems to be basic set up. 4 buttons around the MFD for Audio, Mileage Display, Options & Air Con.

But the thing is that there is already a camera installed! Crossing my fingers that all it takes is simply hooking up the wires to the correct ECU.

Does anybody know?

Also, is the radio/CD system in the basic package able to play MP3? I tried an old MP3 CD that I made, but it didn't seem to work and I don't know if perhaps my CD file format is wrong, or perhaps the player can only deal with constant bit rate MP3, or something. I tried looking at the Toyota Japan website, but I can't read Japanese!

I'll probably try to make another MP3 CD this weekend, but was hoping for some sort of confirmation beforehand.

 

Hmm... I will have to search for those hacks. But no one, especially in Japan, has purchased a Prius that has a camera but no Navi option? No one has attempted to hack a camera in to the MFD?