Strange radio behavior

Mine used to do this only in very cold weather (below maybe 20F), then also in very hot weather (100F+). Now it does it seemingly at random, most recently last week in fairly mild temps (high 70s). The display shows a bunch of garbage and none of the buttons do what they should--trying to switch to FM2 ejects the cd, pressing cd turns the system off, etc. The controls on the steering wheel still work.
It's a 2010 purchased new in September 2009, and it's been happening since that first winter. Dealer can never reproduce the problem so they can't help me. Would love to hear someone has found a solution.

 

Sounds like both of you need to check your 12v auxiliary battery voltages, at rest, and with a load (car off, with headlights on).

 

My first guess would be the button contacts need to be cleaned (but I have no idea how easy or practical it is to disassemble the radio enough to do that).

Depending on the design (which I don't know), it's not uncommon to have a bunch of buttons wired together on a smaller number of wires, where there's a certain, different, resistor associated with each button, and the controller circuit will infer what button you're pushing based on the resistance it sees. Of course, in that scheme, if the button contacts get old and tarnished with noticeable resistance of their own, it throws off what the controller sees, makes pushing one button seem like pushing some other button, etc. Sounds like what you're seeing.

If it can be disassembled to where a rubber bubble membrane behind the buttons can be lifted off and the contact pads behind them are seen, just wiping them well with some contact cleaner and reassembling might be all it takes.

-Chap