My 2004 xj8 has the Alpine Prem. Sound option with 6 disc changer in the trunk. The display on the head unit has gone dark. If I wanted to spend the extra cash, can I put a sat Nav touch screen cluster in to replace the current cluster? The car does not have sat Nav, but will the touch screen cluster just plug in to replace the orig radio, single cd, heater, and valet control panel without a software re programming from the dealer? Are the harnesses and plugs already there? Thanks, Brandon

 

The touch screen display is controlled by the sat-nav unit. You can definitely retrofit one, but it could be more trouble than it's worth. Maybe a better option is to replace the radio with a double din unit with navigation and the latest bells and whistles.

 

You need a touchscreen, radio (with CD or tape, not the same as the one you have now), the Nav drive in the boot, and a custom wiring harness to get it all together. Plus the GPS receiver, and a remote climate control module.

The harness' are available to buy from a couple of guys in the UK, or the schematic is available to make it yourself (or have it made up).

 

Sometimes the head unit is lite by a $ .50 bulb. Check it out if it can be easily replaced.

 

These a LED back-lit, not user serviceable. The LCD light is 21 LEDs organized 7x3 series. If your whole screen is dark (black) it means the control switch that supplies power to these is bad. It's very unlikely that you have all 7 LEDs blow up at the same time.

Sometimes just the LCD unit goes bad, easiest way is to replace the faceplate. You can get a radio unit from X-Type, S-Type or XJ and with a bit of screwdriver skills replace the faceplate.

 

The radio works great, and in the daytime, you can read everything just fine. When the dash lights come on at night, it is too dark to read the display, because the screen is dark. I decided that the Sat Nav screen option was just too much effort for what little is gained, so I took one of my " parts in stock" units from the garage shelf and just changed out the unit today and will throw the old unit up for sale cheap to someone who is currently riding in silence ;-)). Brandon

 

Are you sure that the night brightness and contrast settings are not set to dark? Of you can see on day then you should see at night.

 

The brightness of the dash cluster is set to full bright... Is there a way to adjust the screen brightness of the radio unit using controls on the radio? Seems the display did light up one night, but did not light up again since. Brandon