Toyota Sienna 2011-2014 Aftermarket Navigation Review Jewellet JT-4927

6041 Views 7 Replies 7 Participants Last post by sideshow, Sep 28, 2015

rickvi

Discussion Starter · Apr 23, 2015

Hi Everyone,
Today I am posting a detailed review of the installation of an aftermarket navigation unit for my 2014 Toyota Sienna. The reason I am doing this is so that people who are planning on going down this path of installing a factory look aftermarket navigation, will be able to research different brands and options and choose the best one. Nothing worse than trying to buy one of these units online and have no idea if you are getting a piece of junk or if actual care went into making the unit. There are many different options online from china from sites like Ebay, AliExpress and Amazon.
I decided to give the Jewellet JT-4927 a go:
http://www.jewellet.com/Toyota-Sienna-2011-DVD/Toyota-Sienna-2011-Navigation
They seemed to be a more professional company from what I could see since they at least had an English website. I could not find very detailed reviews on the internet when I was looking, so I am hoping to give the next person looking to install an aftermarket navigation some information on at least this make and model.
My overall Rating: DO NOT BUY, NO SUPPORT, USER INTERFACE IS TERRIBLE
Pros:
Large Screen
Lots of Inputs and Outputs
Physical installation went well with no splicing of factory wires
Cons – Too many to list, here are some of the worst offenders
NO SUPPORT – Communication was established with the company support to address user interface concerns and they stopped responding to me. I was hoping they would have a firmware update. They started ignoring me when very politely described my issues. I installed my unit on March 28, 2015 and have given Jewellet very respectful and helpful requests to both improve this unit and resolve its most negative attributes. They don’t give a crap about their customers. I wouldn’t buy a single Jewellet unit for any of cars they have a unit for.
STEERING WHEEL CONTROLS

When you are in the radio portion of the unit, when you push “previous” or “next” on the steering wheel, the radio moves the tuning up or down 1 radio frequency. What should really happen is that the radio should go to your next or previous pre-set favourite station. Currently when you are driving and using the radio, you can’t use “up” or “down” on the steering wheel to move through your favourite stations easily.
When the radio is playing in the background and you are in navigation mode, the “up” and “down” buttons on the steering wheel do nothing. Again, as point 1, they should cycle through your favourite stations behind the navigation screen. (As a side note, the steering wheel “up” and “down” button do change the CD track when in navigation mode, so this works good). Moral of the story, you have to go back out of navigation, back to the radio app to change the radio station if you are listening to the radio, and then back to navigation if you are using navigation.

UNIT VOLUME CONTROLS
If your vehicle is in reverse and the backup camera is showing what is behind you, the volume controls on the unit itself and the steering wheel do not work at all.
UNIT GLITCHES
When you are in the radio function, and you click the navigation button, the music stops for a second while the system switches to navigation, very annoying. Every time you switch back and forth it does this.
BACKUP CAMERA
When in backup camera mode, you don’t have lines guiding you to see how you are doing.
OVERALL
There are many other really dumb things this unit does. It seems like very little care at all went into the making of the software. Please spend your money on another unit. You will not receive help or updates from Jewellet. I will be sending their support a copy of this post.
If anyone has any questions, please let me know and I will respond. I can provide videos of all the issues upon request.

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Bartman

· #2 · Apr 23, 2015

Thanks for the write up. Sorry to hear about your bad experience. May I ask why go with one of these Chinese aftermarket radios instead of something from Pioneer, Alpine, Kenwood, etc.. I am assuming the savings are significant?

The way I see it spending a few hundred more buys you much better performance form companies that have been doing this for a very long time. While hardware is important so is the user interface. I have a Pioneer 4000 NEX unit and couldn't be happier. The steering wheel controls work as they should plus I have Siri available with the "talk" button to take care of any other needs. I can't imagine that OEM systems provide the type of voice recognition that companies like Apple/Google have.

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rickvi

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 23, 2015

Bartman said:
Thanks for the write up. Sorry to hear about your bad experience. May I ask why go with one of these Chinese aftermarket radios instead of something from Pioneer, Alpine, Kenwood, etc.. I am assuming the savings are significant?

The savings wasn't really the issue for me. This unit provided an 8" screen and I just had a preference to make it look as factory as possible. I also like that it had iGo 8 for navigation. No doubt the tech is light years ahead on something like a Pioneer in all other areas.

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hybridc24k

· #4 · Apr 23, 2015

I also am looking into a more OEM look and hate the dash kits with so much space that is blank. Thanks for the write up. I am thinking about a Android based unit.

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ratbert

· #5 · Apr 24, 2015

The specs say it's only a 7" screen but the image shows 8"? There tend to be a lot of OEM-look chinese droid units on ebay, but I rarely hear good things about them other than they look OEM.

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gs3tek

· #6 · Apr 24, 2015

Thanks for the feedback. I've been tempted many times to get these type of headunit b/c it looks very oem and packs a lot of stuff in there, but hearing that they're running old Windows 6.0 I don't feel too confident.
But for electronic stuff, I try not to skimp on the cost. Even some of these units are pretty pricey too.

hybridc24k said:
I also am looking into a more OEM look and hate the dash kits with so much space that is blank. Thanks for the write up. I am thinking about a Android based unit.

I agree with the huge blank spaces with the dash kit like the metra one. Scosche kit is much better with an aftermarket dd unit.

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akpch

· #7 · May 6, 2015

People seems to be lot happier with Android based units and FW upgrades are coming out frequently. Unfortunately Sienna-specific units are more expensive in general and there still a chance the manufacturer will move ahead and leave you with the unsupported unit with defects.

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sideshow

· #9 · Sep 28, 2015

thanks so much for the post. I to was going to go the route of this model http://www.seicane.com/2011-2012-20...raphic-ui-dual-zone-aux-rearview-camera-t6175 BUT could find NO reviews anywhere. Also realized no Sirius XM support. Honestly, I'd be happy if I could find a way to mirror my smart phone onto the screen. Anyone figure out how to do that?

Thanks,

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