My 2005 X5 Aftermarket Radio Install Thread

[Crowz]

There are 4 screws holding the factory head unit in. Remove these.

[Crowz]

Now slide the head unit out.

[Crowz]

Next remove the two plugs from the bottom of the head unit.

They are removed by rotating the handle from one side of the plug to the other. The pictures show how they work.

Don't bother keeping up with these as we won't be using them again. Just tuck them down in the dash out of the way.

[Crowz]

Your left with this view after it's removed.

[Crowz]

Next we move to the hatch area at the back.

Remove the carpeted cover that's over the spare tire.

Then remove the spare tire.

Next remove the metal cross brace that was under the spare tire. I will post pics of this later.

Next remove the plastic cover that was under the cross brace.

This exposes the factory radio unit and possibly other modules depending on what options your x5 has.

Remove the large connect from the factory radio unit like this :

[Crowz]

This is the plug you removed from the radio module.

[Crowz]

Now place that super long cable they sent with the radio in the hatch area so you can work with it.

Also retrieve one of the two power connectors that are included. One has round pins which is used for non factory nav installs and the other is what you see here which is for factory nav installs.

So make sure you have this end for this install and put the other up since we wont be using that other power cable. Both are labeled as power connectors.

[Crowz]

Next we need to plug these two connector together. Its not easy. The included connector didn't plug in as smooth as I am used to when dealing with bmw connectors but to be honest the thing wasn't that smooth on the factory radio module either so go figure.

[Crowz]

Now pickup the long cable they sent.

Notice that one end is female and one is male.

We are interest in the male connector aka the one with the 90 degree connector and the plastic tab at the top.

[Crowz]

Plug the male connector into the connection on the cable piece we plugged into the factory harness just now.