Page 1 of "E-MOD" Pioneer owners read this.

I purchased an e-modded Pioneer 626 from "that" company due to their adverts stating that the original manufacturers warranty was not invalidated. This was seen both in UK magazines (Total DVD and Home Cinema Choice) and in their online advert at http://www.techtronics.com/uk/shop/510-e-mod.html

When a fault became apparent , the player was returned to "that" company and it has since been brought to my attention that the original manufacturers warranty IS invalidated by their "E-MOD" .

Pioneer have given me written vrerification of this.

Please could any others who bought Pioneer "E modded" players from "that" company thinking they were getting a high spec modified player that still had some manufacturers cover - please contact their local trading standards or better still - goto http://www.asa.org.uk/complain/form.asp
and complain to the advertising standards authority about "that" company`s advert.

This item was edited on Tuesday, 17th April 2001, 21:54

If you pull out the E-MOD (should come out easy by design) before return it to Pioneer under warranty then Pioneer shouldn`t be able to tell that the player has been modified as it should return to it`s region coded state. Just don`t be stupid and tell Pioneer that your player had an E-MOD and don`t leave the E-MOD in place when you send if off to Pioneer for repair.

A couple of Pioneer players require removal of the cover to fit the E-MOD and these do invalidate the warranty.


From what I can tell the slot that the E-MOD uses is a diagnostic port which Pioneer use when you send the player back for repair. Basically it looks like it overides the firmware chip thats built in to the player and so the player boots using whatever chip is inserted in to the slot, if no chip is inserted it uses the players onboard firmware. This port would allow Pioneer to test the player with a specially designed diagnostic firmware as it saves having extra memory chips built in all the players with full diagnostic software.

This item was edited on Tuesday, 17th April 2001, 22:17

The plug in board is simply a dongle to protect the modified firmware that "that company" upload into the player using that same port before inserting it .... no dongle inserted and the player is Region 2 as before but if Pioneer were to look at the firmware in the player it would be quite obvious it has been modifed

Steve
www.dvdchips.co.uk

and for an even easier check how about the possibility that Pioneer have one of the dongles themselves.

As Steve has said the E-Mod circuit is nothing but a dongle (hence the inability to buy the e-mod as a self fit).