2006 Civic Audio PC Card Troubleshooting Guide

All ’06 Civics with the navigation system come with a cool PC card player. It’s included in the audio unit behind the fold-down display screen. It lets you play tunes in both MP3 and WMA format using several popular memory card types.

Unfortunately, there are no error messages or troubleshooting procedures for these memory cards.

Here are some possibilities:

• The PC card might not be fully inserted in the card player slot. Eject the card, and carefully reinsert it. Never force the card into the slot;you could damage the pins in the back of the slot.

• The memory card might have audio files the audio unit doesn’t recognize. This audio unit only recognizes files in MP3 and WMA formats.

• The audio unit might not accept the memory card type. At this time, only ATA cards, CompactFlash, and SD cards have been tested and are known to work.

• CompactFlash and SD memory cards need a PC card adapter to work with the audio unit. There are lots of PC card adapters on the market, but not every memory card will work with every card adapter. The card adapter used might be keeping a known-good flash memory card from playing. Many of these card adapters haven’t been tested.

• The memory card’s storage capacity might be more than 1 GB. Only cards with storage capacities up to 1 GB have been tested.

• The memory card might be blank (there’s nothing on it). If the card has write protection, make sure it’s turned off before loading files onto the card.

• The memory card might have bad sectors or other formatting errors. If this is the case, the card needs reformatting. Use only the FAT or FAT32 format. Never use the NTFS format; the audio unit won’t accept it.

• The memory card might have gotten fried by heat. Remember to eject the card from the audio unit when leaving the vehicle and take it along for safe keeping.

• A hard disc drive (HDD) card is being used. These cards don’t always work with the audio unit and, inside a hot vehicle, they can overheat and shut down. They aren’t recommended.

• The memory card’s filing structure might exceed the allowed specs. The system is designed to work with memory cards with no more than eight folder levels, 99 folders, and 999 total tracks. If any of these limits are exceeded, the audio unit might not display the tune info or play the tunes on the card.

Here’s something else to keep in mind. When inserting a PC card into the audio unit, expect a delay before the CARD button on the display screen works. There’s nothing wrong with the PC card or the audio unit, this delay is normal. The audio unit must read the PC card’s file tag info for album names, artists, and tune titles. Depending on the number of tunes and how complex the folder structure is, this can take some time. You won’t see an hourglass icon on the screen while this is happening, so you’ve just got to be patient and wait for the loading to finish.