Replacing Mazda bootup/shutdown animations for those installing CarPlay® hub

Slideshow photos courtesy of TheSalamander

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[UPDATED 1/31/2019]
Not willing to wait to see whether Fiat will release a CarPlay retrofit hub kit with the respective version 70 firmware needed to make it all work, a few individuals are installing the Mazda kit instead, even with the foreknowledge that their built-in $400 Navigation app will be dysfunctional (as of 1/31/2019, we’ve figured out how to fix the Navigation; see this article).  Of course they’ll have a choice of  Google Maps or Waze to guide them to their destinations instead.  TheSalamander had this to say about his setup…

So its been about a week and I am really enjoying Waze/CarPlay. The ability to use Waze now that iOS 12 is available makes a big difference. I also like that I can have the map on the main infotainment screen and the next set of turns showing up on the phone so it gives me time to prepare and ensure I am in the right lane.

The extra benefit of getting notified when ‘x%’ over speed limits, when there are hazards on the road or when others have seen police is an extra bonus on top. This is my setup using MX5Things phone holder.

I’ve determined that Version 2.8.1 of the MZD-AIO does not properly address this firmware version in regards to personalizing the bootup and exit animations*, so I’m developing tweaks exclusively for those Fiat 124 Spider or Abarth 124 Spider owners with 70.00.100 firmware (and the id7 tweak installed prior to upgrading the firmware!, unless you’re willing to install by serial connection), that would rather be greeted by their brand, rather than Mazda’s.  It also works for 70.00.100 EU and 70.00.021 firmware as of 11/21/2018, by addressing newLoopLogo.ivf and TranLogo.ivf, should they exist.

Installation Instructions

1. Download the appropriate:
   ♦  Fiat Bootup for Mazda Version 70 Tweak
   ♦  Abarth Bootup for Mazda Version 70 Tweak
   (only click the light green download button for the zip file), and Unzip the contents of the downloaded file onto an empty FAT32 formatted USB 2.0 or 3.0 drive (not larger than 32GB).
2. Insert the USB drive into your car USB port.
3. Tap your Start button once (without touching the brake pedal) to put the car in ACC mode.
4. Be patient and wait for the first message (could take as long as 5 or 6 minutes), acknowledge the OS version message (using the touchscreen) and wait while the progress messages scroll by.  As long as you have 70.00.021+ firmware, just answer YES when prompted to continue installation.
5. A  reboot message should appear.  After the screen turns black (system reboot), pull out your USB drive and…
6. Enjoy!  If you feel so inclined, buy me a cup of coffee, and I’ll email you a link to all of the other tweaks.  With version 70 firmware though, it might be best to use MZD-AIO for most of your tweaking..

   

   click to donate to my coffee fund, and thank you!

Notes

• I updated these tweaks again on 11/21/2018, so that they will undo the unintended install of the TranLogo.ivf file, for those that have tried using the Boot animation tweak on v70 NA firmware from either my Fiat-AIO program, or the MZD-AIO, with partial success, since that file has been deemed too large for that version, yet may have been installed by those incompatible versions of the tweak.  For v70 EU and v70 4A, it will replace TranLogo.ivf and newLoopLogo.ivf (in addition to ExitLogo.ivf and LoopLogo.ivf) with the appropriate Fiat or Abarth versions.
• Due to apparent VIN decoding (the car VIN is NE/NF, rather than ND), Dino’s 12/6/2018 video is evidence that the Spider images will be displayed within the v70 Maintenance Monitor screens, rather than Miata images**.
• Due to apparent VIN cross-checking (the car VIN is NE/NF and the firmware is expecting ND VIN), I’m pretty sure that the built-in Navigation will not function though, regardless whether legal Mazda or Fiat SD cards are inserted ♦♦UNLESS♦♦ you install my new tweak that replaces the Mazda version of NNG’s Navigation software with the included Fiat version.
• If you want to uninstall the animation tweak, it is available here.
• If you would prefer no exit animation, delete the ExitLogo.ivf file in the choose/bootanimation/jci/resources folder of your compiled USB drive, and then substitute it by copying the OrigExitLogo.ivf file from my AIO 1.51Fiat_d Updates Folder, and then renaming it ExitLogo.ivf afterwards.
• UNLESS you have version 56 firmware and are able to install the id7 tweak prior to upgrading firmware to v70, you will have to add that tweak via Serial connection to your CMU, which will then allow AIO tweaking to occur.  Detailed procedure here.
  .

RX to 2S ♦ TX to 2T ♦ GND to any CMU housing screw

setting up PuTTY, courtesy of kahdt

Eddie has put a nice video together on the whole process of installing the CarPlay retrofit hub into a 124 Spider.

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*    The Boot Animation Tweak of the MZD-AIO routine is was not Version 70 friendly (as of  version 2.8.3, this is no longer true), as it is written to save backups, and then substitute LoopLogo, TranLogo, and TranLogoEnd as well as ignoring ExitLogo, and there may not be enough memory to save all these files (including the large TranLogo animation file, which isn’t present in the NA firmware), so the tweak fails.  Similarly, my Fiat-AIO boot animation tweak is also not Version 70 friendly, for the same reasons.

**    This is how I would have forced the display of 124 Spider Maintenance Monitor images (but it appears it isn’t necessary after all):

The 124 Spider Maintenance Monitor images are all located in the jci\gui\apps\schedmaint\images folder and are all named with the suffix _J12F.png, and simply need to replace the Miata images by deleting them, and renaming the 124 Spider images with the suffix _J12A.png, so that they now represent the “Miata” callouts.