Just picked up an 02 2.5RS with the stock stereo. It wouldn't turn on, so I pulled it out to take a look. It was totally unplugged, I figured the previous owner had an aftermarket deck and took it out to sell it and was too lazy to plug the stock one back in right. So I plugged it back in and it turns on, everthing works. Only problem now is the backlight stays on after turning the car off, I'm assuming this is why it was unplugged. Any ideas on how to fix this?

 

You have to check the illumination wire....if it is functioning correctly than you need to replace the radio.

It helps if you have a harness that plugs in and tells you the colors but if you dont here's what ya do.

Using a voltage/multimeter set on DC measurements hook the positive lead to a 12 volt power source (one of the constant power wires behind the radio or a cigarette lighter power but the key has to be switched on for that in a subie). Use the black lead to test all the wires until you get a good ground and the meter reads around 12 volts.

There will be more than one, but the illumination wire turns from ground to 12 volts whenever you turn on the lights. Find that wire, and that is the one you need. If it doesn't turn to back to ground when the lights are turned off, then the illumination switch is bad.

If you have a metra or ai radio harness the illumination wire will be orange or orange/white so just test those.

Chances are that it is the radio though...hope that helps and if you don't have a multimeter buy one. You can use it for so many different things and they are only about 20 bucks for the cheap ones.

 

Thanks for the reply, Fasti. I don't own a multimeter nor am I very skilled with electronics. It had to go to the dealership for some recalls so I just had them look at it. They said it was a bad diode in the unit, so I just went and got a new Alpine unit instead of paying Subaru $500 to fix it. =)

 

Thats the best way to fix the problem..I heart alpine