So the battery that came with my 2018 Lexus RX350 was the original and was weak (died a few times which required me jumping it) so I purchased a battery from Canadian Tire with the intention to replacing it myself.  I’ve done this with other cars in the past and it’s fairly straightforward but just in case, I went on YouTube to look it up and followed these instructions minus the pressure washing.  The CT battery was neither tall or wide enough to use the Lexus battery restraint (odd it’s the one the counter gave me after getting my car details) so I didn’t even connect it, pulled it out and put the old battery back so I could get something else that fit properly and that’s the beginning of a nightmare.

Apparently it’s a common problem for Lexus head units/infotainment to stop working after the battery is disconnected (here, here, here & here as an example but there are more) and this affects all models, not just the RX.  I brought the car to my mechanic (who has a lot of experience with Lexus/Toyota products), he confirmed the head unit was dead, that he can’t fix it and a new one would cost $14,000 just for the parts from Lexus!  Talk abut being disappointed, in my search of forums, FB Lexus groups & Reddit this has been occurring since the late 2000s, how is this still a problem now?

So after assessing my options (buying a new head unit, a used head unit on eBay or trying to get it repaired) I’ve decided to drive 8 hours (4 hours one way) to Manlius NY (a suburb of Syracuse) to OEM Auto Audio to have my head unit repaired (they said it takes about 2 hours).  Finding the exact same head unit is difficult as there are a lot of different models for the 4th generation RX, even if they have the same features & specs and there are no local shops that can do this repair.  Yes I could ship the thing down but that’d add another week or two to this whole process and I want it fixed asap.

Anthony, my mechanic said after it’s repaired to plug everything in to test to make sure it works and fingers crossed that everything goes smoothly but OEM Auto Audio has good feedback by the various Lexus groups I’ve searched. Will update after it’s done but quite disappointed that this has been occurring for over a decade and Lexus hasn’t addressed it yet.