Horrible radio reception
 

I just got a 2004 A4 1.8T and the reception of the radio is horrible. I upgraded to this vehicle from my old 1997 A4 and always had great radio reception.

All the same local stations I listen to in all of my vehicles but its mostly static.

Is there something I am missing here or something I can do to improve this?

Thanks

Check the antenna connection at the back of the radio. Reception is great on my 2005 & 2008 A4's. Had a 1998 A4 in the past and can't say there is any difference in my received signals between all 3 cars.

Ok I will check it, is there a special tool required to pull the radio out or a special way it needs to come out. Do I need to pull it out, or can I get to it with out pulling the radio.

Search for Audi Radio Keys - ebay has some for $3.99. It might be possible to reach in behind the console to reseat the radio antenna cable; never done that before on an Audi but have a try from under the dash.

Does the car have aftermarket HID's? If yes, does the bad radio reception only occur when the lights are on? If yes, that's the problem...you have to kinda, live with it.

If its occuring ALL the time, check your FM booster, its at the top of your rear window under a panel, you can do a search on the issue, if its cracked, you need to replace...$110.00 bucks, give or take, or if cash is short, now that you know where it is, go to a junkyard and pull one out of a crashed B6.

I went from a B5 to a B6 as well and I never noticed a big difference. In fact, I think the B6 radio might actually have better radio reception than the B5 did.

So after reading about 20 different threads now, I have realized this is a very common problem with the antenna booster above the rear window (like also mentioned by ggcrash).

I am gonna pull off the panel and see if mine is cracked, just an FYI though, they are about $300

From what I have found it seems this was a problem with the earlier B6's and might have been resolved in the later models as Audi realized they were installing a POS