Newbie has radio code question
 

Hi all, new to the forum, hope someone can help.

I have a 2003, 93. A while back the radio announced that it needed the code. I took it to the dealer who told me that in this version the radio needs to be married to the car and something had gone wrong with the communication between the radio and the car's brain. Problem could either be a failure in the radio, or in the brain and the only way to tell was to install a known good radio and attempt to reset. They told me this would be a $200 investigation, so was reluctant to go forth without thinking it through. So looking for any advice here, esp with someone who has experienced this before. If never seen this problem described in any of the web searching I have done. The few options I have thought of are:

1) buy a used radio (lots on ebay), install it, then go to the dealer and have them attempt to "marry". If its the car, then I am now the owner of two radio's, which I guess I could sell.

2) Buy an older radio that only used the code. Does this work? Not clear to me from reading the various stuff I have found online whether there are older versions of the radio that do not require this communication with the car and only need the code.

All advice welcome.

Thanks,

Rick