Well, bad news. After working perfectly for the last 3 days, I went to start my car this morning and what do I hear...the infamous pops/cracks! I'm still convinced that the IDE cable is at fault here. I may have squeezed the connectors in a vice and got rid of that gap, but I'm thinking that once I reinstalled the cable in the Rio with all the crazy bends it may have loosened the crimps again. Does anyone know if support still has some replacement cables laying around - or better yet does someone know where I can get a replacement cable? I'm still convinced that the cable is at fault, and that if I replace it it will get rid of the problem entirely....