Quote:
Originally Posted by hmbmd
Well that's it for Apple Car Play for now. Dropped another phone call today and it cut out 6 times in one hour. Will have to live with some tracks not appearing in the play list.
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Fascinating this post came up today - I was planning on posting (and still may) regarding the benefits of Apple and Carplay verus an Adroid phone and bluetooth useage.
For the past 16 months, I've had a Google Pixel 2 XL that I had no real issues with. I've had a 2019 40i now for only a week and still have some setup and playing around to do, but in general, the music connectivity is far superior than my 2017 Discovery (with the latest, worthless android auto and carplay update - AA simply won't connect with my phone in the Rover).
I primarily stream my personal music collection from Google Play and pCloud. I haven't tried the latter yet, but as I enter the car, I have been creating a Google Play que of albums. Immediate recognition by the X5.
- No artwork comes across, but at least BMW does not use Gracenotes, so no annoying generic genre images appear when there's not a proper match.
- Full que appears in the iDrive and heads up display. You can scroll and select.
- Track and album labels come across exactly as they are labeled in my Google Play library (with ironically loads from my iMac iTunes library). I have a unique labeling system for albums [Record label, Catalog Number, year of Release] appending each album title in brackets.
- Track length generally appears
- Track running time seems to appear for only the first tracks of a cue. After that, running times stays at 0'00 and the meter tracking stays static. Not a big deal, but I would think a simple fix (same as displaying embedded artwork)
- There have been a few second or two drops, but that's going to be common with Google Play streaming of albums that have not been cached in memory on first play
- Coordination with phone calls has been seamless. Take a call, music mutes. Call ends, music resumes.
- in one instance I had to restart my phone. I finished a trail run with blutooth headphones paired with my phone. When I entered the car, the car wouldn't recognize my phone. I've only had this happen once under the same circumstances.
So now I'm wondering if people have issues with Carplay, is there really advantage to having an iPhone with the 2019 X5? And if so, what are they?
Can text messages be displayed with the iDrive using Adroid? If so, I haven't figured it out, though I do have that setting box checked. do they appear with iDrive using IOS?
I just reset/simplified my Direct Drive password and hopefully can log in now on the car. Not sure what that will change, if anything other then creating my driver profile. Hopefully there's more individual connectivity I will gain.
I currently have no issues with the Direct Drive app using my Pixel. My car's location, fuel/door status. all appear and I can flash lights, lock/unlock, etc.)
This morning I also downloaded the various Apps from the privacy update. I still don't see an icon for Carplay, but the weather and news widgets all work fine.
Interested in the iPhone XS max and the improved (over Android) facial recognition, but need to research that I can still use Google Play apps (namely Music and Photos) - both key apps I use daily. Not interested in Apple Music streaming know that Apple will alter my custom library if there happens to be a "match" of that album or track in their database. Much of my music will never be available on streaming services. I digitize each LP and cassette I own.
I also often use the fingerprint recognition for many business apps, but it seems those apps also work with the facial recognition which I think would be great for activities on the mountain or trail when your hands are wet or in gloves. I use both windows and IOS daily, and appreciate Android, but not necessarily married to any one OS.
Curious any thoughts!
Thanks!