[DaveDee]

Who’s got time to read an owner manual cover to cover, then even if you do some of the firmware updates change things anyway.
I found 2 really useful menus which are not in your face and easily missed.
Please share yours too

1: Why is it whenever you set to even the coldest temperature the AC never seems to get that cold, and being in a subtropical climate AC is needed every day. Seems you could set the temperature on driver or passenger side but it never really gets that cold until I found this hiding in plain sight:
In the AC menu there’s a vent temperature setting which does the trick, so why not just use the set temperature instead of having 2 settings

2: Another one in plain sight thanks to Doug DeMuro’s review on our car
Activation points for the cameras. Very useful for automatically activating the front/rear camera at various settable location points:
Just press the camera button in iDrive

Whist these may be obvious to some or most hopefully these and more contributions would be useful

[Shieze]

Is this temperature adjustment just making it so that if you set 22c that it treats it much colder?

IE if this is ok in summer won't this negatively impact me in winter for the climate control or am I misunderstanding how this works?

[ZacMatic]

Here's page 237 of the US manual. It's really not clear what this "temperature of the ventilation" does. Is this a way to make the climate system reach your chosen temperature faster/slower?

[DaveDee]

Originally Posted by Shieze

Is this temperature adjustment just making it so that if you set 22c that it treats it much colder?

IE if this is ok in summer won't this negatively impact me in winter for the climate control or am I misunderstanding how this works?

It looks like only the mid vents are controlled only from cold to warm with neutral as the default and can be adjusted at any time from the AC menu in the centre strip.
Because this is not an obvious or logical function it does take away significantly from cooling in a warm climate or summer if you are not aware of it.
The neutral setting is just not cold enough for a warm climate
I can't remember ever using heating in any car except when travelling interstate

[DaveDee]

Originally Posted by ZacMatic

Here's page 237 of the US manual. It's really not clear what this "temperature of the ventilation" does. Is this a way to make the climate system reach your chosen temperature faster/slower?

Good find
And you are right, it's not really clear and if used in the default position might give you an overall balanced temperature but does not give cooling or heating relief from the vents

[Rdurty2]

Originally Posted by DaveDee

Good find
And you are right, it's not really clear and if used in the default position might give you an overall balanced temperature but does not give cooling or heating relief from the vents

F generation has this too. It’s so you can have cooler or warmer air blowing on your face while the lower vents toss out the heat.

Lots want heat but not blowing on their face.

[ZacMatic]

Originally Posted by Rdurty2

F generation has this too. It’s so you can have cooler or warmer air blowing on your face while the lower vents toss out the heat.

Lots want heat but not blowing on their face.

This is my first BMW. I've only owned one Mercedes (or two if you count the third gen Smart) before, and I thought MB held the crown for most over-engineered features. Turns out BMW has even more obscure, customizable features, many of which you would never know about without digging though the menus or reading the manual.

Fun things this car does that my A-Class (first gen MBUX) did not:

• Hold down the camera button to start a dash cam recording
• Set location to automatically turn on front camera
• Set location to automatically roll down window
• Lock doors when driver walks away from car
• Unlock doors when driver approaches car
• Enable or disable each of the above door locking features independently
• Set heated seat and heated steering wheel climate rules
• Parking assistance system starts measuring possible parking spaces when driving below a certain speed, not just once you press the parking button
• Option to automatically switch in-progress phone call from infotainment to handset when engine is turned off
• Recommended tire pressures displayed in infotainment, not just current tire pressure

There are a couple things MB does that I am missing in BMW, but I won't list those here.

[DaveDee]

Originally Posted by ZacMatic

This is my first BMW. I've only owned one Mercedes (or two if you count the third gen Smart) before, and I thought MB held the crown for most over-engineered features. Turns out BMW has even more obscure, customizable features, many of which you would never know about without digging though the menus or reading the manual.

Fun things this car does that my A-Class (first gen MBUX) did not:

• Hold down the camera button to start a dash cam recording
• Set location to automatically turn on front camera
• Set location to automatically roll down window
• Lock doors when driver walks away from car
• Unlock doors when driver approaches car
• Enable or disable each of the above door locking features independently
• Set heated seat and heated steering wheel climate rules
• Parking assistance system starts measuring possible parking spaces when driving below a certain speed, not just once you press the parking button
• Option to automatically switch in-progress phone call from infotainment to handset when engine is turned off
• Recommended tire pressures displayed in infotainment, not just current tire pressure

There are a couple things MB does that I am missing in BMW, but I won't list those here.

I think you are right about the brands, so far I’ve found BMW way better over MB and Audi (which has major issues here with reliability of software). A great list and thank you for the contribution

[g42bmw]

Set shortcut button for CarPlay. Took me the 3rd BMW to figure this one out.
You go to Apps -> select CarPlay, then press and hold 1-8. You can't do this while on Home Screen.

[DaveDee]

Originally Posted by g42bmw

Set shortcut button for CarPlay. Took me the 3rd BMW to figure this one out.
You go to Apps -> select CarPlay, then press and hold 1-8. You can't do this while on Home Screen.

Yes those shortcut buttons are really handy, but you can be even more specific, for example you can go right to maps (music or phone) by selecting navigation in iDrive then as follows in the photo below

[woodstock25]

Thats really useful - thanks!

[BeemerBaron]

Originally Posted by DaveDee

Yes those shortcut buttons are really handy, but you can be even more specific, for example you can go right to maps (music or phone) by selecting navigation in iDrive then as follows in the photo below

You can also do the same for going straight into "Contacts" in AndroidAuto/Car Play.