2015 cars came with bluetooth support fir hands free calling using your phone. This was great.
After that, it was replaced with carplay or android auto as the only means to get hands frwe calling. Stupid…stupid.
Plus, last 2 new cars i bought, i had yo take the interior roof apart so i could access the buily in cellular antennae wire and remove that spyware P.O.S. And by the way, car works fine without it.
On most cars, it’s probably easier to unplug it on the head unit side. They’re generally designed to be accessed for repair
I would be shocked if there wasn’t a single fuse just for that antenna.
I think it’s common for the antennas to contain both GPS and LTE. I think the fuse would power the whole fin?
On the head unit side, they’re generally separate cables
Revenue and data.
Every day I get more thankful for my hand-me-down car. It has no heated seats or anything fancy, but that also means no subscriptions, no wifi tracking/stalking, no digital touch screen over physical buttons, etc. All I’ve ever done is use a clip holder on my AC vent for my phone, so I’m used to it. It’s given me time to see how others feel about Android Auto and features in newer cars, and I can make an informed decision whenever my baby decides to kick the bucket. Hopefully I can get something not too stalkerish nor with subscriptions.
Yeah I agree with you. I was talked into upgrading one generation for android auto. I miss not having a screen in the car. They’re just ugly and unnecessary on 90% od trips
I am always surprised I don’t hear more discussion about Automotive Grade Linux.
Man, that sounds INCREDIBLE!!! Never heard of this! Linux on my pc, my laptop, my phone, and now my CAR! 🤣
That’s what most? cars used for a long time (there is also GENIVI)
Many manufacturers are switching to Android as the base OS so they can just hire app developers rather than developers that know other UI toolkits
Something something year of the Linux car
Back to the days of rip out the head unit and stick one in that does have the features you want?
That’s another reason the manufacturers are increasingly locking vehicle features behind the touchscreen. If you buy a 3rd party replacement, you can’t control the AC.
I just had a little magnetic clip for my air vent where I could attach my phone and put up a map.
I’d sooner go back to doing that than use a “Gemini-based AI assistant” in my fucking car.
I quite literally just bought one of those clips recently because I am done with Android Auto, and Google in general as much as I can be.
I imagine they’ll try to make this increasingly difficult; maybe even impossible.
I doubt it will be completely impossible - we’d just be returning to a situation similar to game consoles and modchips - any aftermarket parts need to lie to the “authentication” checks in place first.
I would expect that certain aftermarket groups would specialize based on popular models, maybe even prioritizing models designed to be interoperable with others design and parts wise (Subaru and perhaps Toyota comes to mind).
Are you talking about music/NAV systems or CEOs?
I’d rip out the touch screen SO fast
No need to do that. You could get a Slate and put in what you want.
And replace it with what? You can’t just hot glue knobs on the center console and expect them to work.
That’s the “why I can’t do it” part.
But if it was possible to get knobs and buttons for everything and a small-ish screen only for info, I’d take that. I’d pay for that. Touch screens are dangerous. I’d at most be comfortable to swipe on the screen to show different infos like GPS, temperature/airflow, music/radio. Otherwise I want buttons and knobs with little lights.
And then lose control of numerous functions of your car.
It’s simply not an option in modern cars.That’s the “why I can’t do it” part.
But if it was possible to get knobs and buttons for everything and a small-ish screen only for info, I’d take that. I’d pay for that. Touch screens are dangerous. I’d at most be comfortable to swipe on the screen to show different infos like GPS, temperature/airflow, music/radio. Otherwise I want buttons and knobs with little lights.
I’ll just take a bluetooth battery powered speaker in my car if they keep locking it down
Because GM sucks.
People aren’t asking for much. People just want their phone navigation and music controls displayed onto the infotainment. Won’t consider any car that cannot afford me this tiny bit of convenience for the sake of nickel and diming me.
And if every car manufacturer starts forcing me to adopt their own stupid software I’ll just buy a fucking phone holder.
And GM has shitty reliability anyways.
I won’t buy a car without CarPlay.
My current car has it and I love it. So I imagine Android users feel the same way.
If there is truly no option, then my phone is getting the window/airvent mount option.
I’ll never subscribe to their bs.
My car is from the 2010s.
I bought a GPS looking screen for $40 that has android auto and carplay. I already have Bluetooth added onto the radio for audio streaming.
Works perfectly for GPS off of my phone and as a media controller.
Only thing I’m missing is steering wheel controls.
I’m in a country where stuff in the car is not regulated as much as the US.
One of my ride share drivers had basically a 13” android tablet instead of the stock radio in the car 😂
It was all hooked up to the car to act as a legit part of the car.
Yeah this is the kind of shit I was looking forward to when I got into driving in the 2000s. But then car manufacturers started doing thier own non standard radios.
Then the car mod communities made kits to for a dual bay fit.
Then the corpos made radios required to service the car…
No regulations to protect the consumers let them do what they want.
The car part of the car should be completely independent of the entertainment part of the car. Fuckers.
The line can get blurry when you talk about EVs but protections should still be possible.
Way to make people hate your cars even more.
I didn’t know it was a thing until about two years ago, but my experience with it has made me want to take a tac-hammer to the center console in the vehicles its been integrated into. It hijacks my phone and crashes the apps that were already running but if you try to turn it off while keeping the phone connected it just keeps restarting.
I just want to listen to some tunes from my phone while using the maps/gps on my phone. no need to integrate beyond that.
click saving initiative protocol: because it sucks, but also because it is hostilely proprietary so they cannot monetize on it.
I don’t own a car but I rent them a lot. Part of my “go bag” includes blue tack. A semi sticky putty that doesn’t leave a residue. I use this to stick my phone to the surface of whatever screen is in the car. This puts it right where I can see it and interact with it easily. Then I don’t have to learn a new system in every different car I drive.
I have equally bad experiences with both Android Auto and Apple Carplay. I don’t really want either and am fine with what I’ve got (only 1/3 of the cars I own even has Carplay/Android Auto). I mostly dislike how it’s been implemented with “safety controls” that require the phone to be plugged into the infotainment center in some cars and the requirement that I only connect it while at a stop with the car in park. If someone is driving with me and they want to change to their phone I have to pull over and that’s stupid.
The infotainment centers themselves with their stupid touch screens and lack of buttons are where my real problems start, and the end with the tracking BS and telemetry data. You can keep the new cars. I don’t want them.
You just need a wireless Android Auto dongle. I have an older Honda without wireless AA. I got an “AAWireless” adapter that physically plugs in, then I connect my phone via Bluetooth and WiFi while I wireless charge it. The cool part is that it also removes the safety stuff that prevents you from typing while car is in motion and taking “safety breaks” while scrolling on head unit. I highly discourage distracted driving (just don’t be an idiot).
We have a wireless Android Auto dongle. And it takes an age to auto connect. Not to mention the problems with it still wanting us to pull over and put the car in park to switch, something I thought would be circumvented when I bought it but somehow is not. Usually it’s the person in the passenger seat trying to change something and not being able to. I’m not advocating for distracted driving. I’m pointing out that someone else in the vehicle who’s not driving can’t interact to change certain things even though it’s perfectly safe for them to do so.
If your dongle has a configuration app, I’d look in there for options to sidestep the safety pause bullshit. I couldn’t agree with you more! The head unit can’t tell if its the driver or passenger tapping it, so why on Earth would it force the vehicle to be stopped or in PARK?!? Idiotic babysitting for no reason isn’t safer.
That’s nothing to do with android auto/car play and entirely down to the manufacturer of your car being an asshat.
Is it a Mazda? Mazda is one of the worst about this. I think they’ve gotten better in their latest cars, but that doesn’t fix the existing ones.
It’s a Honda. But that’s exactly the point I’m trying to make here. With both car play and Android Auto I have issues but they’re down to how the manufacturer chose to implement each. Car manufacturers deliberately hamstrung these features and still didn’t get what they wanted.
I really really dislike the UX. Sorry, but I just want my phone to Bluetooth for sound/calls and bonus if I can get a charge via wireless charging.
Android converting my elegant display into something that looks like it was built on Window 95? Nah, keep it.
