675: Cruisin' with CarPlay

Episodes
21

And Siri to answer

Okay, which wife?

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22

Something that I am pretty sure wasn’t mentioned is that connecting and disconnecting from CarPlay are both Automation triggers in Shortcut. You could use it to decide wether or not to go into a Focus Mode and which one depending on what’s in your calendar or time of day. The CarPlay Automation trigger does have the “Notify When Run” and “Ask before Running” toggles as well :slight_smile:

23

I see the same icons in my CarPlay interface, and that’s how I turn the directions on and off, but it is buried too deeply to manage easily while driving. I would love to figure out a way to toggle it off and on while driving. I have tried various Siri commands, such as “Mute directions,” but haven’t cracked the code. Has anyone figured this out?

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24

I splurged and bought a cassette adapter for Bluetooth – and was was quickly glad that I did. The audio quality is much better than the FM converter was, even when the FM converter was at its best.

I don’t have high standards for audio. I just don’t care about audio quality all that much. And I am virtually exclusively listening to podcasts rather than music.

But the cassette adapter is noticeably better, even to me.

3 Likes
25

About what Stephen said regarding the two HomeKit controlled gates (garage and driveway) and Siri suggestions: I have experienced that if I ask Siri to open one of them, it takes priority on Siri suggestions. Don’t know for sure but it’s my impression.

26

If you’re okay with a new item on your dash, I recently spent $150CDN on a cheap 7" touchscreen CarPlay unit for my wife’s 2009 Lancer, as that car has a single-line display and a six-CD changer in the dash so replacing it would be a major job. The unit I got comes with a built-in dash cam and a separate backup camera, which I don’t care about at all and haven’t tried, but it has wireless CarPlay and it works great. It has an audio out plug or you can use FM transmitting, so you could use an old audio jack tape adapter or try your luck with FM transmission again.

Amazon Canada is usually much more limited than US Amazon, so I’m sure you’d have more and possibly cheaper options as well.

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27

While this is the option i use as well, I’m bummed because the difficulty in reaching these controls is a regression.

In a previous version of CarPlay/Maps, before you even started driving, when you got directions to somewhere, there was an “ETA Only” button that you could tap to get silent directions instead of full blown “these are the exact directions to the house you’ve lived in for years”.

I wish they would bring that button back.

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28

I wonder if @MacSparky has ever updated the Sync software in his Fusion? :thinking: It’s fairly easy to do and for me gave significant performance improvements as well as additional features.

29

I don’t think that is possible for me. I pulled out the Ford head unit entirely and put a new one in.

30

I got a Sony head unit for our '07 CRV and it came with an optional backup camera - made the car feel new again.

31

Nice. I think the Tesla ship must have docked in Fremantle recently. I see so many Tesla’s on the road now. It’s great. Way out of my price range. I’ll be sticking with my little 1L Skoda Fabia which does have CarPlay.

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32

Yep, around 500 new ones. Just over a week and loving it so far. No complaints at all. And charging from a 240V wall plug in the garage.
If you have access to novated leasing (and are keen) maybe look into that?

I looked at the Fabia. It fit the bill to replace the Polo in terms of size, which I really liked. But… Tesla :slight_smile:

1 Like
33

I did the Sync software update dance repeatedly on my 2013 Ford C-MAX Energi. The final time (a kind of “good luck!” gesture from Ford as part of abandoning that version of Sync) required hours of dealer time to install. It still often fails to work and sometimes bricks the car too. I totally understand why @MacSparky replaced his.

As far as I can tell no one ever produced a third party head unit that works for this car. Crutchfield, my normal go to for this kind of thing, had no options. Is that common?

After a decade of Sync I’m really looking forward to CarPlay in my next car (on order).

34

2013? Your car is from another era, brother! A dinosaur! Probably Sync 1 or 2. I updated my Sync 3 systems in my Lincolns several times, and yes it’s a pain but worthwhile to do for the new features and bug fixes.

I can say that the new Sync 4 in my current 2021 Lincoln Nautilus is light-years ahead of Sync 3. Sync 4 is cloud based and works a lot like Siri does, responding to a multitude of voice commands, updating maps in real time, and permitting you to work many of the car’s features anywhere on the planet. It also updates over WiFi automatically, just like apps on your iPhone. It works great with wireless CarPlay too.

35

I really like CarPlay. I am about to upgrade the stereo in my 2006 pickup to have CarPlay support. The one issue I have have, when I have one phone plugged in, the bluetooth function of the other phone is lost. My work car is a 2021 Jeep Grand Cherokee.

I am not about to put my music, music streaming, or podcasts onto my work phone.

1 Like