Anyone driven an F30 330?

[John V]

Originally Posted by robg

The latest nav system (particularly the voice recognition) is so good that it's a much better experience than fumbling with my phone. Inevitably, my phone will not have service when I need to put in an address, or Siri misunderstands me, or it loses it's GPS lock while I'm driving and goes through various re-routing shenanigans. I cannot wait to ditch phone-based navigation. Overall, idrive 5/6 with nav is the feature i'd be most excited about in a new BMW.

What did you like about it? I found it really frustrating and slow to enter in an address. It didn't have real-time traffic data and re-routing. The display was nice, but that's about it. Admittedly I didn't try voice recognition... but we were going from Steamboat Springs, CO to Denver International and by the time I'd typed "Den" into Google Maps it had offered DIA as the first result. All while my dad was fumbling with the iDrive controller trying to find the airport.

I can't say I've ever had a GPS issue or a lack of service anywhere with my phone in the last five years.

FWIW I thought Siri was just about completely useless when I had an iPhone, but that was the first generation with Siri (4S?) and I'm sure it's improved since then.

[bren]

Originally Posted by John V

What did you like about it? I found it really frustrating and slow to enter in an address. It didn't have real-time traffic data and re-routing. The display was nice, but that's about it.

Address entry is annoying. The turn directions in the dash (assuming I remember to look at them) is handy.

[wdc330i]

Originally Posted by bren

Address entry is annoying. The turn directions in the dash (assuming I remember to look at them) is handy.

With Apple Carplay, you can just click on the address on your phone, and Apple Maps picks it up on the screen, with arrows on the dash, and prompts on your Apple Watch. Just requires dealing with Apple Maps, and being an Apple fanboy/girl.

[John V]

Originally Posted by wdc330i

With Apple Carplay, you can just click on the address on your phone, and Apple Maps picks it up on the screen, with arrows on the dash, and prompts on your Apple Watch. Just requires dealing with Apple Maps, and being an Apple fanboy/girl.

Come on, be honest. Nobody uses Apple Maps.

[robg]

Originally Posted by wdc330i

With Apple Carplay, you can just click on the address on your phone, and Apple Maps picks it up on the screen, with arrows on the dash, and prompts on your Apple Watch. Just requires dealing with Apple Maps, and being an Apple fanboy/girl.

The car I drove had CarPlay as well but I don't think I'd ever use it. Prefer the built in nav. App integration with pandora and Spotify works without CarPlay as well.

[clyde]

Originally Posted by John V

FWIW I thought Siri was just about completely useless when I had an iPhone, but that was the first generation with Siri (4S?) and I'm sure it's improved since then.

Siri has improved in the sense that if you had to compare the two in detail and had to pick a winner.

Siri has become really good for some things like "hey siri, unread messages" and having it speak incoming texts, let you dictate a response that it reads back to you and doing it all without looking at a screen.

For everything else, no.

We run tests in the car between Siri and OK Google. It's like Siri doesn't even show up.

Originally Posted by robg

Forgot about proclip - yes I tried that as well. Had multiple issues with it falling off the vent .

Proclip rocks. More better than anything.

Originally Posted by robg

The car I drove had CarPlay as well but I don't think I'd ever use it.

The beauty of CarPlay and the Android equivalent is that they're passthroughs that aren't wedded as closely to the car tech. If they keep being able to connect to the phones, they should improve in the future, unlike the built in stuff.

But with Proclip and such...why bother?

I used to be an advocate for built-ins. Not any more.

[robg]

Originally Posted by clyde

Siri has improved in the sense that if you had to compare the two in detail and had to pick a winner.

Siri has become really good for some things like "hey siri, unread messages" and having it speak incoming texts, let you dictate a response that it reads back to you and doing it all without looking at a screen.

For everything else, no.

We run tests in the car between Siri and OK Google. It's like Siri doesn't even show up.



Proclip rocks. More better than anything.



The beauty of CarPlay and the Android equivalent is that they're passthroughs that aren't wedded as closely to the car tech. If they keep being able to connect to the phones, they should improve in the future, unlike the built in stuff.

But with Proclip and such...why bother?

I used to be an advocate for built-ins. Not any more.

Yep- totally get the arguments behind using Carplay or simply mounting your phone. Having used Carplay now in several rental cars, as well as trying various in-car phone mounting options, I've had enough frustrations that I'd still prefer a good built-in unit. Can I deal w/ those frustrations? Sure. Would I prefer not to? Yes. They are tolerable but not good. If I had a special/classic car without modern electronics of course I'd use my phone. Or if I wanted to continue to drive nothing but older fully-depreciated cars, sure. But in a newer daily driver type car I'd rather not.

To me, CarPlay/Android Auto are great in a low-end car or a rental car. Worst case, you'll have key functions projected on a larger in-vehicle screen in a consistent way that you're familiar with. Also great in vehicles with terrible infotainment systems.

Some (most?) built-in systems are (or have been) truly awful. That's why I was so pleasantly surprised by the latest idrive. Does everything I expect quickly/easily. Overall better than using CarPlay. Should CarPlay become amazing over the next few years, it supports that as well. It does NOT support Android Auto, however.

[clyde]

Originally Posted by robg

Yep- totally get the arguments behind using Carplay or simply mounting your phone. Having used Carplay now in several rental cars, as well as trying various in-car phone mounting options, I've had enough frustrations that I'd still prefer a good built-in unit. Can I deal w/ those frustrations? Sure. Would I prefer not to? Yes. They are tolerable but not good. If I had a special/classic car without modern electronics of course I'd use my phone. Or if I wanted to continue to drive nothing but older fully-depreciated cars, sure. But in a newer daily driver type car I'd rather not.

To me, CarPlay/Android Auto are great in a low-end car or a rental car. Worst case, you'll have key functions projected on a larger in-vehicle screen in a consistent way that you're familiar with. Also great in vehicles with terrible infotainment systems.

Some (most?) built-in systems are (or have been) truly awful. That's why I was so pleasantly surprised by the latest idrive. Does everything I expect quickly/easily. Overall better than using CarPlay. Should CarPlay become amazing over the next few years, it supports that as well. It does NOT support Android Auto, however.

I don’t have anything against built in systems and I’d expect the latest and greatest versions in some cars to be pretty good. Part of the question, I think, is how long will today’s best continue to be good? 3 years? 5? 10?

I didn’t mean to argue at all. I’m not too fond of Apple Maps with CarPlay today. I just see promise in it. No experience with android auto. And, FWIW, I have never used any iteration of BMw’s IDrive.

[robg]

Originally Posted by John V

What did you like about it? I found it really frustrating and slow to enter in an address. It didn't have real-time traffic data and re-routing. The display was nice, but that's about it.

With the latest system you can just click the voice button on the steering wheel and say "navigate to [whatever]". Just like with Google maps /Siri you don't need to say the full address and you could also just say the name of a restaurant or whatever it is your're looking for. It seemed to get it right 100% of the time, doesnt' ask for confirmation and immediately starts guidance (again similar to how your phone works but better since it will also work without cell service and the voice recognition seemed faster/more accurate). Worlds better than what you experienced in 2012.

It had real-time traffic that was accurate in the limited time i had it. Another nice thing is that the directions are shown right in front of you in the cluster (again, better than dealing w/ a phone suction cupped to the window or propped precariously in the center console or cupholder).

I'm sure the routing will not always be as good as Google Maps, but overall the benefits outweigh that slight disadvantage.

[John V]

Originally Posted by robg

With the latest system you can just click the voice button on the steering wheel and say "navigate to [whatever]". Just like with Google maps /Siri you don't need to say the full address and you could also just say the name of a restaurant or whatever it is your're looking for. It seemed to get it right 100% of the time, doesnt' ask for confirmation and immediately starts guidance (again similar to how your phone works but better since it will also work without cell service and the voice recognition seemed faster/more accurate). Worlds better than what you experienced in 2012.

The car was a 2012. My experience was based in 2015. I guess it's been updated since then, which is good. Does BMW still make you pay for map updates, or do they have the capability to update them over the air?

It had real-time traffic that was accurate in the limited time i had it. Another nice thing is that the directions are shown right in front of you in the cluster (again, better than dealing w/ a phone suction cupped to the window or propped precariously in the center console or cupholder).

Suction cupped to the window? Propped in the console / cupholder? No.

http://proclipusa.com/

edit to correct link because my copy paste skills fail.