Wireless Carplay Dongle Is Available For Civic

shagam · Dec 6, 2019

civilian said:
Anyone reading this with curiosity, don’t.

Wireless CarPlay is a nightmare in cars specifically designed to work with it, I can’t imagine the problems trying to get a third party dongle to be successful.

One of my three BMWs has wireless CarPlay and I am searching for a wired solution, would kill for one, in fact. My wife can’t get her iPhone to connect and mine is sporadic at best. Count your blessings. Be grateful that Honda chose a wired version.

Except I have one of the aforementioned wireless solutions in my ‘19 Civic and love it. It works flawlessly and does exactly what I wanted when the wired option was frustrating me.

Saying there’s nothing of value in this thread is just completely inaccurate. Saying “your mileage may vary” would be more fair, but there -are- solid solutions available. PS: BMW’s implementation of wireless CarPlay is terrible — that’s a different convo for a different forum.

roth91 · Dec 6, 2019

shagam said:
Except I have one of the aforementioned wireless solutions in my ‘19 Civic and love it. It works flawlessly and does exactly what I wanted when the wired option was frustrating me.

Saying there’s nothing of value in this thread is just completely inaccurate. Saying “your mileage may vary” would be more fair, but there -are- solid solutions available. PS: BMW’s implementation of wireless CarPlay is terrible — that’s a different convo for a different forum.

Thanks for letting me know. I just purchased the most expensive carlink Dongle because I don’t want to load the APK File in my radio. They tell me it will come with the new software update and it works much better. Even if it has a few issues I won’t mind. I like using the wired version for long trips. But sometimes I have to take a quick 5 min drive and I don’t feel like plugging it in. I have been using CarPlay for 5 years now and love it. I always thought someone would make a dongle. I am glad they finally did.

Andruboine · Dec 7, 2019

civilian said:
Anyone reading this with curiosity, don’t.

Wireless CarPlay is a nightmare in cars specifically designed to work with it, I can’t imagine the problems trying to get a third party dongle to be successful.

One of my three BMWs has wireless CarPlay and I am searching for a wired solution, would kill for one, in fact. My wife can’t get her iPhone to connect and mine is sporadic at best. Count your blessings. Be grateful that Honda chose a wired version.

could you describe why you think it’s a nightmare?

In the Honda they put the phone wiring in such an inconvenient place the wire always ends up getting in the way or just near my hand when shifting.
Also it never defaults to Bluetooth and I switch between wired and Bluetooth depending on where I’m going.

I shouldn’t have to tell it every single time what it should already know.

I’ve driven cars with wireless CarPlay and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it that I can tell so I’m curious of what your experience.

I’m sick of these car company’s locking us in to their shitty head units when just years ago we could upgrade our systems within a day with a much better option.

BarracksSi · Dec 8, 2019

jorus said:
Hmm - I think I'd want an IT person to look at what exactly this is doing. Is your information being intercepted by anyone when using this? Some Chinese hardware has been known to be not-so-safe.

This is exactly what would hold me back from getting any third-party dongle. It’s bad enough that I can’t plug just anything into a govt computer (USB keyboard light? USB fan? No-go, believe it or not).

civilian · Dec 10, 2019

shagam said:
Except I have one of the aforementioned wireless solutions in my ‘19 Civic and love it. It works flawlessly and does exactly what I wanted when the wired option was frustrating me.

Saying there’s nothing of value in this thread is just completely inaccurate. Saying “your mileage may vary” would be more fair, but there -are- solid solutions available. PS: BMW’s implementation of wireless CarPlay is terrible — that’s a different convo for a different forum.

When iPhones change and when iOS’s change it creates a myriad of problems when it comes to Bluetooth connectivity, Wi-Fi protocols, and third-party firmware and hardware not to mention changes to Honda infotainment software and hardware. Too many variables.

What may work today isn’t guaranteed tomorrow. The issues are always with wireless connection; wired is much more stable and predictable. No third party dongle manufacturer to rely on for updates down the road. We’ve seen companies cut and run instead of spending money on expensive firmware coding many times before.

Count your blessings that Honda has a wired CarPlay operation. Wireless isn’t dependable, and let’s be real; you need to plug your phone in to a lightning cable anyway, the battery on your phone is significantly compromised when you are running CarPlay, Google maps, and Apple Music simultaneously.

civilian · Dec 10, 2019

Andruboine said:
could you describe why you think it’s a nightmare?

In the Honda they put the phone wiring in such an inconvenient place the wire always ends up getting in the way or just near my hand when shifting.
Also it never defaults to Bluetooth and I switch between wired and Bluetooth depending on where I’m going.

I shouldn’t have to tell it every single time what it should already know.

I’ve driven cars with wireless CarPlay and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it that I can tell so I’m curious of what your experience.

I’m sick of these car company’s locking us in to their shitty head units when just years ago we could upgrade our systems within a day with a much better option.

If you read my response above you can get the sense of what the problem is, just too many cooks in the kitchen. Apple making changes to firmware, Honda making changes to firmware, some random third-party dongle manufacturer who isn’t going to make expensive updates, it’s doomed to be problematic.

But there is a very basic flaw in the entire argument; it doesn’t really matter if the connectivity is wireless, you still need to plug a wire into your phone or your battery is going to die very quickly. Your iPhone running CarPlay, Google Maps, and a streaming music service simultaneously just kills the battery. I have wireless Bluetooth in three different cars, trust me, they need to be plugged in for every trip you take anyway. So just leave the Civic alone and embrace the wire.

JoeShades · Dec 11, 2019

There is a rumor Apple is removing the charging port on Iphones in a few years

R MODE · Dec 11, 2019

JoeShades said:
There is a rumor Apple is removing the charging port on Iphones in a few years

Keep your phone with you at all times so they can't get to it.

They will have to pry my phone out of my cold dead hands to remove MY charging port!

:flame:

Apple

civilian · Dec 11, 2019

JoeShades said:
There is a rumor Apple is removing the charging port on Iphones in a few years

You can ignore that. Not enough wireless chargers in the world. Probably won’t ever be.

roth91 · Dec 17, 2019

I love wireless charging. The only time I ever plug my phone in to a wire is with CarPlay. My battery never goes below 90% because I always have it sitting on a wireless charger. I ordered the dongle and I am happy i did. There are times I jump in my car and go 5 minutes down the road. Plugging it in for CarPlay all the tie just doesn't make sense.

Andruboine · Dec 20, 2019

civilian said:
If you read my response above you can get the sense of what the problem is, just too many cooks in the kitchen. Apple making changes to firmware, Honda making changes to firmware, some random third-party dongle manufacturer who isn’t going to make expensive updates, it’s doomed to be problematic.

But there is a very basic flaw in the entire argument; it doesn’t really matter if the connectivity is wireless, you still need to plug a wire into your phone or your battery is going to die very quickly. Your iPhone running CarPlay, Google Maps, and a streaming music service simultaneously just kills the battery. I have wireless Bluetooth in three different cars, trust me, they need to be plugged in for every trip you take anyway. So just leave the Civic alone and embrace the wire.

Jesus, how long are you in your car that you need it plugged in for that long?

I guess just keep in mind that just because that’s your experience doesn’t make it everyone’s. My commute is small and I would love to use wireless CarPlay with wireless charging.

not to mention unless your car is hooked to your WiFi there are no updates that can screw things up.

I don’t want cords and garbage in my car.

I want to be able to get in and out without fumbling around for a few minutes plugging things in and out. It’s sad that I had more versatility in my 2009 corolla. It should have the basics being a touring model and it just doesn’t.

I’m fine with it for the most part because I bought it for the engine. But if options become available. They’re being added for sure.

Andruboine · Dec 22, 2019

dgd3322 said:
I am running the newer version of the firmware (firmware version is at the bottom right of that screen (newest is 2019.9.23.1727COP) and can confirm that it still skips in my car, although its not bad or frequent enough to bother me really. Literally like a fraction of a second and its barely noticable. The four things that bother me with the newest firmware are:

1. It seems that very rarely it will connect and play but not actually play audio until I connect to CarPlay with a cable and then with the dongle.
2. The on screen selector ring thing (I'm not sure how else to describe it, but there is a blue ring that seems to be some sort of indicator used for cars that allow have jog wheel control or something) is controlled by the right mirror camera button on the turn signal column, and while not the biggest deal, it will at some point switch screens from the widget view to the app view if you are running ios13. not the biggest problem in the world but it sucks when your using maps to go somewhere and you have to reselect that view to know where you're going.
3. the steering wheel buttons to select tracks don't work currently. the tac screen will register the command but the track names don't pop up and nothing happens.
4. the slight and infrequent skips.

I have been talking to the manufacturer about it and whoever I'm talking to (they are a saint btw, I have been bothering them almost everyday and they have been more than helpful and accommodating) said that they will try to have a new firmware out next month to solve these issues. so it seems everything is a temporary issue (fingers crossed). In the mean time I will be downgrading to the old firmware (the one shown in your screenshot) on October 4th to see if any of these issues are preset there. I have to wait to get it because the person I have been speaking to is on holiday until then. I only ran that firmware for a few minutes before updating so the only thing I know about it is the steering wheel controls worked for me before the update, I'm not sure about everything else because I just haven't spent enough time with the old firmware. Will update when I know more.

Do you happen to have any of the firmware files? and how did you update or downgrade it? Did you do it via the computer?
Mine shows a blank screen so i'm just trying to get it to recognize it and use it.

EricSten · Jan 28, 2020

I ordered one, CarPlayAir2, and got it yesterday. After a bit of an issue with the linking of the phone to device (I think it had to do with HondaHack being installed, telling HondaHack to fix issues took care of that). After getting it connected I've not had any real issues. Four times I got into the car, four times it connected without issue and CarPlay worked fine. No skipping issues after installing the latest firmware, which instructions on how to do are included with the device. At this point I'm very happy with it. Wireless charging wise, I got a wireless charger that is designed to fit in the cubby behind the gear shift by CarQiWireless on Amazon. Works as expected.

rob17LX · Jan 29, 2020

EricSten said:
I ordered one, CarPlayAir2, and got it yesterday. After a bit of an issue with the linking of the phone to device (I think it had to do with HondaHack being installed, telling HondaHack to fix issues took care of that). After getting it connected I've not had any real issues. Four times I got into the car, four times it connected without issue and CarPlay worked fine. No skipping issues after installing the latest firmware, which instructions on how to do are included with the device. At this point I'm very happy with it. Wireless charging wise, I got a wireless charger that is designed to fit in the cubby behind the gear shift by CarQiWireless on Amazon. Works as expected.

Which dongle did you go with?

EricSten · Jan 29, 2020

rob17LX said:
Which dongle did you go with?

I got the CPlayAir2. https://carplay2air.com/products/cp...y-android-auto-module-and-mirror-link-feature

Wireless Carplay Dongle Is Available For Civic

shagam

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roth91

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Andruboine

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BarracksSi

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civilian

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civilian

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JoeShades

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R MODE

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civilian

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roth91

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Andruboine

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Andruboine

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EricSten

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rob17LX

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EricSten

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