What! No CarPlay!?!

[Bigscreen]

I wonder if someone could kindly check info from the attached image and tell me if my system can be upgraded to Carplay. Lexus salesman said no when I bought car a short while back but info on this thread suggests otherwise??? I was going to attempt it myself, but not so sure now with the risk of a £3.5K mistake .

Car is a NX 300H F-sport Registered Sep 2018.

Thanks in advance.

[pobrown]

Yes, that looks like the same system I had in my 2018 NX, so it can be upgraded. 

[Bigscreen]

4 minutes ago, pobrown said:

Yes, that looks like the same system I had in my 2018 NX, so it can be upgraded. 

Excellent, thank you Phil.

[Bigscreen]

Had an email from Lexus today, it provides a link to a Lexus web page where you can enter your VIN for a definitive answer to whether you will be able to upgrade your NX, UX or EX to Carplay or Android Auto.

Click Here  (And scroll down to check VIN)

[AtomAnt]

On 1/31/2022 at 9:35 PM, Bigscreen said:

Had an email from Lexus today, it provides a link to a Lexus web page where you can enter your VIN for a definitive answer to whether you will be able to upgrade your NX, UX or EX to Carplay or Android Auto.

Click Here  (And scroll down to check VIN)

Yep, I got it as well. This whole AA/AC upgrade has been controversial! On many fronts, Lexus had been playing catchup, in my view. 

[Bigscreen]

17 hours ago, AtomAnt said:

Yep, I got it as well. This whole AA/AC upgrade has been controversial! On many fronts, Lexus had been playing catchup, in my view. 

To be honest, I was a little disappointed when the salesman said not possible on my 2018 NX, I thought 'What! No CarPlay?!?!' on a reasonably newish premium brand??. Agree with you and saddened that some will be not lucky enough to get the upgrade due to incompatibility. Lucky enough though, I have mine booked in tomorrow for the update but will be £80 lighter as a result.

[Moleman]

38 minutes ago, Bigscreen said:

To be honest, I was a little disappointed when the salesman said not possible on my 2018 NX, I thought 'What! No CarPlay?!?!' on a reasonably newish premium brand??. Agree with you and saddened that some will be not lucky enough to get the upgrade due to incompatibility. Lucky enough though, I have mine booked in tomorrow for the update but will be £80 lighter as a result.

The CT being such a vehicle, even with the premium Nav unit and the latest system for 2019 it appears unable to be updated. Very poor for a modern car.

[kerrso05]

14 minutes ago, Moleman said:

The CT being such a vehicle, even with the premium Nav unit and the latest system for 2019 it appears unable to be updated. Very poor for a modern car.

Honestly, it's just not worth it. Even if you could get the upgrading I have found that it is a hit and miss upgrading. Sometimes when I go out to the car it connects to the apple Airplay and sometimes it doesn't. I would say the majority of the time it doesn't connect..... a total waste of time. Definitely not worth £160 (which I had to pay for the upgrading) There is absolutely no rime nor reason why it doesn't work. Defintely when it works the sound is superb but the trouble I have is trying to get it to work. Anybody who is contemplating getting this  done to their Lexus should think twice

I agree with "Moleman" statement "very poor for a modern car".......I have a late 2019 lexus ES and it doesn't have it and I had to get it upgraded (which most of the time doesn't work)....totally useless upgrade

[kerrso05]

1 hour ago, Bigscreen said:

To be honest, I was a little disappointed when the salesman said not possible on my 2018 NX, I thought 'What! No CarPlay?!?!' on a reasonably newish premium brand??. Agree with you and saddened that some will be not lucky enough to get the upgrade due to incompatibility. Lucky enough though, I have mine booked in tomorrow for the update but will be £80 lighter as a result.

"Bigscreen"....be very careful. They told me it would be £60 to get it done and when I actually took it to them it was increased to £80 but that if the software needed to be upgraded then it would be £160. I told them as far as I was aware the software was upgraded but it appears that there is hidden software upgrades that only Lexus Service Engineers have access to. So they had the car a whole day and it cost me £160 and as I say it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. If I was you I would think twice about getting this upgrade and if you do go with the upgrade I would insist that they put that quote of £80 in writing. My upgrade was done by Lexus Belfast....so it wasn't some back street dodgy garage that did it. I know if I was to do it again I wouldn't go ahead with it. Don't get me wrong I love my Lexus ES.....it's beautiful car to drive and it's a quality build but this upgrade is just not worth the hassle. Lexus have been playing catch up with this intergration and as far as I know all of their new cars come with already built into them.....be very careful

[Bigscreen]

1 hour ago, kerrso05 said:

"Bigscreen"....be very careful. They told me it would be £60 to get it done and when I actually took it to them it was increased to £80 but that if the software needed to be upgraded then it would be £160. 

2 hours ago, Moleman said:

The CT being such a vehicle, even with the premium Nav unit and the latest system for 2019 it appears unable to be updated. Very poor for a modern car.

kerrso05 Yes I spotted your posts and think you were pretty unlucky there, and treated quite poorly as well. I hope my local dealer doesn't spring any nasty surprises on me like that. To be fair, so far they have been nothing but exemplary in their dealings with me so I will report back tomorrow, hopefully with a big positive shout out for them and a fully working update too. 

Moleman Cant help but agree with you, seems odd that the Premium Nav in the CT is so different to the one in the NX. Fingers crossed they will find a way round it for you in the future. Must be very disappointing.

[Bigscreen]

Bit of an update so to speak: Lexus service called me this morning to say they are waiting for an 'update' for the update! They say "We have successfully updated 2019 NX's but have had issues on 2018 models". They also say damage has been done to 2 x 2018 multimedia units and they cant risk trying the current update until the update has been updated - Apparently this is in the pipeline. In short, they seem to think the current software release and VIN check is a bit premature to be safely applied to 2018 models..

Not sure what to make of that.  

[kerrso05]

As I have said many times be very very careful about this upgrade. I do believe they are trying to put a “square peg in a round hole”. I think that the CarPlay technology is much more advanced than the systems they are trying to put them into and they just haven’t got it right. Which is why mine sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t (mostly it doesn’t)……..which is why they have changed all the head units of all their new vehicles. I suppose the good thing about you getting it upgraded by Lexus themselves then if they brick your unit they have to change your head unit (which I believe is £3700) so either way you gain or you might be like me having a system that doesn’t work most of the time. Good news is they are waiting on an update on an update. Whatever way you look at it this is a Premier car manufacturer who is playing catch-up with technology with cars that are costing £40,000 plus…..IMO it is just not good enough. 
 

PS when do they expect this update of an update? At least your garage contacted you about this update whereas mine hit me with the bill of an extra £80 for that new update and left me with a unit that doesn’t work properly

[kerrso05]

This is what you and I need

[StGeorge]

1 hour ago, Bigscreen said:

Bit of an update so to speak: Lexus service called me this morning to say they are waiting for an 'update' for the update! They say "We have successfully updated 2019 NX's but have had issues on 2018 models". They also say damage has been done to 2 x 2018 multimedia units and they cant risk trying the current update until the update has been updated - Apparently this is in the pipeline. In short, they seem to think the current software release and VIN check is a bit premature to be safely applied to 2018 models..

Not sure what to make of that.  

Interesting.. So, my NX went in for it to be done Weds last week and I got a call mid-morning to say they needed to keep it overnight as they hadn't got the right licence key from Lexus. Then get a call the next morning saying they were on 'back-order' so would need to rebook for it to be done in a couple of weeks. Also, a friend who also has a 2018 has theirs in for service and to have the update applied, collected their car and it hadn't been done but didn't seem to have a good explanation as to why it wasn't done - sounded like they 'forgot', which is very unlike Lexus.

Maybe you got the real reason why they didn't apply it and I just got flannel.

[kerrso05]

To be perfectly truthful I think most of it is flannel. I went out the car today (2019 Lexus ES from new) and the first time I tried to play Spotify on the Android Auto and it didn’t work and played through the phone. I then stopped and took the USB lead out and popped it it in and again it didn’t work and then I asked Google to play a track and it worked……it’s a pain in the neck. I have tried various ways to get it to work but to date I haven’t found a combination in getting it to work first time. I’m hoping to purchase a new car next year and this is going to affect by buying decision, thankfully the new cars come with it wirelessly built in. Lexus you need to get your act together this is just not good enough

[Bigscreen]

3 hours ago, StGeorge said:

Maybe you got the real reason why they didn't apply it and I just got flannel.

Quite possibly. He certainly sounded very cautious and I guess they would pick up the bill for any damage caused. 

3 hours ago, kerrso05 said:

PS when do they expect this update of an update? At least your garage contacted you about this update whereas mine hit me with the bill of an extra £80 for that new update and left me with a unit that doesn’t work properly

They didn't say, just that I would be added to the queue of 2018 NX owners waiting for the update. You obviously have a bad update there which is not performing as it should. Are the dealers not able to work with you until its right? 

[First_Lexus]

4 hours ago, Bigscreen said:

Bit of an update so to speak: Lexus service called me this morning to say they are waiting for an 'update' for the update! They say "We have successfully updated 2019 NX's but have had issues on 2018 models". They also say damage has been done to 2 x 2018 multimedia units and they cant risk trying the current update until the update has been updated - Apparently this is in the pipeline. In short, they seem to think the current software release and VIN check is a bit premature to be safely applied to 2018 models..

Not sure what to make of that.  

Odd. My 2018 NX had the upgrade last year - all done in a couple of hours and no issues. 

Occasionally it wouldn’t connect to Waze in terms of location, needing the connector to the Iphone removed and re-connected. I found the trick was to get Spotify going first, then Waze. Then it worked fine.

My new RX has it as standard, albeit still an older system that’s been upgraded.

[Bigscreen]

2 minutes ago, First_Lexus said:

Odd. My 2018 NX had the upgrade last year - all done in a couple of hours and no issues. 

That is strange isn't it. I did state that I've heard of others who have had the update but he wouldn't budge erring on the side of caution. Maybe some 2018 owners are lucky, and some are not with the current version. I was considering doing it myself but if a dealer is hesitant - then so am I  . 

[kerrso05]

Bigscreen, definitely leave it for them to brick it that way if anything goes wrong you won’t have to fork out £3700

[Herbie]

1 hour ago, First_Lexus said:

Odd. My 2018 NX had the upgrade last year - all done in a couple of hours and no issues. 

The only thing I can think of is that they changed the head unit at some point in the production run, for example, say from Pioneer to Panasonic or something.

Remember that they're trying to add a function to something that was never designed to have it and they have a huge amount of variables to contend with, i.e. different phones, keeping OEM switches and controls in a functioning state and so on.

I have a 2018 RX and there's absolutely no chance whatsoever of Lexus providing AA/ACP functionality to these cars due to the original multimedia systems fitted at the factory being completely incompatible, which is why I splashed out £510 on a Grom Vline 2, and with which, I have to say, I'm completely happy.

[Bigscreen]

1 hour ago, Herbie said:

which is why I splashed out £510 on a Grom Vline 2, and with which, I have to say, I'm completely happy.

Nice to know there is a fall-back.

[PeteTP]

20 hours ago, kerrso05 said:

To be perfectly truthful I think most of it is flannel. I went out the car today (2019 Lexus ES from new) and the first time I tried to play Spotify on the Android Auto and it didn’t work and played through the phone. I then stopped and took the USB lead out and popped it it in and again it didn’t work and then I asked Google to play a track and it worked……it’s a pain in the neck. I have tried various ways to get it to work but to date I haven’t found a combination in getting it to work first time. I’m hoping to purchase a new car next year and this is going to affect by buying decision, thankfully the new cars come with it wirelessly built in. Lexus you need to get your act together this is just not good enough

Spoke to my dealership today regarding a possible software update to my Jul ‘20 ES. I established that there isn’t an update enabling wireless AA for my ES vintage.So, I’ll stick with using my wired connection from the phone rather than investing in an entirely new car….that has it via a touchscreen system.

PeteTP

[AtomAnt]

Just now, PeteTP said:

Spoke to my dealership today regarding a possible software update to my Jul ‘20 ES. I established that there isn’t an update enabling wireless AA for my ES vintage.So, I’ll stick with using my wired connection from the phone rather than investing in an entirely new car….that has it via a touchscreen system.

PeteTP

Thats correct, the existing unit’s software roadmap stops at wired connection. However,  you can use  CPLAY2air wireless adapter (only AC compatible though), which I use everyday! Its plug and play! 

[PeteTP]

Interesting thanks. Looked it up on amazon. Sounds too complicated for a village idiot like me. Appreciate your help nevertheless.

PeteTP

[kerrso05]

50 minutes ago, AtomAnt said:

Thats correct, the existing unit’s software roadmap stops at wired connection. However,  you can use  CPLAY2air wireless adapter (only AC compatible though), which I use everyday! Its plug and play! 

This looks interesting. Which CPLAY2air wireless adapter do you have and what Lexus model do you have? Also what do you mean by AC compatible?

I looked at something like this before but if I remember it doesn’t work on all entertainment systems. Does it connect every time you switch the head unit on?