RX450h Infotainment equipment. Aaaaaaaaarghhh!!!!!!!!!

[Lesfac]

I have had my Lexus RX450h for two weeks now and I have to say I am finding the infotainment system very disappointing. The mouse is awful to use and the voice control seems hell bent on raising my blood pressure.

Tha car is lovely to drive but the media system is just plain difficult to use. I have seen many good reviews of the car but nothing is said about the media systems. It seems to offer facilities which are hard to make work.

I am hoping familiarity will make these issues go away but right now I could make a list of disappointments.

[PDM]

1 hour ago, Lesfac said:

I have had my Lexus RX450h for two weeks now and I have to say I am finding the infotainment system very disappointing. The mouse is awful to use and the voice control seems hell bent on raising my blood pressure.

Tha car is lovely to drive but the media system is just plain difficult to use. I have seen many good reviews of the car but nothing is said about the media systems. It seems to offer facilities which are hard to make work.

I am hoping familiarity will make these issues go away but right now I could make a list of disappointments.

Les, I seem to be one of the few people that like the trackpad.  I don't like touch screens.  They get too many finger marks on them and you have no where to rest your arm when trying to use them whilst driving.  I think the trackpad can work well.  Try changing the haptic feedback setting.  (Try turning it off, you may prefer it).

Which voice commands are proving difficult?  If it's audio related I may be able to help.

I find the "call <name> at <home>" type of commands very reliable.  Mostly work first time.

Paul

[DavidCM]

Read the manual..you'll find out how to adjust the sensitivity (and many other useful things).

[flookyk]

2 hours ago, Lesfac said:

I have had my Lexus RX450h for two weeks now and I have to say I am finding the infotainment system very disappointing. The mouse is awful to use and the voice control seems hell bent on raising my blood pressure.

Tha car is lovely to drive but the media system is just plain difficult to use. I have seen many good reviews of the car but nothing is said about the media systems. It seems to offer facilities which are hard to make work.

I am hoping familiarity will make these issues go away but right now I could make a list of disappointments.

I started with the "mouse" type of the Gen3 then the "trackpad" of the Gen4 and now the mixed track pad and touchscreen, and for myself I quickly got used to each of them but I am one that can use a computer mouse of trackpad with either hand anyway so using it on the RX was no problem.

Never tried using the voice commands so cannot comment on how that works ...but coming from the NE England I would guess it would have problems with my accent anyway.

[Lesfac]

Hi Paul,

I can us the phone fairly well but today I put Smooth radio into my favourites and then said Station Smooth radio and it failed to recognise it. Just to try something else I said Station BBC 2 and it played it. I can see the system showing station names but when I say play them it says they are not recognised.

I tried to say an address for the sat nav and I gave several versions of the same address before it worked.

I'm hoping the frustration will go with familiarisation.

[PDM]

1 hour ago, Lesfac said:

Hi Paul,

I can us the phone fairly well but today I put Smooth radio into my favourites and then said Station Smooth radio and it failed to recognise it. Just to try something else I said Station BBC 2 and it played it. I can see the system showing station names but when I say play them it says they are not recognised.

I tried to say an address for the sat nav and I gave several versions of the same address before it worked.

I'm hoping the frustration will go with familiarisation.

Les,

Glad the phone dialing is working ok.  The issue you may have with radio is a bit of a quirk on this specific multimedia system (MM19): voice commands to select a station do not work on DAB stations.  It may be that Smooth Radio is only available on DAB?  So it could not find it on FM.  But when you asked for BBC2, this is available on both DAB an FM, and I bet it picked the FM one.  (this is an undocumented "feature").  You can select DAB stations with voice on MM21 (new NX, just released RX model etc) but, for a reason only known to Lexus and its suppliers, not on MM19.

I never use voice for satnav unless I get it to go to one of the favourite destination.  Like "Go Home" will auto start navigation to your home address (if programmed) and "Favourite work" will auto start to the favourite called "work".  These I use quite a bit, but generally other destinations I simply program by the trackpad before I start driving.

I always say there is nothing intuitive about any specific user interface: just familiarity.

Paul

[Herbie]

The infotainment systems have long-been the Achilles' Heel for Lexus so one of the first things I did when I bought my 2018 RX was to buy a Grom Vline2 for it. It's not perfect by any means but it's close and I can now keep what bit of hair I have left instead of losing it in frustration.

Example 1 Lexus system

Me: Call Caz Home

Lexus: Calling Dentist

Me: NO, dial Caz Home

Lexus: Dialling 0612

This repeats three or four times until I give up!

Example 2 Lexus system

Me: Navigate to M33 4FP

Lexus: Twiddles thumbs and says, "I don't understand that"

Me: Oh I give up!

Example 2 Grom with Android Auto or just native Grom

Me: Call Caz Home

Google Assistant: Calling Caz Home

Caz answers

Example 2 Grom with Android Auto or just native Grom

Me: Open Waze

Google Assistant: Opening Waze

Me (when Waze is open): Navigate to M33 4FP

Waze: M33 4FP, OK lets go.

And that's it, no problems at all.