Prius II vs Prius III options ?

[BillsPrius]

As others have already said, mainly the Prius III is about factory integration. For way less money you can get the better quality components for stereo quality, bluetooth and navigation but it will not have the nice factory look.

For example a $400 portable GPS will blow the doors off the Prius' built in $1800 unit BUT it will need to mounted to you dash or windshield or somewhere else. Likewise a $80 to $150 bluetooth unit will have more features and better sound quality than factory but won't have the nicely integrated steering wheel buttons.

So if your happy with the quality/features of OEM and you value the nice factory look the extra cash may be worth it for the III. If your looking more for higher quality components (Nav, BT and/or audio) you can save money by buying a II if your OK with it being upgraded and things not quite looking factory.

I love the integrated look but am also cheap so chose the II. I'm sure you'll love either as these are great cars!

Thanks,
Bill

[BillsPrius]

Oh by the way, the CD player in the II reads MP3s & WMAs on CD. I am a bit of a gadget geek and have a nice smartphone that streams audio via BT and a decent MP3 player but have decided now that I'd rather burn 10 to 12 CDs worth of MP3s on a single CD and listen to them on the car stereo without messing with connecting player cables, keeping another device charged, etc.

I have about 8 CDs with MP3s in the Prius (about 90 audio CDs on 8 discs!). That means I have most of my music collection with me and don't need to flip CDs all that often to hear things.

The player doesn't support playlists (that I know about) but plays music within folders. I don't use playlists much I usually listen to whole albums at a time but I guess you could simulate playlists by just saving songs within folders named for different lists. You may have the same song recorded in multiple folders this way but I think it would still be manageable.

Thanks,
Bill

[Wolfgang80]

We were at a dealer over the weekend and I was showed a spec sheet for a II that was in transit. It had a separate line item for $299 blue tooth option. Is that going to be integrated like on a III?

Thanks,

[BillsPrius]

Originally Posted by Wolfgang80

We were at a dealer over the weekend and I was showed a spec sheet for a II that was in transit. It had a separate line item for $299 blue tooth option. Is that going to be integrated like on a III?

Thanks,

Depends on what you mean by integrated. It does automatically mute and plays sound through the radio but the controls are not the steering wheel controls you've probably seen pics of but a button installed by your knee.

More details in this thread:

The link also talks about BT streaming of music with this unit that I guess the other integrated BT doesn't offer.

Bill

[spinnsilly]

Originally Posted by Wolfgang80

We were at a dealer over the weekend and I was showed a spec sheet for a II that was in transit. It had a separate line item for $299 blue tooth option. Is that going to be integrated like on a III?

Thanks,

I got this option. It's not part of factory but added later. It's called bluetooth logic. It's suppose to actually work better than the one that comes factory with Package III and up.

[RL Prius]

I also have the II with the Bluetooth Logic. Happy with it. I have a I-Phone. I am able to listen my Iphone thru BT to the head unit.