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Bluetooth Audio and the iPhone

Discussion in 'Gen 3 Prius Technical Discussion' started by cmalberto, Aug 12, 2009.

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  1. cmalberto

    cmalberto New Member

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    Since iPhone's 3.0 update now supports BT Audio, I was excited to see that the Prius does BT Audio too. I got this setup yesterday. Never having the capability to use BT in a car, I found some peculiarities.

    1. The BT Phone and BT Audio will not connect at the same time. Seems odd as I thought these 2 tasks could run co-operatively. So what happens when a I am listening to BT Audio and a call comes in? I haven't been able to test this yet.

    2. The BT Audio controls appear to be primitive. It appears I can stop and start the audio for an existing playlist. Not sure what happens if there isn't a playlist already started. Obviously(or can I?) I can't manage the selection of the playlist from the BT Audio interface. Is there a way to skip to the next entry in the playlist? How about fast forwarding or reversing?

    3. I listen to a lot of Podcasts on my iPhone. They are typically longer than most songs in that some are up to a couple of hours. The point is that when I turn off the car an exit the vehicle, I am not sure what happens to the iPhone as far as stopping the selection playing. What I have found(and most annoying) is that the position on the selection is lost and the selection starts over when the BT Audio is restarted in the vehicle. This is a PIA when half way through with the previous session. It would be ideal to be able to start from when the selection was stopped. No perhaps I am not doing something correctly that should be done differently. Is there a recommendation or has someone else experienced this?

    What I do know is that my podcasts are setup by the provider of these to have the keep last position set. This fact works well if use the AUX cable to connect. I can simply pull the cable which stops the iPhone selection and I can restart by plugging back in and pressing the play switch on the iPhone.

    I will probably repost some of this on the Apple Discussions site as this may be a limitation to the BT stack on the phone itself.

    I know the list is long. If you guys can comment and or point me to where I can address these, it would be most appreciated. I really do want to utilize the BT Audio and eliminate the Aux input if at all possible.

    I have heard the USB interface will be available at a cost soon. This may be a solution abeit a costly one. I am hoping to remain cable-less(except for chargin) as much as possible.

    Thanks again.
    --Mickey
     
    #1 cmalberto, Aug 12, 2009
  2. jay_man2

    jay_man2 jay_man_also

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    Everything you describe has been discussed in a couple of threads. I haven't had an opportunity to test it, but think that with regard to 1., the car will switch from BT streaming to telephone mode when a call comes in. And you pair the phone mode and BT streaming in two different pairing screens.
     
    #2 jay_man2, Aug 12, 2009
  3. cmalberto

    cmalberto New Member

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    Point 3 is an issue with the iPhone's OS. I found reference in the Apple Discussions site. Bummer.

    --Mickey
     
    #3 cmalberto, Aug 12, 2009
  4. a priori

    a priori Canonus Curiosus

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    I have them both connected simultaneously. I used the same name and password for both setups and that seemed to make everything work well.

    Aside from volume and pause/start, all other selections must be done from the phone. If you simply select the BT audio mode, you'll get the last thing played, as far as I can see.

    This is a pain. I don't like it for regular music selections, but it really is a pain when listening to most classical music or podcasts. You have to pause the podcast and view the time (or time remaining) so that you can find your spot again after restarting the car. I haven't found a way to ensure I'll be right back at the same point without taking this action.
     
    #4 a priori, Aug 13, 2009
  5. rstark18

    rstark18 Member

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    All and I mean ALL of these issues are Apple limitations. PLEASE call apple to complain about this. I did this and it was noted. Hopefully if they get enough feedback they will upgrade AVRCP from 1.0 (current version) to 1.4. If they did that it would give us the ability to actually control the iPhone. As for the current song/podcast reseting to the beginning after turning the BT off, I don't think that is an AVRCP issue, just a bad BT stack implementation. Complain about this also so they'll change it.
     
    #5 rstark18, Aug 13, 2009
  6. pri-serious

    pri-serious New Member

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    Phone and bluetooth works really well together, the phone rang, music paused, when I end the call, music came right back. While iphone was steaming through BT, I plugged in the usb just to see what would happen, usb took over and starts playing music (pandora plays fine too :) when the usb is unplugged, BT started streaming right away. I thought that's pretty nice.
     
    #6 pri-serious, Sep 28, 2009
  7. johntt

    johntt New Member

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    This has finally been fixed in iphone OS 3.1.2. I got in my car and noticed my podcast didn't start from the beginning, but where it last left off. I thought it was a random occurrence, but it to worked several times after that.

    Now if I could only control the track selection through bluetooth...
     
    #7 johntt, Oct 10, 2009
  8. cmalberto

    cmalberto New Member

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    Yes, yes, yes...I guess I should have tried to find this post and reply to it. It actually corrected itself for me in 3.1. Me likes it now. Very usable. No more cables, except when my dang battery is pooping out.

    Track selection would be the ultimate. Now is this a problem of the phone or the Nav system? I am ok with it none the less.

    --Mickey
     
    #8 cmalberto, Oct 10, 2009
  9. rstark18

    rstark18 Member

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    Track selection is a limitation of the iPhone Bluetooth stack. Currently it's A2DP and AVRCP is needed. HOPEFULLY Apple will implent this before I breakdown and get a VaisTech interface.
     
    #9 rstark18, Oct 10, 2009
  10. bighouse

    bighouse Active Member

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    rstark,

    Can you explain whtat A2DP and AVRCP is? Also, what number did you call to complain to Apple? Maybe we can start a grassroots complain chain! When I call I want to know what I'm complaining about and asking for!

    Thanks,

    Robert

    Edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth_profile#Audio.2FVideo_Remote_Control_Profile_.28AVRCP.29
     
    #10 bighouse, Oct 10, 2009
  11. bighouse

    bighouse Active Member

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    Ok, I sent feedback to Apple...here's what I wrote:
    "I believe my iPhone would work better and be more compatible with my Prius 2010's navigation system if Apple would rollout AVRCP 1.4. Right now to play my iPod over my 2010 Prius's Audio system I can only successfully do that in BlueTooth- but can't use the more "heads-up" Navigation/steering wheel controls because Apple is using AVRCP 1.0. This creates a potentially dangerous problem for Prius users who have to them fiddle with the controls on their iPhone to control music instead of using the saver controls at their fingertips and in front of their eyes. PLEASE help keep us all safe and implement a AVRCP 1.4 rollout."

    Point your browser over to: Apple - iPhone - Feedback and do likewise!!!
     
    #11 bighouse, Oct 10, 2009
  12. rstark18

    rstark18 Member

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    Your feedback is spot on. My last response was done on my iPhone while shopping at Costco so it wasn't accurate. Your response clarifies exactly what is needed (from AVRCP 1.0 to either 1.3 or 1.4). In my feedback that I will submit again I will add that Blackberry and MANY other phones support AVRCP 1.3 right now and Apple is behind in their Bluetooth support.
     
    #12 rstark18, Oct 10, 2009
  13. cmalberto

    cmalberto New Member

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    This is good to know. There is at least a chance that Apple will update. It may be a 4.0 update next year(I suspect) but they eventually will. I doubt you would get an update from Toyota as easily. It could/would probably be tied to a NAV update priced 200-300 dollars. Or a service call to Toyota which would also be a minimum of 100 bucks.

    --Mickey
     
    #13 cmalberto, Oct 10, 2009
  14. bighouse

    bighouse Active Member

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    I wonder if we should encourage all iPhone users to send such a request to Apple to help motivate them? We could start a new thread about doing so...and even visit the iPhone forums out there on the internet and encourage others to send the request to Apple as well...anyone?
     
    #14 bighouse, Oct 11, 2009
  15. rstark18

    rstark18 Member

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    Let's do it. The iPhone AVRCP 1.3/1.4 Petition!
     
    #15 rstark18, Oct 11, 2009
  16. dlevy

    dlevy New Member

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    Sorry for the double posting but I'd really like to get this to work esp., if I am missing some crucial setup step:
    I'm unable to stream audio over BT from my iphone. I have a 2010 Prius with Nav system and I have no problem using the iphone phone over bluetooth but am unable to establish a connection for streaming from my iphone's music player ( ipod).
    I've gone into the Audio setup on the nav and attempted to Register, then back to my iphone settings / bluetooth control .. entered the passcode ( same passcode for phone as audio).. long story short, it always fails to connect ( leaving my BT tab disabled in the nav audio screen.

    Any help? I have the latest iphone software os 3.x installed on my 1st gen Iphone
    -david
     
    #16 dlevy, Oct 17, 2009
  17. ggood

    ggood Senior Member

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    Try deleting pairings on car and phone and starting over.

    It worked for me after I deleted the phone, set password the same for phone and audio in car setup, then paired the multimedia audio and then phone. Might also want to power down and power back up after everything seems to be working.
     
    #17 ggood, Oct 17, 2009
  18. dlevy

    dlevy New Member

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    Thanks for the quick response. I tried that again:
    1) on iphone main-settings / general / BT - hit forget this device and powered down the iphone
    2) on Prius Nav panel info-phone - removed the phone
    3) set the password in setup/phone to default bluetooth. ( "car multimedia" / 1212 ) ,
    4) Went over to setup/audio/ bt and set to default settings
    5) that defaulted to same name but 0000 as pswd so I changed and saved it to 1212
    6a) powered up my iphone
    6b) while still in the nav setup/audio / bt screen - hit "Register" .
    6c) back to iphone - went to main-settings / general / BT - saw "car multimedia" , touched it and was prompted for passcode.. entered 1212 (in iphone)
    6d) the nav setup/audio / bt / register screen looked like it was connecting but then subsequently gave me a connection failure message.

    Again, I have no problem following the above procedure to connect my iphone to use as a phone ( before or after attempting to connect the audio)

    My only observation from all these threads ( and a youtube video ) was that there seemed to be an indication that BT - audio pairing from the iphone took place from the iphones-ipod screen. However the only BT configuration screen that I can make out on the iphone is in main-settings / general / BT - is this only for the phone connectivity and not the audio?

    thanks again... and great forum btw

    -happy prius owner
     
    #18 dlevy, Oct 17, 2009
  19. ggood

    ggood Senior Member

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    Hmmm, not sure what to do now. The iphone bluetooth setup screen is definitely the same for both phone and audio. Double check that password change got saved? Maybe try pairing phone first? Power down between saves? The other people that have had trouble have eventually gotten it to work, so don't give up quite yet.
     
    #19 ggood, Oct 17, 2009
  20. rstark18

    rstark18 Member

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    Have you restarted the iPhone? Today I was doing some errands and after doing one of my stops the BT Audio didn't connect automatically. I went to the BT Audio screen and pressed connect. That didn't work. Nothing I tried on the Prius end would get it to connect. I thought of your post as this was going on. I then reset my iPhone and it instantly connected when it was fully rebooted.
     
    #20 rstark18, Oct 17, 2009
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