Monthly Archive: August 2019

How a rented Hyundai Kona is better than every BMW

My father rented a Hyundai Kona this morning for a road trip along the Oregon Coast. It's a base SE model in Surf Blue that typically starts at $21,085. As my parents were leaving, I explained that the Kona comes standard with Apple CarPlay, and then showed my dad how he can use Google Maps through the car's standard touchscreen and USB port. Just plug in your phone, press the Apple CarPlay button prominently displayed on the home screen, and voila! Yes, you have to "unlock" your iPhone the first time, but never again thereafter.

OK, now let's contrast this experience with the $102,895 2020 BMW 740i I've been driving the past week. To use Apple CarPlay, I had to …

  • Connect my phone to the car's Bluetooth system, which means interacting with both the phone and finding the appropriate menu with BMW's iDrive interface.
  • Make sure I'm allowing for Apple CarPlay to be used with that Bluetooth connection and not just interacting with iDrive.
  • Confirm the Bluetooth PIN is correct on my phone and the BMW, and then agree to some other things.
  • Assuming your phone and car are now paired (an iffy assumption as you'll soon see), you must now find Apple CarPlay in iDrive.
  • To do so, press the Media menu button on the center console, twirl the iDrive knob down the various media types: Presets, Sirius XM, FM, AM, some other stuff, and then Apple CarPlay.
  • Great, press that icon. Congratulations, you can now use Apple CarPlay.
View the 3 images of this gallery on the original article

So, that is quite obviously a pain in the ass, but it does allow you, in theory, to use Apple CarPlay without plugging in your phone. You can therefore leave said phone in your purse, for instance, or keep it charged on the standard wireless charging pad, freeing the cabin from the unsightly iPhone wire that gets in the way of the cupholders.

That's all excellent, plus you'd only have to do that Bluetooth song and dance once, right?

Wrong. I had to do it constantly, both in the BMW 740i as well as the BMW M850i and BMW X7 that have recently passed through my garage. Sometimes it would just take an interminably long time to re-establish the Bluetooth connection. Sometimes it would never re-establish it at all. My phone would indicate it's connected to the car, but the car wouldn't respond in kind. In the 740i, I would connect it once as described above, it would work as it should, then it would essentially forget the next time I drove the car. It's a Groundhog Day of annoyance.

Now, the car would remember my phone if I initially set it to pair with Bluetooth only, no CarPlay. I could still play things through the car, but would have to control my phone with my phone. So at least there's that.


As an added bonus, all of these BMWs claimed that my "USB device (was) not supported" when using the non-Apple lightning wire I use successfully in every other manufacturer's car. The white Apple wire, by contrast, worked fine to successfully charge my phone.

Now, I did not attempt any of this using a different iPhone other than my 6s, so this is a less-than-scientific inquiry. However, my phone is fully updated and I never have these problems with the cars of any other brand that require a hardwire for CarPlay connection. Furthermore, Senior Editor Alex Kierstein reports having similar BMW-CarPlay connectivity issues in an X2 and 3 Series, with inconsistent behavior and an inability to connect his iPhone 6 without deleting and re-connecting via Bluetooth. The 330i also froze his wife's iPhone, forcing a hard restart. According to BMW, the system requirements for Apple CarPlay to function are "an iPhone 5 or newer running iOS 9.3 or higher." That would include both of our phones.

However, there's a kicker to all this: BMW offers Apple CarPlay as a subscription. Oh sure, it's standard on the 7 Series and other high-dollar models for a year like Sirius XM is, but after that trial period, you're paying for it constantly. Once again, CarPlay is standard on a $21,000 Hyundai Kona and cars even cheaper than that. At the very least on other cars, it can be a one-time option charge or included in a package or upper trim level. None of this subscription business. Just plug in a cable and go.

Quite simply, this is unacceptable. If I spent my own money on any of these BMWs, I would be furious. Actually, I didn't spend my own money, and as an X7 full of friends can I attest, I was still furious. Even when I actually could maintain a connection to Apple CarPlay, the interaction between the system and iDrive is still suboptimal relative other car companies. While there are obvious functional benefits of connecting to Apple CarPlay through Bluetooth, that connection clearly doesn't work well enough. That BMW charges you extra for it is absurd. It should be standard, and it should work. Or you should at least be able to bypass the Bluetooth-CarPlay dance entirely with a cable connection.

Then again, it could be worse: Several of our editors have Android phones. Android Auto isn't available on any BMW. On the $21,085 rented Hyundai? Standard.

Don’t like automated license-plate readers? These shirts throw them off

Automatic license-plate readers (ALRPs) are among the most prolific yet least-talked-about technologies fast eroding Americans’ diminishing right to privacy. The camera-based systems, mounted on police cars or in static locations, automatically photograph license plates and feed information about their location into government and other data bases. Now, privacy advocates can fight back, simply by getting dressed in the morning. As reported in MIT Technology Review, a new clothing company, Adversarial Fashions, is selling a line of men’s and women’s wearables with license-plate patterns that are designed to trigger ALPR cameras and feed the systems useless data and obfuscate actual plates.

Three different patterns are offered. One depicts black-and-white plates with miscellaneous letter-number combinations or license plates, another has the same thing mixed with circuit imagery, and a third puts into license-plate form the text of the fourth Amendment (the one against unreasonable searches and seizures). The collection includes T-shirts, hoodies, crop tops, skirts, jackets, and dresses. The company suggests shoppers might consider buying a size larger than normal, since the patterns are most easily read when the garments hang straight. And this is one instance where you want the readers to get a good, clear look.

These school bus-themed YouTube tracks are the songs of summer

In two areas of the country, from two completely separate sources, school bus-themed music videos have surfaced on the internet this summer. One, from the official Michigan City Area Schools account, takes a light-hearted approach to the serious topic of stopping for school bus drops and pickups. The other, from a Florida driver named Mr. Jay, remixes "Old Town Road" into a jokey song about life behind the wheel of a school bus. 

A remix of a Lil Nas X remix, "Washboard Road" is titled after a particularly bumpy route in East Pasco County, Florida, that Jay Heilman drives on a regular basis. Heilman says he heard his students singing "Old Town Road," and he freestyled the chorus off the cuff: "I’m gonna take my bus down the washboard road, I’m gonna drive until my mirrors fall off."

Heilman was poking fun at the road, but he says his mirror actually did fall off on two separate occasions. The rest of the song has lyrics about the kids' constant complaining and pedestrian drivers not stopping when his stop sign is out. The full lyrics are written in the description of the video on YouTube.

The second video, which has equally high levels of production value, is all about safety. "Stop Arm," a reference to the collapsible stop sign on school buses, starts with a statistic: "On just one day, April 23, 2019, Michigan City Area Schools bus drivers recorded 38 motorists ignoring their extended stop arms. Please STOP, before you hurt a child. (It's the law)." The sad and frustrating message then goes black and the video transitions into a group of drivers who start singing, "STOP! when the arrrrrrmmmm is ouuuuutttttt" to the tune of the hit song from The Supremes, "Stop in the Name of Love." 

The video pays special emphasis to the part of the law that states both sides of traffic, including oncoming traffic, must stop when a school bus has its stop sign out. We've written about these rules time and time again, but with the school year starting back up, it's never a bad idea to remind the masses. Watch both videos above and below, and please be careful driving around school buses this season.

Chris Harris and Jack Rix chat about the new Toyota Supra in this ‘Top Gear’ clip

In this "Top Gear" clip, host Chris Harris and "TG" magazine deputy editor Jack Rix share their thoughts about the new Toyota Supra. Jack Rix puts Harris on the defensive right away by asking him to explain a line he wrote in a previous review of the car: "This is one of the strangest cars I've ever driven." Harris initially seems to admit that his perspective may be unique to someone who tests cars so frequently, then explains that what he meant is that he's very used to individual brands and expects certain things from them. "... When I get into an Audi, there's a smell to an Audi, there's a feeling to the seats, there's a feeling to the steering wheel." But when he got behind the wheel of a Supra, it just didn't feel like a Toyota. The two discuss the history of Japanese sports cars and what Harris thinks of the Supra's segment overall. To get the full scoop, you'll have to watch the clip above and don't forget that "Top Gear" airs on BBC America Sundays at 8 p.m. ET.

You can now own a pet robot spider

Transcript: A pet robot spider. HEXA is a programmable 6-legged bot that follows simple commands. It’s designed to navigate terrain that is difficult for humans to explore. HEXA is programmable and uses a SDK program that’s considered simple for programmers and consumers. The user can input custom commands for HEXA to follow. Commands like write, bull fight, climb obstacles, dance, and more. The user can also control HEXA’s movement via smartphone app. The app lets users see what HEXA can see. Learn more at Vincross’s YouTube page and you can purchase the little bot here. 

This vehicle can patch a pothole in less than 2 minutes

Transcript: Pothole patching vehicle. This mini truck can fill and flatten a pothole in less than 2 minutes. The Python 5000 Pothole Patcher is a unique vehicle. It only needs a single user to operate it eliminating the cost for a 2 or 3 person team. The operator uses a joystick to complete the patching process. First, a blast of air is released to remove any debris in the damaged area. Then asphalt is deployed. The asphalt is then leveled by a rake and patted down with a compaction roller until it is smooth. All this can be done while the operator remains in the cabin. The Python 5000 can carry up to 5 tons of asphalt and uses its own engine exhaust to heat it up. 

RAY is the coolest robot valet you’ve ever seen

Transcript: Autonomous parking bot. RAY is a self-driving robot that can easily park your vehicle. Created by Serva to save space. RAY detects the vehicle and adjusts itself to fit the size of the car or truck. The bot then slides under the vehicle and raises it off the ground. RAY is battery operated, can carry 6,000 lbs, and needs minimal room to maneuver. 

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