MY9-11 Alpine Bluetooth Issues - Work arounds

[blueg33]

I have been having the common issues pairing my Blackberry to the unit.  The most common and widely reported on the net is a failure to pair correctly, with the term "no unit" or "no telephone" displayed, but still the ability to receive calls or make them through the handset.

 

I have found a simple workaround for this

 

On the phone I have set the connection preferences to "Prompt", when the Alpine unit is booted up, wait 2 seconds and then the phone prompts for connection.  Click "yes" and it works exactly as it should.  If you still have problems, disable the bluetooth music streaming.

 

I have also encountered another issue and found a work around.

 

I use a USB stick for my music, sometimes when the head unit is switched on, it wont recognise a stick attached.

 

The workround is to set the head unit source to radio before powering off.

 

Apart from these issues the headunit and satnav are ok IMO, sound quality is ok, my car has a loud exhaust so its partly irrelevant., satnav isn't too bad now I am used to it, full postcode entry beats the £2.5k OEM nav in my Audi.

 

I am taking the car to LeMans this year, it will be interesting to see how it navigates the unusual routes in France

[Bibs]

Good info! I drove an Evora to Le Mans is 2012, sat nav was just fine all the way there and back

[auRouge]

Interesting point on it not recognising a USB/IPod even though it's plugged in... Will give that a go!

I've ended up unplugging it and then re plugging it to register again..

A bit tedious but hardly the end of the world!

Watch out for its re-routing ability in Sat NAV preferences... At first you think it's great until one day it sends you into another traffic jam!! Tbh it's no worse than my OEM sat NAV in our XC60... There all a bit limited apart from an up to date TomTom, or use an iPhone 5 (also TT based)

The NAV works fine in Europe. On a recent trip back from Germany it out performed a 997 Turbos NAV :-D

Have you tried to update it yet? My local dealer did it for me.. Interested to find out which software we should have on it.

Have you had "No GPS Signal" yet?

Cheers

A ;-)

[Jukka]

Good info. I have no issues with Alpine. The user interface is little odd, but can be used. Pairs ok with my Android phone and even work phone (Nokia Lumia).

 

The sat nat works perfect when we drove from Roma to home last summer. Allways must be careful with sat naws, because sometimes send to jam or dead end.

[MHC]

Had my Bluetooth sorted under warranty by B&C the other week. I am guessing they either replaced the unit or changed the software as it now plays music via Bluetooth from my iPhone as well as making calls. I seem to remember reading somewhere that the original module was calls only (that's all it ever did anyway, until it stopped working altogether). Works absolutely fine now and if I leave the Bluetooth eneabled on my phone the Alpine recognises it automatically when I start up the car. Can't comment on what the cost/ease of doing that outside of the warranty would be, but might be worth investigating.

 

I think the Alpine unit with SatNav is fine, once you disable most of the pointless functions.

[auRouge]

MHC,

Your making me feel bad for not reading the instructions! Disabling what functions?

NAV, Reversing Camera, Radio, Disc, IPod and ?

[blueg33]

MHC,

Your making me feel bad for not reading the instructions! Disabling what functions?

NAV, Reversing Camera, Radio, Disc, IPod and ?

Disable the bluetooth music streaming, you probably have to do that on the phone

[softlips]

JCT swapped my unit as the Bluetooth stopped working. I wasn't bothered about that, it was the overheating I didn't like which I think the new unit does as well.

[robcarter]

Had my Bluetooth sorted under warranty by B&C the other week. I am guessing they either replaced the unit or changed the software as it now plays music via Bluetooth from my iPhone as well as making calls. I seem to remember reading somewhere that the original module was calls only (that's all it ever did anyway, until it stopped working altogether). Works absolutely fine now and if I leave the Bluetooth eneabled on my phone the Alpine recognises it automatically when I start up the car. Can't comment on what the cost/ease of doing that outside of the warranty would be, but might be worth investigating.

 

I think the Alpine unit with SatNav is fine, once you disable most of the pointless functions.

Let me know what they did as I have had issues and we have the car at B&C next week. Thank you.

[blueg33]

Let me know what they did as I have had issues and we have the car at B&C next week. Thank you.

 

I had a chat to Alpine customer services, the bluetooth can have a firmware update but needs to be removed from the car and done by the dealer or Alpine 

[MHC]

MHC,

Your making me feel bad for not reading the instructions! Disabling what functions?

NAV, Reversing Camera, Radio, Disc, IPod and ?

 

Instructions are hopeless and I wouldn't blame anyone for not reading them unless you have to. I was referring to functions like the ones that interrupt whatever you are listening to, e.g. speed limit, NAV voice. May be useful for some but driving around central London the NAV never shuts up! I think the NAV also had some sort of re-routing tied in to the traffic warnings - again, city traffic confused the hell out of it. 

Let me know what they did as I have had issues and we have the car at B&C next week. Thank you.

 

Afraid I don't know, but feel free to refer to the Evora S they had in 5-7th Feb. I suspect they have to try simple things like a hard reboot before Lotus allow them to incur real cost, but persevere and it can be sorted.

[auRouge]

MHC,

Fair enough, yeah I've turned all that off too. The basic NAV works well enough for me. Every now and then I still get No GPS signal.. Quick flick over to how many satellites and sure enough it down to two...

My personal view on it is similar to yours. However as has prob been discussed on another thread previously the dodgy arial is mostly to blame for inconsistent NAV and Radio signals.. I'm only guessing, but all cars with NAV usually have a sharks fin for a GPS signal..

Even the Airbus I'm flying to Sharm tomorrow morning has two that stick out for a positive signal!! Any unnecessary drag is deleted but Airbus decided the aerials must protrude outside the skin..

I thought Lotus might know something I don't about composite bodywork not interfering.. But it seems the only logical reason for a crappy FM signal and intermittent loss of GPS.

A decent arial wouldn't hurt. But where the hell do you put it?? Anyone replaced an arial recently? Photos?

Cheers,

A ;-)