[thedonva]

Hey - I tried searching on BWM Apps w/in the forum and it keeps crashing - is this worth the money because you also have to pay for the assist - it comes out to $820. I do want to listen to my iPhone (iTunes) and of course use BT to make calls. Can you do this w/o BMW APPS?

[ric124]

When I read this thread back in March, I was like I love my Nexus but thats too much trouble and then the My remote app came out and thats iphone only. So I called up Sprint and asked how much to pay off my contract they said $45 so I said do it and I went and got my self the iphone 4s. Its no Android but I dont want to miss out on the little features.

[thedonva]

So Ric124, - do you recommend the BMW Apps?

[ric124]

Originally Posted by thedonva

So Ric124, - do you recommend the BMW Apps?

Not in a position to recommend as yet since my car is not here yet. Figured I would get the iphone and get used to it while I wait. I didnt want to lose out on certain feature thats why I ordered BMW apps.

I wanted a more integrated feel with everything being displayed on the BMW screen and not on the phone.

Pandora
MOG
World Radio
Twitter
Facebook

MyRemote app I think this alone is a winner to be able to lock/unlock etc especially since i dont have comfort access. Look at screen shot


send address to your car while u walk to it

[thedonva]

I see - thanks - I will probably just order it.

[ric124]

See screen shots from BMW apps here

[pcbrew]

Originally Posted by thedonva

Hey - I tried searching on BWM Apps w/in the forum and it keeps crashing - is this worth the money because you also have to pay for the assist - it comes out to $820. I do want to listen to my iPhone (iTunes) and of course use BT to make calls. Can you do this w/o BMW APPS?

This is my current understanding:

without Apps or Assist
- BT phone support is standard
- You can control/play music from iphone but need Y-cable and don't think you get album art, etc.

with BMW Assist
- You can use Apple cable only and have head unit decode MP3 files
- You get better UI and can see album art, etc.
- You can stream music via BT without a cable
- with a snap-in adapter: you can get video out from iphone and use cat antenna
- MyRemote App should work with just Assist

with Assist and Apps
- You can use BMW apps as ric124 describes
- You can email addresses to Nav (if you have Nav)

[NAV8TT]

the att HTC vivid does not support its use as a WiFi hot spot for other devices as long as u still have unlimited data plan, I think till the android market starts offering BMW connect app BMW apps is a waste of money, I had the iPhone and it worked perfect.

[Raspartan]

Also for those wondering, I was told that the Y cable is only supplied with the car if you don't get 6NL integration.

[mxdirtmx]

FYI.....On the Motorola Droid Razr & Razr Maxx the Smart Actions functions the same as Tasker, but free and preloaded on the Razr & Razr Maxx... Use it and save $6.95

Typo in the title.... The app preloaded on the Razr and probably other Motorola phones (part of blur interface? Not sure)....is called: " Smart Actions "

...... But the app is useful for setting triggers and actions, like needed in this tutorial.... So Smart Actions rocks to get this done ( as well as being great at saving battery and automating everything to be switched on or off based upon the phone's state (i.e. charging or not moving, etc.) or location (GPS used to, for instance, switch phone to meeting mode profile once the phone is identified to be at your office).... Overall great built-in app for automating something tricky like what is needed to allow your love the better OS (Android) to be used in BMW apps!

[pcbrew]

Originally Posted by svache

The only thing I cannot guarantee is if it works with an iPod Touch since I have none available and don't really want to buy one without knowing for sure if it works. I will, however, try in a couple of days to see if I can get it to work with my wife's iPad 2. If that works, then I'm betting it should also work with an iPod Touch

Did you ever try the touch?
Just got back in country and haven't had a chance to try the connection part with my Galaxy Nexus but when I tried installing the BMW Connected app on a touch 2G it said it was incompatible. Not sure if incompatibility was with the old hardware or if it is expecting to have an always on cellular connection.

I will have to see if it installs on my daughter's 4G touch...

[ric124]

Originally Posted by pcbrew

Did you ever try the touch?
Just got back in country and haven't had a chance to try the connection part with my Galaxy Nexus but when I tried installing the BMW Connected app on a touch 2G it said it was incompatible. Not sure if incompatibility was with the old hardware or if it is expecting to have an always on cellular connection.

I will have to see if it installs on my daughter's 4G touch...

I was able to install the app on my dad's ipad 3g so it must be looking for a cell connection.

[jims2321]

Mobile Hotspot is a per month charge for Verizon customers. So if you want to enable it, it will cost

Data for Smartphones & Basic Phones
Data Allowance How much do I need? Monthly Access Overage
Pay As You Go (For Basic Phones Only) $1.99/MB – Personal Email $5
75MB (For Basic Phones Only) $10 $10/75MB
2GB $30 $10/1GB
5GB $50 $10/1GB
10GB $80 $10/1GB
Overage charges occur when you exceed your Data Allowance.
Personal email is included with all data packages. 2GB and 5GB data packages not eligible for discounts.
Extend the capability of your device—increase your data package with an additional 2 GB of data each month for an additional $20 per month, and enable:
Mobile Hotspot–Using your smartphone, share your data allowance with multiple Wi-Fi–enabled devices. No additional drivers or software necessary.

[jaybeeunix]

Originally Posted by pcbrew

Did you ever try the touch?
Just got back in country and haven't had a chance to try the connection part with my Galaxy Nexus but when I tried installing the BMW Connected app on a touch 2G it said it was incompatible. Not sure if incompatibility was with the old hardware or if it is expecting to have an always on cellular connection.

I will have to see if it installs on my daughter's 4G touch...

The BMW Connected App tells me it only works on iOS 5 when I try installing it on an iOS 4 iPad. According to Apple, only the iPod Touch 3Gen and 4Gen support iOS5.

[svache]

Originally Posted by pcbrew

Did you ever try the touch?

Nope... but... I think it should work, though (with iOS 5). Read this:

BMW Apps is compatible with iPhone GS3/4 and iPod Touch (with an active Wi-Fi connection) devices and requires the optional equipment “Apps”.

Taken from this site: http://www.bmw.com/com/en/newvehicle...apps.html#more


Either way, chances are that I will know for sure soon enough. I'm thinking about just getting one and trying it out. If it doesn't work, it's back to the store with the Touch xD

[svache]

Well I just tried it with my wife's iPad 2 and everything seems to work. I was able to get WIFI from my phone through Tasker as described in my first posts in this thread and the iPad was able to have the BMW Apps accessible. I could read my wife's calendar, see Facebook posts, listen to webradio and so on. So, yeah, I think I'm going to stay with Android for my next phone and buy an iPod Touch instead

[zeezz]

Can anyone confirm whether there is a BMW MyRemote app for Android yet? I don't really need the facebook/twitter feeds on my iDrive, but would like the remote unlock etc features available with the BMW Assist subscription.

[Raspartan]

Somewhat related topic: It seems that cyanogenmod for Android has added the Bluetooth MAP profile in some builds. This would potentially allow SMS and emails to be read by the F30. Flashing your phone with a custom ROM like this has risks though and I don't even know if it works with the car.

[Raspartan]

Partial success!!!

I flashed my Samsung Captivate with cyanogenmod 7.2 RC 1 last night and ran some tests this morning. The car now picks up all of my SMS text messages and displays a little envelope icon on the screen when I get a new one. Haven't tried emails yet.

However, the car doesn't read them out loud automatically. You can select the message in iDrive and click the play icon to have a message read, but it doesn't do it by itself. I'm beginning to wonder if it actually does this automatically, or whether I'm a victim of a slick advertisement.


WARNING: Flashing your phone with a custom ROM can carry big risks and in the worst case you can end up with a bricked phone if you're not careful. Your mileage may vary and all the usual cliches apply.

EDIT: The manual doesn't seem to say anything about reading out loud automatically. Only that you can select the message and have it read out loud.

[svache]

Originally Posted by Raspartan

Partial success!!!

Hey that's pretty cool

How hard is it to flash anyways? I never gave it a try as I didn't want to have the risk, so I only skimmed some explanations but never really did anything with it so I have honestly no idea.

Seeing how I'm ending my contract, and my phone is getting more and more issues anyways, maybe I should give Cyanogenmod a try..

And yeah, like you I also thought it would do it automatically but I noticed the same with the FB and Twitter updates that it didn't do this. Oh well, got me an iPod touch yesterday so that part is covered, now if I can get the text messages to work, that would be even better =)


edit: dangit, probably need to back my phone up again if I'm going to flash it.. I seriously hate doing that lol
edit2: seeing how you have it already installed, do you still have the Mobile Accesspoint available in this mod? If not, then I'm going to skip lol

[Raspartan]

Originally Posted by svache

How hard is it to flash anyways?l

Originally Posted by svache

seeing how you have it already installed, do you still have the Mobile Accesspoint available in this mod?

Mobile hotspot is still available in this mod and it seems to work. Many other things are different from my stock Android 2.3.3 ROM though.

Now I've never done this before, so I have to say I found the process to be very involved. I made several recoverable mistakes, but I thought I had bricked my phone at least 3 times at various points.

I found this XDA thread to be the most useful.

The basic process is:

1. Root your phone by flashing a rooted kernel using Odin or Heimdall.
2. Back up all your apps, bookmarks, files, everything. Preferably move the backups to your pc. I used Titanium Backup for some of these, and other apps to do some backup tasks.
3. Install ClockWorkMod. You can also flash a kernel with CWM already installed as part of step 1.
4. Download cyanogenmod 7.2 RC 1 (release candidate 1) onto the phone's *internal* sd memory, not the external SD card.
5. Reboot the phone into recovery mode (vol up+vol down+power)
6. Back up the phone
7. Choose install update from zip file.
8. Browse to and select the downloaded cyanogen zip file.
8. I think the phone reboots at this point, but if it doesn't then reboot it.

I think you're supposed to wipe the data at some point but I didn't, and this may have contributed to some of my problems. I also didn't have much success with the speedmod kernel mentioned in the thread, and had to find one that worked on my phone (Cognition). This may have been partly due to the fact that I already had Android 2.3 installed and most of these apps work best with 2.1 or 2.2.

As before, it's a risky process and you follow it at your own risk.

[STAT1]

Originally Posted by Raspartan

Partial success!!!

I flashed my Samsung Captivate with cyanogenmod 7.2 RC 1 last night and ran some tests this morning. The car now picks up all of my SMS text messages and displays a little envelope icon on the screen when I get a new one. Haven't tried emails yet.

I have an HTC Incredible that is rooted with S-OFF, and flashing a custom rom with MAP support is a really great idea. I'm a little confused though, do I need BMW App for SMS support? I am getting BMW assist with enhanced Bluetooth, but do not plan on paying extra for the Tech package or BMW Apps.