Prime Premium versus Advanced

Discussion in 'Prime Main Forum (2017-2022)' started by MagnetoBlue, Jun 5, 2018.

  1. MagnetoBlue

    MagnetoBlue Junior Member

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    Hey guys, thanks again for the help with my other thread. I'm planning to buy the Prime this month and I'm still unsure if I should I buy the Premium or the Advanced. I read the thread, "Prime Features Explained" and YouTube'd the difference but I'm still confused. My main concern is, are all these extra features worth the extra upfront cost and the possible maintenance cost it can cause in the future?

    If I can get you guys' help again, I'd really appreciate it. It'll be my last set of questions before I make the final decision to buy this month. Hopefully this week!

    Here's the list of features that Advanced has compared to Premium:
    1) Integrated LED Fog Lights and LED Accent Lights: Does it physically look different than the Premium? If there is a difference, are there any pictures online somewhere? Is it a game changer?
    2) Blind Spot Monitor (BSM) and Rear Cross-Traffic Alert (RCTA): Is it worth it for a driver like me who always looks over my shoulder to the left and the right for my blind spots? (I still can't trust technology to detect my blind spots)
    3) Safety Connect: What exactly is it?
    4) Intelligent Clearance Sonar (ICS) With Intelligent Parking Assist (IPA): Is it worth it for a driver like me who always looks over my shoulder to the left and the right for my blind spots? (I still can't trust technology to detect my blind spots)
    5) Auto-Dimming Rearview Mirror with HomeLink Universals Transceiver: What exactly is it? Does it physically look different than the Premium? If there is a difference, are there any pictures online somewhere? Is it a game changer?
    6) Caro Area Heavy Sliding Tonneau Cover: Premium has the Lightweight Tonneau Cover. What's the difference? Why would anybody want a Heavy cover instead of the Light cover?
    7) Color Head-Up Display (HUD) with Battery Charge and Toyota Safety Sense (P (TSS-P) Alerts: What exactly is it? Does it physically look different than the Premium? If there is a difference, are there any pictures online somewhere? Is it a game changer?
    8) Prime Apps with Remote Climate and Remote Charge Management: I saw this youtube channel explaining the Remote Climate (
    ) but why is this important? And What is Remote Charge Management?
    9) Rain-Sensing Variable Intermittent Windshield Wipers: Premium has the Washer-Linked Variable Intermittent Windshield Wipers. Wouldn't it be better to have the Premium version since it seems it has less electronics to maintain (Rain-Sensor wipers versus standard intermittent wipers).
    10) Entune Premium JBL Audio with Integrated Navigation, App Suite, and Prime Apps with 11.6-In. HD Multimedia Display: Premium doesn't have JBL Audio and Prime Apps. Is Prime Apps a game changer?
     
  2. schja01

    schja01 One of very few in Chicagoland

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    <sarcasm mode on>If you are worried about all the electronics why are you even considering ANY model Prius?<sarcasm mode off>
    I'm 70 years old and chose the Advanced even with it's $4300 higher MSRP. I figure "you only go 'round once" why not do it well.
    I am concerned about the possible high cost of repairs so I'm getting a Toyota Platinum VSA "just in case" I keep the car beyond the standard warranty.
    Have you test driven a Prime? Even looking over your shoulder the visibility is poor. BSM is a must for me.
    I'm coming off a 2009 Venza. I wish the Prius had an AWD option but it doesn't. I've really come to love the HomeLink mirror.
    I'm also wishing the Prime had auto tilt down mirrors so maybe Parking Assist will mitigate that omission.
    I am most concerned about the lack of a real spare tire (compact or other) though that's not model specific.
    Since I plan to keep the car a while (God willing) I'm going with the protection package, rear and shifter applique and all weather mats (no carpet liners). I chose the black interior as I really don't like the white cup holders. Even with the console applique you still see white.
    You left out the wireless phone charger. I was skeptical about wireless charging at home until I got a phone that supports it and now I'm hooked. All my previous phones eventually got flakey charging ports so wireless charging will reduce wear on those ports.
    I avoid parallel parking I hope Parking Assist helps.
    FWIW I didn't want my options dealer installed so I placed a custom order from Japan and hope the folks who do "Port" installed options do a good job.
    Good luck with your choice.
    J
     
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  3. SteveMucc

    SteveMucc Active Member

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    The blind spot monitor is quite valuable. I live in an area that is inundated with very large vehicles (pickups and suv's) (actually that's pretty much everywhere nowadays). When backing out of a spot, there's often zero visibility to the left and right no matter how much you try to crane your neck. The rear-cross-traffic alert lets you know if a vehicle is coming that you can't possibly see. It's alerted me more than once to something that I would not have been able to see. Did it save an accident? Don't know. I usually back out very, very slowly in those situations and hope that the other driver is paying attention, but that's a losing game in the long run.

    Take a look at the pictures on the Toyota web site.. the fog lights are clearly visible and an alteration from the standard body. Near as I can tell, they're the only outwardly visible differentiation (albeit slight) between the plus/prime and the advanced.

    If you want you're garage door opener built into your car, the only choice is advanced. a number of threads on this one

    I love the HUD... go take a ride to the dealership and see for yourself.

    I really like the rain sensing wipers. For the most part you just leave them on auto and they speed up and slow down as the water on the windshield accumulates. It's not perfect, but for the most part's better than intermittent wipers. Regarding the reliability... it's probably no different then intermittent wipers. The wiper mechanism is identical (make this claim without having looked at it, but I don't see any reason for Toyota to have a different mechanism and the added cost). The difference is in the trigger. In the intermittent case it comes from a timer, in the sensing case it comes from the cameras. If the camera's go out you have a lot of other things that go out as well.

    Intelligence clearance sonar adds 12 sonar sensors around the perimeter of the car. When you're pulling into/out of a parking space they detect if you're going to hit something, give you a warning, and slow/stop the car to avoid damage. the system will also park and un-park you car for you automatically if you wish.
     
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  4. Salamander_King

    Salamander_King Senior Member

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    #4 Salamander_King, Jun 6, 2018
    Last edited: Jun 6, 2018
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  5. Pizza Driver

    Pizza Driver Active Member

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    Features I am glad I have:
    1) blind spot monitoring. Especially useful when you vision is limited by parked cars or other obstructions like plants. can also prove useful for highway driving when changing lanes.
    2) HUD, although I wish the hybrid monitor indicated when the engine is on or off.
    3) safety link. I actually used this once when I needed to get the car pulled out of a ditch.
    4) remote climate is nice to have.
    5) heated steering wheel. one of the main factors that sold me on the advanced.
    6) the electochromic mirror seems to work well.
    7) not a must have, but the accent lights do look nice.

    Features I am not impressed by
    1) auto dimming headlights. Either don't dim soon enough, or dim in situations they don't need to.
    2) auto wipers. work ok in summer, but not so well in colder weather when the windshield fogs up.
    3) auto parking features. only time I used them was to try them out. never use them in practice.
    4) fog lights are useless.
     
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  6. SaraBBrown94

    SaraBBrown94 Active Member

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    I bought the premium. Wish I'd gotten the advanced. The little extras are worth it in my opinion.

    Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
     
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  7. MikailSJ

    MikailSJ Member

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    Got a plus. Yeah blind spot and cross traffic are nice; but not worth the extra 2-6K above the base model. I personally prefer the cloth seats (more breathable IMO) and the dumb infotainment system is not on the base model.
     
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  8. PT Guy

    PT Guy Senior Member

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    The worth can't be evaluated in dollars. Do you want the features? Maybe some strongly, maybe some not so much. It is all up to how you feel.

    We wanted the features on the Advance, so we bought one. Some aren't the best of breed. The fog lights are worthless--even the best have the job of lighting the shoulder, not "cutting" through fog--and these are far from the best. The cargo cover is worthless to us, maybe you like it. The cell phone apps are worthless to us, others use them a lot. The big screen isn't my favorite--sun reflection--and who needs the map all the time?

    All that said, we really like the driving assist features. The safety features are important to us, and we use the heads-up display instead of the dashboard display all the time. I'm glad we bought the Advance.
     
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  9. CharlesH

    CharlesH CA HOV Decal #5 on former PiP

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    Safety Connect is the emergency response system, comparable to GM's OnStar. In case of an accident, the system uses the built-in cell phone to automatically call for help. It provide GPS location info and exactly what happened to the dispatcher. You can also manually call the dispatcher with the SOS button, for other situations, like needing a tow. Presumably, one could also use it where one would otherwise call 911, since the operator will have the car location to pass on to the 911 dispatcher. The 911 function in a cell phone is supposed to provide the GPS location information to the 911 operator, but not all 911 centers are set up to receive that information ("budget constraints"). The Safety Connect cell phone is also used to support the Prime Applications such as vehicle locator and remote charge management and remote climate control.

    Concerning cross-traffic alert, the big advantage with this is that it can see things from the point of view of the rear of the car that simply are out of the line of sight of the driver.
     
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  10. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    1. Yes. It adds foglights and the lower part of where your turn signals are, will have 3 white LED lights that will come on with the parking lights (and of course headlights). There are pictures of it. Base or Premium: Note there is a blank grey triangular plastic area in the lower corner of the front bumper. primegrey.jpg

      Advanced. Note the extra foglights in the triangular grey area at the corner of the bumper. primebeige1.jpg


      Is it a game changer? No.
    2. If you often park straight into a stall spot instead of reversing into the spot, then RCTA could prove useful, especially if parked beside a wall or a large vehicle. BSM is "nice to have" but if you always fully shoulder check (both sides of the car), then it may not be as useful to you as to someone who may have limited mobility (e.g. stiff neck)
    3. Safety Connect is standard on all Prime models. It's Toyota's telematics services. It provides automatic collision notification (A live agent will call you if your airbags deploy. If you do not respond, they will call 911 and send for help), stolen vehicle locator, emergency services (if you need 911 help and your cellphone battery is dead or you witness something while driving, you can push the button to call for help)
    4. ICS helps with low speed collisions. Again, accidents do happen and perhaps you were distracted by a passenger and scrape a wall in a parking garage or your spouse/kid left something on the garage floor that you didn't see. IPA is just a "wow" feature. Again, it can help if you have limited mobility but for the majority of us, it's more of a "look what my car can do!"
    5. The rearview mirror will automatically dim according to headlight brightness behind so you don't have to manually flip the mirror between day and night mode. Homelink is mostly used for garage doors and/or gates. You can program your door/gate to the car so you don't have to carry your garage remote with you.
    6. The difference is that one is a vinyl roller-type cover (same as the Gen 2/3 Prius and the higher models of the Gen 4 Prius). The "lightweight" tonneau cover is just a mesh with a wireframe. The roller cover has better coverage over the cargo area than the wireframe mesh. However, it doesn't lift when the hatch opens while the mesh cover does.
    7. The HUD is a really nice feature. It displays your speedo, HSI and navigation instructions on your windshield. Not necessarily a "game changer" but for most people, I'd think the opinion is mostly favourable.
    8. It allows you to remotely start your Prime's climate control with your smartphone. It means you do not have to be within remote fob range of your car. With the Advanced, you can pre-heat/cool your car while you're still inside the mall as opposed to the Plus/Premium where you have to walk outside and get within range to press the A/C button on the remote/key fob. The smartphone app also has a greater range of options for climate. On the Plus/Premium (and the Advanced if you use the A/C button on the remote fob), it just turns on the climate control to your last setting. On the Advanced, if you use the smartphone app, you can turn on max heat, max cold as well as front or rear defrosters.

      Remote Charge Management allows you to start your charge, again without having to go to your car to start. Say, your car is plugged in but not charging (cause your setting has it charging overnight) but suddenly there's a change of plans for the evening and you want to go out, you can tell the car to start charging now with the Remote Charge Management from your home, rather than go to the car and fiddle with the screen, saving you time.
    9. Personal preference. You don't have to use the AUTO function. In addition, there is a setting in the car to turn the rain-sensing wipers off completely so that the AUTO position will function like the "INT" or intermittent setting on the Plus/Premium
    10. The JBL audio is nice and apparently it is a step up from the base audio system. Again, Prime Apps include the Remote Climate and Remote Charge Management.
     
  11. crimsontime

    crimsontime New Member

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    I bought the plus because the huge touchscreen on the other models made using climate controls annoying. Also I don't like to look at screens when driving. To me, the plus still has too much tech . I don't use most of it let alone wanting more in the higher models.
     
  12. MagnetoBlue

    MagnetoBlue Junior Member

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    Thank you everyone for your help! I liked everyone’s posts.

    Hi PT Guy, I messaged you.
     
  13. MagnetoBlue

    MagnetoBlue Junior Member

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    After reading everyone’s posts carefully and meeting up with a Prime Advanced owner, here are features that I really like from the Advanced:

    1) Homelink: How is this not a standard feature for any car at this time and age? That’s ridiculous.
    2) Remote charge management: I charge my car at work using SemmaConnect and it’ll be nice if I can stop the charging at work instead of having to physically be at my car to disconnect. Are there any other charging companies that can stop charging my car automatically when it notices the battery is fully charged?
    3) JBL audio: I thought it was just a gimmicky upgrade but actually it’s a significant improvement from the base audio system. I’m not a sound guy so I wouldn’t be able to describe the specifics but it’s noticeably louder and more bass. It helps when you’re using Bluetooth to talk to people and music with a lot of drums.
    * Note: One feature I was most disappointed from the Advanced is the fog lights. I’m 30 years old so I’m still trying to be superficially cool so I don’t care too much about the functionality of the fog lights but just in terms of the overall look of the car. I don’t think the fog lights look good on the Prime design. It feels like there’s too much going on in the face of the car, maybe because of the 4 square headlight design.

    In conclusion, those 3 features are not worth $4,000 to me so I’m glad I got the Premium over the Advanced.

    Thanks again for the input!
     
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  14. Tideland Prius

    Tideland Prius Moderator of the North
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    Congrats on your purchase!
     
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  15. Salamander_King

    Salamander_King Senior Member

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    All good points, but I am glad you got mostly what you wished for. For the point 2, any charger you connect will automatically stop charging when the battery is fully charged. I am not sure why you would want to stop charging remotely half full?
     
  16. MagnetoBlue

    MagnetoBlue Junior Member

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    Yeah! I just confirmed that using SennaConnect. I didn’t know any better. I got my Prime couple days ago and it was my first time charging today. I called SennaConnect and they told me it won’t stop charging even when the battery is full so I’d have to physically disconnect it or else I’ll keep getting charged. Clearly she was wrong. She said she’s the only person in the customer service department on Sundays so I think their company is still really small to know these kinds of details.
     
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  17. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Sorry, Goggle is being obtuse this morning for me. Is there a URL for "SennaConnect"?

    Thanks,
    Bob Wilson
     
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  18. Salamander_King

    Salamander_King Senior Member

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  19. MagnetoBlue

    MagnetoBlue Junior Member

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    Lol yes, I meant SemaConnect. Sorry about that, Senna is a pill that causes diarrhea.
     
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  20. MMBH

    MMBH Member

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    I'm in the same choir as you are! Me too! :(