Entune Updates?

Sounds more like Out-of-tune.

 

I got an email suposedly from Toyota but th links were weird so I dumped it as a fishing scam. I have never been able to get the Entune ap to load on my Sasung Moment anyway.

 

The only thing you're missing out on is frustration.

 

Fun fact I learned semi-recently: You can connect your iPhone to your car wirelessly to connect Entune to the internet, and the Entune app isn't required. I have an iPhone, and I always thought it was really dumb that you had to plug your phone in and launch the Entune app in order to get a data connection to your car, instead of a wireless connection (tapping "Connect for Internet" always failed for me). There's this thing... called Bluetooth... works really well! ^^

Maybe I'm just clueless, but I didn't realize you could do this, and instructions were buried in Google (advanced PiP info seems hard to come by), so in case others don't know how to do this, here's how (your iPhone must support Personal Hotspot):

1. In your car, press "Setup", then "Bluetooth". Pair your smartphone if it's not already paired.
2. Open up your Paired Device List. You should see your phone listed here. Tap it.
3. You'll see an entry called "Connect for Internet". If you press this, and you have an iPhone paired, it'll probably fail. So, tap the configuration icon on the right of that button.
4. There's an entry called "DUN/PAN Connections". Tap that.
5. Under "username", enter your iPhone's name. It's probably something like "John's iPhone".
6. On your iPhone, enable Personal Hotspot if it's not already enabled by tapping Settings > General > Cellular > Personal Hotspot and switching it to On.
7. On that page, you'll see your Personal Hotspot password. Enter that into your car on the same screen as in Step 5.
8. Tap Confirm on your car.

Now, any time you launch an Entune app on your car's dash, it'll automatically connect to the internet via your iPhone's WiFi connection. Best part? The Entune smartphone app isn't required for any of this to work.

But one thing you're going to notice is that the car will not automatically "connect for internet" when you start it; it waits until you launch a dash app that needs it before trying to connect. So, when you turn the car on, your car won't be connected for internet, but if you run a Bing search, it will seek out your phone, attempt to connect for internet through it, then run your Bing search. Nice. Except, when you launch maps/navigation, it won't color the roads according to current traffic conditions or show you traffic alerts automatically. Unless you're already connected, you'll need to head back into your paired device list and tap "Connect for Internet" manually (now that you've entered Personal Hotspot information into the car, this button should work now).

I wonder if this functionality would work with mobile hotspots like the Verizon MiFi. Could be an interesting option to keep one of those devices tucked away in the car someplace, always ready for internet access requests from the car.

I don't know if this also works for Android phones, but I'd be surprised if it didn't.

It's also worth noting that in the instructions I found (I can't link to them yet), the author mentioned the 2.1.0 update breaking wireless tethering for iPhone, but my PiP is the base model running firmware 1.7.0 and I never was able to get it to work.

 

Interesting find ML1. I presume you have to have a Personal Hotspot data plan with some carriers for this to work, as that option may not otherwise be available, if my memory serves me right?

 

Most plans these days allow your phone to be a wireless hotspot.

 

On at&t it's a $20/month add-on.

 

Really? On all plans? Even family plans?

Verizon all of a sudden isn't looking so expensive.

 

I guess I recall now that both switched to 'share everything' plans as their primary selling point recently. Problem was it would be significantly more expensive for our family to switch to those new plans. We just buy data tethering on the rare months we need it.

 

Verizon's and AT&T's data capped plans don't charge extra for using your iPhone as a mobile hotspot (that's Share Everything on Verizon and Mobile Share on AT&T). On those plans, mobile hotspot usage is included. You may remember hearing stories about carriers trying to clamp down on people using their phones as mobile hotspots. That's because they don't want people tethering laptops and desktops to their phones to milk unlimited internet out of their plans. Now that plans are capped, it's no longer an issue. But if you're still grandfathered into an unlimited plan, it will likely be an extra fee.

Sprint does not charge for using your phone as a mobile hotspot.

Personal Hotspot is supported on iPhone 4 and later, iPad 2 and later (cellular models only), and iPad Mini (cellular models only).

But as always, check with your carrier for confirmation.

 

I'm on one of AT&t's capped plans that doesn't share everything or offer tethering. As I said, when they released those plans I looked into how it would effect us if we switched. My recollection was that it was an extra $20-40/month to switch. AFAIK, on both carriers you have the option to still build your own plans, possibly at a cost savings. Every plan change is strategically designed to move the largest number of customers into more expensive plans while keeping things confusing enough that most people won't notice.

 

Well, in their defense, I will say that they're only following their customers' usage. Their old unlimited plans were based on the premise that people talk and text more than they use data. That simply isn't the reality anymore. In fact, I was looking forward to saving a lot of money by getting a plan with the minimum number of minutes and no texting but with unlimited data. I was looking forward to that precisely because I don't talk or text much these days, but I do use a lot of data. Well, that's how everybody is these days, and the carriers finally caught wise. I can hardly blame them for keeping up with the times.

I think the plans are actually a lot simpler now since all you have to worry about is how much data you want. Minutes and texting are all free and included. I remember when it was $15/mo per line for texting, and there were distinctions between "primary" lines and "secondary" lines; when I sold mobile phones, some customers' contracts would have a huge list of all the varying charges and they were complicated as hell. Now, it's just data + number of phones. Much cleaner.

Also, it is worth mentioning that the "base" level Verizon plan is the exact same price as a single line was before: unlimited minutes, unlimited texting, data access, $100/mo. The only thing that's changed is that the data is no longer unlimited, it's 2 GB, and you don't have the option to get fewer minutes or texting. But, you can share multiple lines and save money since adding on a smartphone is only +$40.

To be fair, unless you're streaming a lot of music or video, you're unlikely to hit that cap. And even if you do, the overage fee is actually pretty reasonable: $15/GB. That's far better than the "good-ole days" when it was $0.01/KB (aka $10.24/MB). And if you're looking like you might hit your cap, you can call customer service and have them raise your plan temporarily. The price between plans on Verizon is $10 for +2 GB.

I'm thinking about trying to pair my car with my home WiFi connection to try and track Entune data usage because I'm betting it's minimal (except for the Pandora app).

Also, because I'm a geek and I love exploring this stuff, I found a setting in the car dash to Save System Info to USB. So, of course I tried it. Then plugged the USB into my computer to see what it sees. It saves a bunch of stuff. And looking at some of the files, I see references to "/var" which made me geek out: "Does my car run freakin' Linux?!" Which, of course, I think makes sense. And when I see people plugging USB devices into their car to run firmware updates, I absolutely would love to know precisely whats on that drive and what the car is looking for when it detects that it's a firmware update. I would love to tinker with my car and change things around, but I'm too scared I'd brick the thing. But man, wouldn't it be nice if the music player "pull-down" bar (that appears when you skip tracks outside the music player screen) actually showed artist and track information instead of just "iPod [#]".

 

Just to clarify:
Base models have always had this (we cover this in the FAQ)
Advanced models apparently don't require personal hotspot on iOS
Android apparently just works without personal hotspot for both models

 

Just looked through the FAQ lensovet - I did not see the section that details the differences between how the two models handle this?

My base model works fine over USB. Obviously won't work over Bluetooth.

If I did have a tethering plan, would the Entune data connection work automatically over Bluetooth? The iPhone can tether with other devices over Bluetooth.

 

Here's the relevant section

Does Entune require a USB connection?
Depends. If your phone supports tethering over Bluetooth (aka personal hotspot), then no. If it doesn't, then you'll need to connect your phone via USB. Note that it makes no difference what OS you're using! Also, Android phones support connecting over Bluetooth regardless of whether you have personal hotspot.
Note that certain iPod features are not available over Bluetooth (such as music browsing).

Regarding your "automatic" question: it would connect automatically when you request a feature that requires data. So, for example, if you go into map settings and turn on traffic, it will connect. But you have to do this every time you start the car — there's no way (as far as I can tell) to have it load traffic immediately. I suspect if you use pandora or iheartradio and turn off the car with that input method on, perhaps it would automatically reconnect then.

 

We are still on the original ATT Unlimited Data Plan. However, as time goes by, they're doing everything they can to weed us out. Almost any change to the plan you have kicks you into one of the capped plans. Fortunately, hotspot wireless isn't something I really need since I have an iPad, too. Unfortunately, you can't tether your iPad to anything, either.