USB and Safety Connect Are Almost Here!

Yes. First post at the top of page 2:

 

I received my iPod connection from PriusChat's Shop today and just finished installing it. Took me 1 hour because half way through the sun went away. I love it!

 

Yes, but only intermittently, and it does not seem to be impacting the performance of my iPhone 3G S or the USB functionality.

 

Thanks. I kind of suspected that it wasn't part of my problem but was just a case of not all the pins connected at the same time. My iphone 3G is pretty useless on the USB. I bought a 16G flash drive to put my music on and it works fine with that but my phone won't stay connected for more than a few minutes. I will check my install this weekend and am looking to borrow someones phone in the office to eliminate my phone as the problem. If that checks out it leaves a firmware or kit problem. I've written Toyota but they haven't responded.

 

Here is my idea:

I organize all of my music onto a USB hardrive in folders labeled A-Z. In each folder I put all of the Artists that start with that letter. Next I do a subfolder in each Artist folder with all of their Albums and then within the Album folders I have the Tracks.

So it goes Letter / Artist / Album / Track.

This would obviously require more manual integration than simply using an iPod, but could be a viable solution for those of us with thousands of songs in our collection. If it works like I envision it, then the amount of scrolling you have to do to narrow down your track is minimal. If you have iTunes, most of the organizational work is already done for you within your music folder.

Does anyone who has the USB interface kit see a problem with this theory in practical use?

 

Apparently it doesn't support nested folders--I thought of something similar, but it was confirmed (can't remember which thread) it works like using a MP3 CD (see here for example: http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-iii...-safety-connect-almost-here-4.html#post924254 ). Plus the folder select function doesn't work when the car is moving.

 

Argh. C'mon Toyota!! How can such a smart car be so dumb!

Thanks for the warning before I went out and spent money on such a thoughtless feature! Maybe Toyota can release a firmware update in the future that fixes these shortcomings?

 

I would hope so. The nested folders seems trivial. The lock out is intentional, though.

 

I have a 16GB flash drive with my folders structured as Artist/Album/songs. It works great. I think the Album and song are what are displayed, don't really remember. In any case it works a lot better than the iPhone interface, which for me doesn't really work for more than a few minutes before it disconnects but in any case is slow and cumbersome. The folder interface is faster but it doesn't allow you to scroll through folders while moving, you can only go up and down one folder at a time while moving.

 

For clarification, are you saying it supports nested folders? In other words, with your folder structure above, can you access an artist, then an album, and finally a song? Or is is limited like in my post above?

 

The touch screen displays song, album and artist. The song and album have select keys. You can scroll song by song with the steering controls, from the touch screen you can scan song by song, go up or down one album at a time, Push select on the song and select from a list of songs in the album, Push select on the album and select from a list of albums. The "songs in the album" and "albums on the card" lists can not be scrolled when you are moving but you can select one if it is on the screen. I have about 11 GB of music on a 16 GB card and it works pretty well.

Like I said the iphone interface is pretty bad and on my car disconnects every few minutes.

 

I just purchased the 2010 Prius USB Interface Kit at Longo Toyota in LA for $192.00 plus $8.00 shipping. It is in stock and I should have it by the end of the week. Yeah!!!, ahem, unless I was wrong. Check it out, they are on line.

 

Anyone have walkthrough photos of their DIY USB install? Would love to see the connection that goes into the back of the nav unit, to see if it's similar to the Australian version.

The part number for the kit PT233 47100 is non-existent in Australia. Doesn't even come up in the master files from Toyota Australia. So those in the land of Oz who are looking to install one of these kits (if compatible) will probably have to order from the US.

 

Couple of additional things:
- The tuning knob also lets you go up and down though the songs.
- The artist seems to be updated from the music meta data because on a few of my songs it says "no data".
- It looks like the system just uses the file and the directory just above the file.

 

The U.S. USB connector attaches to the Sat radio module under the driver's seat (which I doubt is installed in cars outside of North America)--not behind the head unit like the European kit.

I posted install instructions for the European USB kit (thinking it was the same as the U.S. kit, before the U.S. kit was released) in the audio sub-forum if you want to search for more info.

 

I installed the USB iPod connection for the navigation package and even if I turn the car off while it is playing music from the iPod every time you turn the car back on it either goes to FM, SAT or CD. It will not stay on USB

That is so annoying!

 

The kit does support the iPod Touch, just not iPhone, which I agree is a major brain fart.

 

FYI, There are contrary posts stating it does work with iphone.

 

There are posts that say it works with the iphone. I doesn't work with my iphone 3G. I got a message from Toyota yesterday saying that they are checking but they weren't sure if it worked with the 3G but it is compatible with the original iphone. If that is the case it would be really unfortunate.

 

I purchased a 2010 Prius V with the ATP 3 weeks ago. It didn't come with the USB/IPOD integration. It does have the NAV. I had my dealer order the PT233-47100 and install it. When I picked up the car and plugged in my 80GB IPOD, it doesn't work. The IPOD turns on and si charging but there is no USB tab on the NAV screen. I have XM-Sirus and that still works via the "SAT" tab.

So I returned to the dealer and of course all of the technitions are gone. They gave me a loaner and said they would fix it and call me. So today, I get a call and they are saying that that part "only provides USB integration, but not IPOD control via NAV or steering wheel". That it doesn't work with "older 2010" model Prius'. I have the manual for the part and it says nothing like that. Anyone have any ideas. I think they are just BS'ing me and that they installed it wrong. CPATCH has it working in his and his is before the Aug 2010 model upgrades...

So far I am very disappointed with the dealer.

Regards,
Dave