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No carplay because its an Australian Delivered car, so it was built in November 2015.
I asked my dealer about carplay when I first ordered the car and was told that they thought it could be a firmware update. But the at pickup he told me was that the head unit was different and no retrofit would be available.
I would be interested in any new developments regarding carplay...
I also emailed Nick a few days ago. No response yet.
I just emailed Mr. Schwartz. I hope he has the courtesy to respond to all of us and rectify the situation. VW's costing a third of the price have Apple CarPlay included and I see no reason why Mercedes can't include it in our cars when it is now available.
There is fierce competition today in the luxury car market, and customer support and satisfaction is expected of the manufacturers today. Without regard for issues that arise, customers look elsewhere for their new car purchases. Mercedes, don't let us down.
I agree with you all. If my same car getting delivered next week's has it, then the same previous car should have it.
But...................MB has a long way to go with the command system.
(Example. My 2014 Toyota Entune blows the doors off my wife's '14 E class in sound, options, and easy of use. I've also seen car play in a new chevy and still the entune is better, cheaper, faster, easier, and does more. (Except make calls by voice) I have also been research MB's carplay online and till I actually get in my car with it and try it, I'm not impressed. I'm probably going to have a hard time giving up that part of my Yota for the MB.)
I'm starting to wonder if there is any one particular person at MB we can email, write to, or call collectively about a retrofit.
I'm speculating that this update is most likely a software one on a specific head-unit that probably hasn't changed between production dates. Probably the only reason MB wouldn't offer such a thing is because not enough owners are vocal about it and if that isn't the reason, we should at least know why.
Edit:
Looking at the original CarPlay notice, it looks like this might be a good place to start:
Having taken delivery of 2016 GLE300d built in November 2015, I would like to express my dissatisfaction in not having the Apple CarPlay capability included. As you announced on December 9, 2015, this feature is now included on the later builds similarly configured as mine, for the same price as my model which omits this feature. More discouraging is the deception of not being informed that if I had waited a few weeks, this feature would have been included at no extra charge. I had specifically inquired about this feature and was told that it was unavailable on the 2016 model.
Please do the right thing and offer a retrofit. If this can be done by software, it would be a disgrace not to offer it. Even if a hardware change is required, it should be provided free of charge.
Disappointing Response from Nick Schwartz about Apple CarPlay
I just got a response back from Nick Schwartz. He told me I should take the issue up with my dealer. I told him I purchased a Mercedes and they should stand behind their cars instead of passing responsibility to my car dealer. Apple CarPlay is a feature Mercedes offers, not my car dealer.
Having taken delivery of 2016 GLE300d built in November 2015, I would like to express my dissatisfaction in not having the Apple CarPlay capability included. As you announced on December 9, 2015, this feature is now included on the later builds similarly configured as mine, for the same price as my model which omits this feature. More discouraging is the deception of not being informed that if I had waited a few weeks, this feature would have been included at no extra charge. I had specifically inquired about this feature and was told that it was unavailable on the 2016 model.
Please do the right thing and offer a retrofit. If this can be done by software, it would be a disgrace not to offer it. Even if a hardware change is required, it should be provided free of charge.
Please email back a response.
----
I also received a response from Mr. Schwartz. I commend him for his timely response.
I apologize you are dissatisfied with your vehicle. As you saw in our announcement, Apple CarPlay was only available on the GLE with build dates on or after January 8th, 2016. I am not able to speak to how dealerships or specific personnel were communicating the availability, but regardless, I’m deeply sorry that you feel deceived in the least. Please know when we received all of the details of this program, we promptly communicated it to the dealerships along with its availability on our vehicles.
At this time, I am unable to confirm to the public that a retrofit will be available, but know that I am well aware of the demand for this feature and I am strongly pushing for expansion of the program.
Please keep in contact with your dealership – they will be able to assist you with a retrofit in the future if it should become possible.
Thank you for your message.
Sincerely,
Nick
Here is my emailed response back to him:
Mr. Schwartz,
Thank you for your response.
I understand that you may have kept the dealers in the dark until you "received all of the details of this program." It would have been nice had you given your dealers a heads up as you became aware of the timeline, with updates to the plans, even prior to ALL details being known.
Since my dealer may be the last to know that a possible retrofit is pending, if possible, please keep me updated directly.
Again, I appreciate your response.
--JC
He says he is "strongly pushing for expansion of the program." So I hope he succeeds.
I apologize you are dissatisfied with your vehicle. As you saw in our announcement, Apple CarPlay was only available on the GLE with build dates on or after January 8th, 2016. I am not able to speak to how dealerships or specific personnel were communicating the availability, but regardless, I’m deeply sorry that you feel deceived in the least. Please know when we received all of the details of this program, we promptly communicated it to the dealerships along with its availability on our vehicles.
At this time, I am unable to confirm to the public that a retrofit will be available, but know that I am well aware of the demand for this feature and I am strongly pushing for expansion of the program.
Please keep in contact with your dealership – they will be able to assist you with a retrofit in the future if it should become possible.
Thank you for your message.
Sincerely,
Nick
Here is my emailed response back to him:
Mr. Schwartz,
Thank you for your response.
I understand that you may have kept the dealers in the dark until you "received all of the details of this program." It would have been nice had you given your dealers a heads up as you became aware of the timeline, with updates to the plans, even prior to ALL details being known.
Since my dealer may be the last to know that a possible retrofit is pending, if possible, please keep me updated directly.
Again, I appreciate your response.
--JC
He says he is "strongly pushing for expansion of the program." So I hope he succeeds.
--JC
Just got a new response from Mr. Schwartz. He said the issue of not having Apple CarPlay is to be handled at the dealership level. If the dealer has no idea about a retrofit or software update, then how can they handle my request. It's called passing responsibility and I am totally fed up with Mercedes lack of trying to rectify this situation for all of us.
If they cared about us and not just selling vehicles, they would have a fix for us. Shame on them. They aren't the only game in town and I might have to venture elsewhere for my next luxury car purchase.
Decided to call Apple to find out more about Apple CarPlay and what's involved to
retrofit it into our cars. All that's involved is putting a chip in the stereo system and updating the software. I can't understand why Mercedes hasn't offered to offer the retrofit to us. These are expensive cars and Mercedes should at least retrofit the cars for us.
I am blaming my wife for all of this and glad that it is her car and she doesn't care about carplay..this makes me feel better about my cheapo VW egolf commuter that has both carplay and android auto standard..
I thought I would just chime in on this for folks who are looking to upgrade to add CarPlay. I have a GLE 400 that has CarPlay. I have to say that while I thought CarPlay would be a big deal going in, I actually don't use it very much. I actually prefer Send2Benz + COMAND navigation + mbrace Concierge to CarPlay.
CarPlay frankly is very version 1.0 and doesn't have a lot of features yet.
If you really want CarPlay you should give Send2Benz a shot in the mbrace app. It is free and lets you paste addresses from your smartphone directly into the built-in nav (even when you are not in your car yet). I hate Apple Maps nav, so I think this is actually a big improvement over CarPlay for navigation.
I thought I would just chime in on this for folks who are looking to upgrade to add CarPlay. I have a GLE 400 that has CarPlay. I have to say that while I thought CarPlay would be a big deal going in, I actually don't use it very much. I actually prefer Send2Benz + COMAND navigation + mbrace Concierge to CarPlay.
CarPlay frankly is very version 1.0 and doesn't have a lot of features yet.
If you really want CarPlay you should give Send2Benz a shot in the mbrace app. It is free and lets you paste addresses from your smartphone directly into the built-in nav (even when you are not in your car yet). I hate Apple Maps nav, so I think this is actually a big improvement over CarPlay for navigation.
I agree I thought car play was gonna be awesome but I find my self not useing it at all. Send to Benz is great and the MB interface is great also. Just me having to plug in car play just to use it is really stupid and this is coming from a die hard apple fan. If u don't have car play your not missing much.
I apologize you are dissatisfied with your vehicle. As you saw in our announcement, Apple CarPlay was only available on the GLE with build dates on or after January 8th, 2016. I am not able to speak to how dealerships or specific personnel were communicating the availability, but regardless, I’m deeply sorry that you feel deceived in the least. Please know when we received all of the details of this program, we promptly communicated it to the dealerships along with its availability on our vehicles.
At this time, I am unable to confirm to the public that a retrofit will be available, but know that I am well aware of the demand for this feature and I am strongly pushing for expansion of the program.
Please keep in contact with your dealership – they will be able to assist you with a retrofit in the future if it should become possible.
Thank you for your message.
Sincerely,
Nick
Here is my emailed response back to him:
Mr. Schwartz,
Thank you for your response.
I understand that you may have kept the dealers in the dark until you "received all of the details of this program." It would have been nice had you given your dealers a heads up as you became aware of the timeline, with updates to the plans, even prior to ALL details being known.
Since my dealer may be the last to know that a possible retrofit is pending, if possible, please keep me updated directly.
Again, I appreciate your response.
--JC
He says he is "strongly pushing for expansion of the program." So I hope he succeeds.
--JC
http://roccos.tumblr.com/
Retrofits are possible on many vehicles , but there are many factors, Dealer is not gonna have a solution soon or maybe never,
2 Thumbs up for you guys to make it happen as I would never expect the MB stealership or MB Corporate to care about their customers..now onto the how to, how much, how long question?
http://roccos.tumblr.com/
Retrofits are possible on many vehicles , but there are many factors, Dealer is not gonna have a solution soon or maybe never,
You guys hooked me up a few times when I was at the dealership, mostly R class nav hard drives. Never an issue with ya's, MidCity turned me on to you.
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Retro Carplay
