CarPlay New problem with CarPlay and Volvo

[anthonymoody]

Had an iPhone X working great with CarPlay on my 2018 Volvo V90 CC.

Got a new iPhone, an XS Max.

In order, I:

-unpaired the X
-paired the XS Max
-plugged the XS Max into the CarPlay cable

Instead of starting CarPlay automatically as before, I get a message saying something along the lines of "there's already a phone connected to this car, do you want to start CarPlay with this phone?" and I have to select Yes or Connect or whatever.

Any thoughts? The X is definitely no longer in the device list in the car.

TIA

 

[anthonymoody]

Well, I have a partial diagnosis. Maybe someone can help get me from here to there

When I first turn BT off on the phone, then plug into the CarPlay cable, CarPlay starts automatically. So, it would seem that for some reason the car sees the phone's BT connection as another phone, even though it's obviously the same phone.

To be clear, I never had to turn BT off on my prior iPhone. So this is definitely different behavior for no reason I can discern.

 

[PeteLP]

On my Porsche, if I start the car without the carplay cable pugged in, then Bluetooth connects first, and when I then plug my phone into the carplay cable, I get a message that Porsche needs to disconnect my phone from Bluetooth in order to proceed to carplay.

It does do that, but it’s not a problem since carplay appears to handle calls and everything else I want.

I can confirm that the phone is actually disconnected from Bluetooth at that point because I can see that on some status screens, and it won’t play Bluetooth when I subsequently disconnect carplay while the car is still running. I can reconnect Bluetooth manually at that point.

If, on the other hand, I plug my phone into carplay before I start the car, then I get no message when carplay starts up. After disconnecting carplay while the car is still running in this sequence, Bluetooth appears to work.

Not sure if Bluetooth is connecting while carplay is still wired (perhaps right after carplay starts up) or it’s connecting immediately AFTER I unplug carplay.

It doesn’t seem like much of an issue for me, in that I never really need to disconnect during my trip.


I do believe your Audi message is all about (temporarily) disconnecting the Bluetooth connection for your current phone, rather some permanent unpairing of another phone. It may not be a problem for you either.

 

[anthonymoody]

Issue is that my Volvo didn't used to do this. I could plug in for CarPlay *after* I started the car and the phone/car BT connection was established, and CarPlay would take over without prompting me every time.

 

[PeteLP]

Issue is that my Volvo didn't used to do this. I could plug in for CarPlay *after* I started the car and the phone/car BT connection was established, and CarPlay would take over without prompting me every time.

With iOS 11.3 some people reported that USB audio stopped working. I noticed that myself and discovered that it only failed to work if I was first connected to bluetooth.

I suspect that iOS12 is doing something to explicitly disconnect bluetooth and report that to users (potentially through the cars interface) in order to assure that audio over usb and carplay work reliably, (assuming that carplay audio may be similar, or identical, to usb audio in some technical ways. They are both wired audio)

So that may explain the new alert you're seeing. It may be an intentional action to retain reliable audio through CarPlay.

You haven't responded to my thought that this alert, and the disconnection from bluetooth, may not be a real problem for you. Do you agree?