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What are your thoughts about today’s show? We’d love to hear from you!
For a vent mount solution, this product is great. Jelly Grip Car Vent Mount Details - Square Jellyfish
I have been using it for more than a year.
I could be doing something wrong, but I’ve never had a car that works with vent mounts. The vents aren’t strong enough to hold the mount horizontal, the vent just closes.
It would be interesting to see the panel’s response if GM had announced an ‘Apple built-in’ only solution for its proposed in-car system.
I agree, BTW, that not supporting CarPlay/Android Auto is a mistake, and they’ll probably end up supporting it in the end. But they are obviously keen to get across that the optimal experience (in their view) in these vehicles will be Google built-in.
That is an issue with cars I’ve used with CarPlay. It’s an island. No integration with any of the car’s features. To use the radio, see driving modes you have to swap back to the built-in functionality. Mapping has no awareness of range. So I’d like more integration, but you’ve got two groups of users to keep happy - Apple and Android.
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There is no reason why you need a smartphone integrated with your car. Beyond the phone functionality which works perfectly well with Bluetooth.
I find it hard to belive that 79% of car purchasers find CarPlay essential - unless of course they only asked iPhone users 
I love having Android Auto in my car. I get my preferred navigation apps, my preferred music, etc, all accessible via the infotainment system. I really don’t think I’d purchase a new vehicle that doesn’t support it.
Maps with reliable traffic data? That’s what I miss in my ‘dumb’ car.
I assume they’re using a phone based GPS and want the car to integrate the display and have the spoken direction automatically override the car [music/podcast] audio.
Considering that both Apple and Android are walled gardens, particularly when it comes to auto use, I can see why a car manufacturer would want to keep them out of the loop.
Both our vehicles have a very serviceable satnav built in, both provide better routing than Google maps which is awful in Spain and Portugal.
IMHO the phone is only required for calls and as a cellular modem, let the car have access to your streams and podcasts.
Google knows enough about me without messing about with my car - Apple users, you are on your own, you all bought in to Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field and Tim Cook’s promise of puppies and flowers…
One comment had me flumoxed, when the panel was talking about Apple and the German Kartelamt. They asked, why Apple was being singled out and picked upon?
Have they not read any tech news in the last 10 years? Amazon is under several investigations for various alleged infringements of cartel and monopoly law in Europe. Google is under several investigations for various alleged infringements of cartel and monolpoly law in Europe - most of those investigations are for the same alleged infringements as Apple and are running concurrently to the Apple cases, in a couple of cases, I believe they are combined.
In addition, there are the hundreds of cases that don’t make the tech press, like Osram and Philips cartel dealings on light bulbs or Philips, again, on cathode ray screens, both around the 2018-2020 mark, for example.
Regarding Alex’s comment about Section 210 being enabling, defining what can be done, that is exactly what GDPR does and, I would have thought, Alex would be praising that, given his comments on Apple not sharing user data with developers. It tells individuals exactly what rights they have to their data and how it is protected - and in contrast it tells companies exactly what responsibilities they have to ensure that information isn’t misused (used for purposes other than collected - E.g. if you collect it for a warranty or invoice, you can’t use it to add that person to a marketing mailing list) or shared or sold to third parties, how long that data can be kept and when it has to be deleted.
Every built in nav I’ve used is poor. Out of date maps which are £hundreds to update officially, useless traffic monitoring, awful voice control, slow UI and crash just when you need them.
All the rentals I’ve had recently have had no built in nav, they are CarPlay or Android Auto only. Which is a pain if you haven’t got a local SIM yet and you forgot to download the local Google maps.
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Both our cars download updates from our WiFi, usually let them do it once a month. Have tried Google maps, but in Spain and Portugal it is useless, strangely Waze which is also owned by Google is far better.
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We’re not that advanced, it’s either SD cards or DVDs in ours 
Concur with @RosemaryOrchard 's pick. I’ve had both XM4 and now XM5 Sonys, and they are excellent. Surprisingly good for calls too. It’s not only the price that would put me off the Apple ones, but the weight - they are so heavy. I’m guessing iPhone users miss out on Sony LDAP though. Is Apple starting to support higher-bitrate BT codecs now or are they sticking with their own way of doing it?
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