silentbob

for anyone who has the actual lexus oem ipod kit (not the vaistech unit), how do you like the unit? i'm trying to decide between the vaistech unit or the lexus unit. i don't care about having xm or playing videos, all i pretty much care about is ease of browsing and quality of the user interface. the vaistech unit does not allow the use of the tune dial to scroll thru artists, songs, albums, etc, so navigating thru large libraries seems like a major pain. i have heard that the lexus unit integrates the tune dial -- is that true? if so, does it make navigating any easier/faster?
thanks!

evotolexus

I have the OEM interface kit. I love the integration and use of all the factory controls (tune dial). However, i hate the interface. It doesn't allow you to view a list of albums/artists. You have to scroll through each one by one which lasts forever when you have 20GB+ of music. Also, when scrolling by artists, each altered spelling/capitalization, will result in a seperate entry. Also, not many people remember each album title, so searching by album is pretty tough. Then when you find the album, you can't see a listing of each song.

Don't get me wrong, i love the integration, sound quality, and ability to hide in glovebox. However, just saying I personally feel the interface is the biggest disappointment.

I still use my Griffin dock cable when i don't feel like scrolling one by one or dealing with 20 entries for the same artist. The sound quality through the dock connector is pretty good.

You'll definitely get varying responses, but just my opinion.

is350drive

i have the OEM interface kit. THeres one thing that i dont like but i think it only happens on mine, i dont know why. Almost every time i turn on my car, the screen says "check ipod". the ipod freezes and i have to reset it. does this happen to anyone else? what could this be?
btw, everything else on the interface kit its awesome. Its pretty user-friendly.

mo12hammad

but is it iphone friendly?

silentbob

geez, that sounds painful. so after you click artists, it shows every artist one at a time??? at least the vaistech unit shows 6 at a time, maybe the lexus interface, even with the tune dial, is less convenient than the vais unit? thanks for the help btw.

mild_se7en

i agree with evotolexus, sound quality on the oem kit is great but the song navigation leaves much to be desired. and, it seems like my ipod always need to come out of the car to get charged. i'm still considering buying a different ipod kit. hope this helps.

evotolexus

yes, when you scroll anyting (artists or album), it's line by line. Then after 5-10 seconds, the audio screen goes away and you're scrolling on a single line while on the nav screen. Then once you find what you want, you have to go back into the audio screen to select it. What really is hard to deal with is when you have an artist which features another artist, each is considered a different artist. So if an artist has 10 songs on an album, but each song is listed as ARTIST A feat artist B, then ARTIST A feat artist C, etc... each will show up as a seperate entry in the artist view. Kinda hard to explain.

Like i said, i'm not bashing it as it definitely has its positives, but the interface is poor. Also, I understand that this was reverse engineered and it's better than nothing.

In my opinion, if money isn't an objective, i'd say purchase it for the convenience. However, if don't want to spend the $250-$300 + install if you don't do it yourself, then i'd highly recommend this Griffin AutoPilot dock connector. I was going to return it, but after being disappointed in the Lexus interface, I kept it. It fits nicely in the console, power plug can stay plugged with the console closed, has dock sound versus the headphone jack, and allows you to use your ipod interface. I use both connections depending upon my mood.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1203815033701

irfan

you can change your settings to not go back to the nav screen automatically.

andytseng

With the OEM integration, can you use the steering wheel controls to go through the individual tracks once you have an artist/album selected? I usually just choose an album to listen to and go through the tracks, so this sounds like a viable option for me.

Also, will the ipod turn on when the car starts and off when it's not in use? Currently, I just connect my iPod to the aux jack in my armrest and it's a pain to open and close it everytime I need to either start it, change a track, or turn it off. I worry that my armrest will get loose over time from excessive use.

This is for a 2009 IS w/ NAV.

vdubturbo

I have an iPod dock like that except with the remote. Works fine ::but:: if you don't plug/unplug it in the right order when you get in the car, the remote doesn't work and you need to re-initialize. Pain in the butt.

I wish I had an integrated system. WHen I was car shopping, the new Benz C-Class had nice integration. Let's go Lexus!!!

mild_se7en

Yes. Playlists are the way to go.


Well, sort of. My ipod will turn off after a while... Sometimes. Often i get in my car and the ipod is just dead. i'm not sure if anybody else has this problem. It could just be my crap ipod.

andytseng

Just going through the other threads on CL and some on my.is and it seems like other people report this issue too, but it seems like the kit is pausing the ipod, so I'm not sure why the ipod would stay on after being paused (I think they should usually turn off after a few minutes of being paused?). What happens if you put the iPod on hold mode?


Anyway, I think I've got it narrowed down to the Lexus OEM kit, because it seems you can't select by Artist with the Vaistech kit. Now I just have to find a dealer in SoCal that'll do it for the right price.

Koz

I would never invest another penny in anything that involves iPod/Apple. I've had four iPods and everyone has failed within a year or two (One within a month). iPods are nothing but a POS! Google iPod reliability, you will be SHOCKED!

Koz

IntegresS

iTrader: (2)

I have to agree with evotolexus-- scrolling to find an artist is painful, even if you have it set to just stay on the audio screen instead of going back to the nav as the main screen.

Also, on mine, when I hit "Shuffle all," it will sometimes only shuffle within that artist. Like, say a 311 song comes on, I hit the next button and another 311 song...then another 311 song....- So I"ll hit "Shuffle all" again and it will go to, say Green Day. And the same thing will happen until about the 4th time I hit the Shuffle button.

Does this happen to anyone else? this only happens in my IS, it never happened in any of the Scions I drove and it doesn't happen when plugged into the ihome player

Kurtz

iTrader: (1)

Any that failed within a year would've been replaced under warranty, unless they failed because you had an accident and broke it... which is what a lot of ipod "failures" are caused by. (two years if you were smart enough to buy with a credit card that doubles mfg warranties)

The very earliest models had higher failure rates, like you'd expect with anything, but generally if you don't drop the thing it'll run fine for years... and if you buy a flash-based one you don't even really have that concern.

The only "problem" area left at that point is the battery isn't user replaceable, but if you're keeping it plugged into your car that's not really a concern anyway.