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For me it’s about the waste. Engineers have taken the time to build a screen into the car with a good viewing angle, that works well with glare, doesn’t obstruct the drivers view.

Then the software side just makes the whole thing useless with a terrible UX that will never be updated.

CarPlay is a great solution because the non safety critical stuff (music, navigation) gets offloaded to a competent software company.

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Plus it improves every year.

On my previous car it never changed from the day I bought it, other than navigation getting more and more out of date.

On my current car I get software updates occasionally. I’m not sure that function ever changed though.

Meanwhile my iPhone gets better every year. And if I buy a new phone? CarPlay can get faster. My car never will even if I wanted to pay them.

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So, I fully recognize this is dumb, but humans (like me!) are dumb and lazy.

The ability to just get in your car and have the phone-powered interface right there without having to take your phone out of your pocket and mount it in the holder is something I didn’t ‘niceness’ of before experiencing it.

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I was super bought into carplay and android auto until I actually owned a car that had it. Oh great, it requires USB. Well my phone is 4 years old and the port is toast, so that doesn't work for me. Okay, wireless then. Car doesn't support that. Lovely. Bluetooth implementation is half-assed and the pairing process is Byzantine. Terrific stuff.

That car ended up sucking in other ways too. I quickly sold it and went back to buying old Lexuses. Wireless charging phone holder, and off you go. The siren call of infotainment is powerful, but actually living with it is just more fiddly bullshit I don't need in my life.

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It doesn't negate the problems you are pointing out, but there are several devices that bridge the USB wireless gap. (Aawireless, etc)
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