I received the cplay2air device this week and it’s working great. Set up went flawlessly with clear but specific directions. There’s a weird moment briefly at startup when it hijacks the main screen for a few seconds. I do wonder about security given the product’s origin (hint, not American)....

 

Pat- we must have been in the same shipping box! Mine arrived as well this past week. Straight forward connection. I am going to get some 2 sided tape and mount it down below out of sight.

 

I got a couple of usb extensions of different lengths (works flawlessly still) and am going to try discrete placement as well. For now it's resting on the most out of sight shelf in the lower console (where the cup holder cover now permanently rests!).

Now, here's hoping all my personal info isn't leaking with every use..

Installing this coincided with a SOTA update, and CarPlay is much more stable for me (I'm on a version of 2.0.7 xxx now, which is back in distribution). I was getting sporadic CarPlay dropouts prior. These had a loose correlation with poor cell signals, but will try that theory out more systematically soon.

I know this is minor in the grand scheme, but it gives me a lot of pleasure to just drop the phone in the wireless charging shelf and get driving...

 

Quite thread for while... Any one have experience with "CarlinKit 3.0"? Its on Amaz$n and seems to get better reviews (FWIW) than Cplay2air. I'm sure they're all coming from the same Chinese factory. Additionally any updates on people's experiences with software updates over recents months. Thanks!

 

Duplicate threads really but it would be great if someone could hit up someone like Simon at Powerful UK and get a kit that hides the dongle. No cutting involved. All they would have to do is pop the existing port out of the dash, plug into a splitter behind the dash with the dongle attached and run a new 2nd port back to the dash hole.

The alternative is cutting and re-terminating or just pushing the port behind the panel and plugging the hole.

Either way, I don't want to see any wires or dongle and this is simple.

 

Ironically, @_Allegedly - I was just going thru his website and spotted that he is selling USB-C outlets. I think the 2020 versions had USB-B's so you can upgrade. I bet it wouldn't be that tough for him (impossible for me!) to take one of those and split it before the exterior connector. Not sure how it would (if it could) deal with input/output from two USB-C's though.

 

I think his are power only. It looks like this is in the dash already so should be able to disconnect the wire coming out of this and heading to the audio port in the dash then connect a new port underneath the dash. This would leave the dash audio port inoperable but, since no wires are cut, it could easily be reversed.

https://parts.landroverpalmbeach.com.../LR070580.html

 

That connects to this part below but I can't find the cable that goes between them so I have no idea if it's 1 data cable going to this entire cluster or if each port in this cluster has its own wiring???

If it's 1 cable, the entire cluster would be disabled and would have to be subbed under the dash. If it has dedicated wiring for each port (ideal) you would only lose the port you unplugged. If I actually had my truck right now i'd go pop it out.

https://parts.landroverpalmbeach.com.../LR139590.html

The other alternative is cutting wires.

*** This part goes up to any VIN ending in M2034558. Vehicles newer than that use port cluster LR146789 instead.

Wiring harness is VIN specific as well based on options in the vehicle so I truly have to wait for mine.

 

@_Allegedly - what's your experience with LR Palm Beach? I've been having a CRAP fest from them with a part order. I'm about to put my Yelp/Google Review writing skills to the test. Poor communication, lack of urgency, gotta follow up every few days for scant details or to nurse their efforts along. Every time I am about to cancel the order I have a gleam of hope that they will eventually ship. Are you just using their on-line search/parts pages or have you had better experience than the "crap" show I have?

 

None actually other than I just called and they were very helpful. I updated the last post with VIN specific info that they just gave me.