Apple CarPlay ULTRA for Scout: A Game Changer for Infotainment?

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tuvok

Member
May 17, 2025
11
22
Maryland, USA
It would be amazing if Scout vehicles fully embraced Apple CarPlay Ultra and, eventually, Google's upcoming "ultra" version of Android Auto.

if you're unfamiliar with Apple CarPlay Ultra, 👉Click here to read an article from MotorTrend. There is also a video in the article.

Let's be honest, car manufacturers generally s*ck at infotainment software that's as polished and user-friendly as what Apple and Google offer. It's a tough battle when you're going up against big companies whose sole focus is software and hardware development. Especially with the rapid integration of advanced AI into smartphones, there's no way car makers can realistically match Apple and Google in terms of cutting-edge intelligent feature integration in their vehicles.

Here's why I think this deep integration is so crucial:

Seamless Smartphone Integration

All of us carry iOS or Android smartphones. We're familiar with their interfaces, how they work, and what they can do. More importantly, our phones already know so much about us: our schedules, daily habits, appointments, preferred routes, and more. With CarPlay Ultra (and the equivalent Android Auto "ultra"), this familiarity and personalized information could seamlessly extend to our driving experience (without having to be transferred or shared with the car's software).

Imagine getting into your Scout, and your car's display immediately reflects your phone's familiar UI, apps, navigation, and even your calendar, all optimized for the driving environment. No more learning a completely new, often clunky, car-specific operating system. It's about eliminating that "dual digital personality" we currently experience in our cars. The cool thing is that the new CarPlay Ultra can even works with physical buttons in the dash!

Benefits for Scout and Us

While full integration might seem like giving up control, it actually presents some significant advantages for both Scout and the customers:
  • Customization and Brand Identity: Apple and Google are already working with automakers to allow for customization of the interface, meaning Scout could still incorporate its unique design elements, like its distinctive horizontal speed gauge, while leveraging the robust underlying software.
  • Engineering Focus: Instead of spending countless hours and resources reinventing the infotainment wheel from scratch (which usually never truly succeeds), Scout's engineers could focus their energy on other critical aspects of the vehicle – performance, safety, battery technology, and more features. This could lead to an even better overall vehicle.
  • Potential Cost Savings: Since much of the computing power for the infotainment system would be handled by our powerful smartphones, it might reduce the need for expensive, high-end computer hardware within the car itself. Hopefully, any savings from this could then be passed on to us, the customers!
Ultimately, I'd love to see Apple CarPlay Ultra fully supported in Scout vehicles, allowing for a truly integrated and intuitive experience.

What are your thoughts on deeper smartphone integration like this?
 
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After downloading the latest and greatest to my iPhone I haven't had any wireless CarPlay failures in my 2024 Lincoln, Fingers crossed. Prior to this update the most common failure was no audio, still got the route and directions on the center stack and cluster. If you wanted audio back I would have to stop the vehicle press Stop and open the door to shut down everything. Then, close door and press Start. I never had to repeat the reset it always worked the first time.
We’ve had issues off and on over the years with Acuras. We’ve been told the car manuf and CarPlay work together but occasionally Apple does updates that don’t cooperate 100% with the vehicle until the manufacturer does their update and that seems to be the issue. And as often as Apple does updates it does create issues but some of that comes down to the interface and manuf paying attention
 
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After downloading the latest and greatest to my iPhone I haven't had any wireless CarPlay failures in my 2024 Lincoln, Fingers crossed. Prior to this update the most common failure was no audio, still got the route and directions on the center stack and cluster. If you wanted audio back I would have to stop the vehicle press Stop and open the door to shut down everything. Then, close door and press Start. I never had to repeat the reset it always worked the first time.

It sounds like this audio issue is quite common. I've had it happen in both VW and Volvo (both wired CarPlay), and some of my friends have experienced it in their cars too. What's super strange is that in my VW, the audio would still work for phone calls and Siri, but not for podcasts or other apps! My quick fix for that was just to disconnect my phone from CarPlay and then reconnect it, and that always did the trick.

A friend of mine shared a different workaround: he'll use a Siri command first (like asking "what's the weather?"), and apparently that kickstarts the audio working for everything else afterward! 🤷🏻‍♂️
 
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It sounds like this audio issue is quite common. I've had it happen in both VW and Volvo (both wired CarPlay), and some of my friends have experienced it in their cars too. What's super strange is that in my VW, the audio would still work for phone calls and Siri, but not for podcasts or other apps! My quick fix for that was just to disconnect my phone from CarPlay and then reconnect it, and that always did the trick.

A friend of mine shared a different workaround: he'll use a Siri command first (like asking "what's the weather?"), and apparently that kickstarts the audio working for everything else afterward! 🤷🏻‍♂️
Nice to solve it but none of us should need work arounds.
 
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After downloading the latest and greatest to my iPhone I haven't had any wireless CarPlay failures in my 2024 Lincoln, Fingers crossed. Prior to this update the most common failure was no audio, still got the route and directions on the center stack and cluster. If you wanted audio back I would have to stop the vehicle press Stop and open the door to shut down everything. Then, close door and press Start. I never had to repeat the reset it always worked the first time.

We have the same issue with CarPlay in my Wife’s Q5. Same ‘reset’ procedure you mention.

On my older A5 Cab, I can unplug and plug it in and usually get it to ‘reset’.

Other glitches are:

Completely blank Apple CarPlay
Frozen A-CP
Or frozen screen/map of Waze but has audio.
Spotify clearly playing (counting time of song seconds and displays the ‘play symbol’) but no sound.

The ‘Audi App’ needs to be running in the background, it seems, and the Q5 with A-CP works more smoothly. A5 is agnostic for the App, even though it does interface with it but when ‘hardwired’ or plugged in.

Audi Q5 glitch that drives me nuts is my wife’s older iPhone has priority over mine via WiFi Apple CP even though I’ve wiped them all out and made mine the ‘primary’. But I think that’s an Audi thing more than Apple thing.

Cheers!

L
 
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We have the same issue with CarPlay in my Wife’s Q5. Same ‘reset’ procedure you mention.

On my older A5 Cab, I can unplug and plug it in and usually get it to ‘reset’.

Other glitches are:

Completely blank Apple CarPlay
Frozen A-CP
Or frozen screen/map of Waze but has audio.
Spotify clearly playing (counting time of song seconds and displays the ‘play symbol’) but no sound.

The ‘Audi App’ needs to be running in the background, it seems, and the Q5 with A-CP works more smoothly. A5 is agnostic for the App, even though it does interface with it but when ‘hardwired’ or plugged in.

Audi Q5 glitch that drives me nuts is my wife’s older iPhone has priority over mine via WiFi Apple CP even though I’ve wiped them all out and made mine the ‘primary’. But I think that’s an Audi thing more than Apple thing.

Cheers!

L

Haha, funny you should bring up the issue with your wife’s old iPhone. I had a similar experience with the 2024 Lincoln. A few months after getting the Lincoln, my wife got a new iPhone. We deleted her old iPhone and added her new one. But no matter what we did, it kept finding her old iPhone. You could go in and select her new one or mine, but that was just not cool. The only way I fixed it was to go into the infotainment settings and do a factory reset. After adding back in our phones and preferences, it worked fine.

Just a heads up, doing a factory reset also wipes out your vehicle information from the Lincoln App.
 
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I've seen those videos. However, the UX demo does not show what software is working under the hood. It could be a proprietary software, or Google's full Automotive suite. AFAIK Google Automotive allows customization of the UI/UX to some degree.
The software “under the hood” is almost certainly coming from the joint venture with Rivian that VW is investing $5+ billion in. Rivian software and architecture seems to be very good by all accounts.
 
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It sounds like this audio issue is quite common. I've had it happen in both VW and Volvo (both wired CarPlay), and some of my friends have experienced it in their cars too. What's super strange is that in my VW, the audio would still work for phone calls and Siri, but not for podcasts or other apps! My quick fix for that was just to disconnect my phone from CarPlay and then reconnect it, and that always did the trick.

A friend of mine shared a different workaround: he'll use a Siri command first (like asking "what's the weather?"), and apparently that kickstarts the audio working for everything else afterward! 🤷🏻‍♂️
Thanks interesting. If audio goes out on me again I will definitely try this. In some situations pulling over for a reset isn't that simple.