I agree with you here. I do not like the idea of having to drop $200 on an armrest upgrade every time I change phones, and given the track record so far, they're not even quick with coming out with those very, very expensive cradles. There needs to be a universal holder in the armrest that hooks into a USB port so you can just use whatever damn phone and phone case you want.

It's hard enough to do software and hardware integration as it is, and they're making it even harder by being so rigorous about form factor.

 

Yup. My head is starting to hurt as the details are slowly revealed. I can't figure out why the output from the connector on the cradle is different from the output from the cable. And why some features work with one connection that don't work with the other. So much promise, but the devil is in the details.

 

Right. Keep It Simple, Stupid is the design philosophy that should govern phone integration.

Put USB jacks in the places where a user might want to put a phone or iPod (glove box, armrest, center console).

Then go and make as many expensive, phone-specific accessories as you want. Give me a thing that clips to the center rail or into the cigarette lighter that only works for an iPhone 4. Give me an armrest holster that only holds a 3GS. But, if I buy an iPhone 5 the first few months it's out, don't take away all of my functionality unnecessarily until you get around to designing and releasing an expensive part. Give us as universal as possible a system, and then let us buy hyper-specific accessories to make it slightly better if we want to.

I really, really hope they keep a clear head on basic principles of good design as they refine MINI Connected. It has boatloads of potential. What irks me is that so much of MINI's design philosophy so wonderfully adheres to the concept of doing more with less.

They're darn close as it is.

 

This whole armrest/cradle deal is so contrarian to the advantages of Connected that are being espoused by MINI that it is almost laughable.

I do not even own an iPhone and am not waiting for a cradle but have been keeping up on the posts of this thread. One of the greatest virtues of Connected is it's ability to adopt new technologies quickly and easily simply by adding or updating an app on your phone. While this is all true, and the armrest cradle is not actually REQUIRED for this to work, the expensive nature and lack of availability of the cradle sure does taint the overall experience, especially considering the armrest option is required with the Connected option.

 

The annoying thing is that on the more recent models, many features cannot be accessed unless the phone is in the armrest cradle. So you simply can't do stuff without an accessory that isn't just expensive, but wasn't actually even available until just now.

 

So the weird state of the system right now is:

With just the cable you can Play music, video, use plugins, and otherwise use all the Connected features except for Minimalize and Mission Control.

With the armrest cradle that we know about currently, you can Use Minimize and Mission control, but you can't play video or use plugins (what specifically are the plugins anyway? Is that just something like Pandora, or does in include twitter/facebook)?

The other interesting difference is that with the cable only, the audio cable goes into a different jack from USB. With the dock the whole thing is one connector.

Currently I am leaning towards just finding a good solution to mount the iPhone on the dash, and use a dock extender cable to get power/connectivity up there. Less elegant to be sure. I'm also waiting to see if there's not some better dock connector that would work better coming out soon.

 

Well..just came back from the Mini Dealership. Thought I was going to be coming home with latest I phone cradle, Same one rsbell just received from BMWparts.com but after playing with it in the countryman for more than a half hour (they were kind enough to let take it out to the mini) the parts manager asked..and I pretty much explained the same thing as everyone here mentioned. The main thing was that the plug-in did Not recognize the phone thru that cradle that specifically said Media on the front and ended in 390-02 on the back. He looked at the latest bulletin received from BMW-Germany and there is a part # ending in 392. Warehoused in Germany but not yet ready for release. So I decided to hold off and he was going to make a few calls in the morning asking why that part # (392) is listed but not available to ship. Sooooo that's the story for now.

 

Well, let us know what your dealer finds out.

I'm keeping what I have for now, until the "right" one comes along.

 

The plugin feature supports the "iPod Out" feature of the latest iPod/iPhone operating system. It allows replication of an iPod Classic type graphical interface on the mini connected screen, which is controlled by the joystick.

 

rsbell.. I found when I was using the cradle..and had the I phone bluetooth off I was not able to see any contacts…or numbers or even dial out for that matter. I wonder if the correct cradle allows that or that the bluetooth always needs to be in sync with Mini either way. I did notice that if the bluetooth was connected I was unable to play music thru the I phone with the cradle only via bluetooth. Every time I tried connect thru the phone it opted me to disconnect via bluetooth..which was weird. That's when I realized my contacts & #'s were not available..only the ones actually saved in the address book.

 

I noticed today that there was some weirdness with the Bluetooth connectivity/phone book function. It seemed to work fine as long as I connected as I normally do through the "CD/Multimedia" menu. I did notice that no contacts were showing up, so I turned on the Bluetooth connection and it seemed to be working, even updating the phone book.

 

The "Plugin" feature works -- you have to go in through mini connected and activate plugin that way. I don't like the interface as much, but it's there for those who want it.

 

jmdor..Yes the Plugin works fine with the supplied Y cable…but with the latest
cradle out..Plugin is not functional..even states not "compatible". Just seemed with the latest cradle with the I phone 4…the bluetooth reacted somewhat different.

 

rsbell…or anyone else with the latest cradle out for the I phone 4.
Could you let me know the model # printed on the back of the cradle.
Mine has Media on front with a built fan as well. My previous cradles were ending in 389 & 390. And I saw some in 390-01..and as you can see the latest I sampled is 390-02. The ones in stocked in Germany are ending in 392!
My Parts Mgr..stated these are all BMW part/Item numbers…Mini has nothing close or out in bulletins.

 

Also note the production date under MEDIA..3/28/11..seems to be the latest available. My last one 390-01 was dated 1/26/11 w/o fan.

 

Let me clarify - I have the part ending 390-02 media cradle, and plugin does work. I went to mini connected, selected "plugin", then "activate plugin", and it worked just fine.

 

I didn't check the production date, but the part number is the same one you had-ends in 390-02.

 

Someone needs to get their hands on this elusive cradle that ends in 392....

 

That's Great jmdor…You must be one of the lucky ones…as mine and the few others that have the same cradle cannot. If I had I would of kept it…as I'm not as interested in watching videos as everything else working correctly

 

Whoops - I lied. It was looking at the nano I had plugged into the y cable. When I pulled the nano, it gave the same message regarding the iphone. Back to square one...

 

ahhh. now I don't feel so bad…Sorry

 

For people wanting to use an iPhone in a case and use the arm-rest plate, there are people who make iPod/iPad/iPhone extension cables. They are technically called 30-pin dock connector extension cables:

http://www.amazon.com/Ziotek-Apple-i.../dp/B004PBBSWO
and
http://www.amazon.com/RadTech-ProCab.../ref=pd_cp_e_1

are just two examples I found.

A small short cable like that should be enough to be able to hookup any iPhone in the armrest.

Here's a dumb question: is there a physical difference between the iPhone 3G/3GS plate and the iPhone 4 plate? Or is it some sort of subtle software thing in order to support the more advanced capabalities of the iPhone 4? And an even dumber question: is there any real advantage to using the armrest mount plate over that of the Y cable? For our needs, it seems to be a duplication of effort. We just want to be able to a) play music, b) control the music from the joystick/steering wheel, c) make/answer phone calls (which ends up going over Bluetooth), and d) most importantly: charge the phone.

I've noticed that if I pull the phono-mini plug out of the console while playing music, it still plays music, as if it is coming out of the usb side. Is the phono-mini plug instead used for video playback? I haven't tried playing back any videos...

 

devmini…I see your point and the logic to it and perhaps that is the way to go.
Mini should of made a standard plug in like they did on the rail and placed it in the armrest, and if needed allow us to pick the correct connector depending on the phone/I pod, leave that up to the owner. I guess some of us are more particular than others. Either set-up the armrest/cradle correctly or give us a longer y cable to be able to place the phone somewhere other than the edge of the seat. Those of us that wanted all the gadgets..cradle, mini-connected etc..required us to buy the armrest and the additional options needed to support those. If my only choice was to have a cable plugged in and exposed..then give us a longer cable..or let us know we need to purchase one. There are plenty of mounts out there to mount peoples I pods/phones/accessories. Ram manufactures great mounts for almost any application. I use two for flying to mount my IPad and other portable devices needed to be removed often, but those need to be insight, watched and controlled. I think the point for me is that in the CM, my I Phone does not need to be viewed to be controlled and would like it to be concealed as I was told it could be and sold as. I knew that I was going to spend some extra $$ for the cradle..that's my choice and that's ok.

 

I agree 100% Flyer, this is complete bull crap, when I have the time I'm going to call MINI USA and give them a piece of my mind. Hell if I had the money and the time, I think its worthy of a class action law suit. I mean its bad enough they force you to spend $250 for the arm rest (that only works with the cradle), to get Mini connect, but then they basically force you to spend another $200+ for the cradle to get the features, and thats not fully functional, and wasn't even available until now. They give almost no option to someone who does not want it in the arm rest (I'd rather have it where I can see it, I hate it being in the arm rest), except limited functionality. Not to mention I've been updating my iPhone every year so basically I'm being forced to pay an extra $200 every year to have connect, and if they keep on the current pace, I will have to wait 10 months before they have an adapter for that. It's just wrong.

 

I couldn't find it when I re-read this thread, but it seems like someone mentioned that they had "downgraded" the MINI Connected app to the previous version so they didn't get the message about needing the cradle. Anybody know how to go back to a previous version of an app?