Lumia 1020 Bluetooth/USB Connections won't play music in cars

[SunnysGlimpse]

I loved my Lumia 1020 but could not get music to play via Bluetooth in either of my cars no matter what I tried. It says it connects fine for phone and music and I can receive calls, I can hear and dictate texts, but when it comes to music the phone plays one song for 1 second and then continually loops trying to play the song but only ever makes it 1 second. In the Toyota, it also doesn't send any song information. I have unlinked bluetooth, relinked it, reset the phone, disconnected voice and left music, and had no luck.

My cars are a 2011 Tundra Platinum and 2013 Infiniti JX. I've also read some people had the same issue with Audi and Lexus.

Additionally, both of my cars have USB jacks to interface and play music through with the Navigation/sound system directly and that doesn't work either. The cars completely don't recognize it. Androids and iPhones all work flawlessly.

I honestly had become a big Lumia 1020/WP8 fan and love what Nokia offers in software. I actually really like the WP8 interface as well but not having Bluetooth connectivity to my vehicles (for both voice and music streaming) is a deal-breaker.

Are others experiencing these issues and do they have any solutions? One person said this is a known issue with GDR2, which of course comes with the 1020.

All I get back from the Microsoft forums are to contact the auto manufacturer (great advice when it works on every other iOS/Android device).

 

[antiochian2010]

Honda 2013 Accord connected up nicely

 

[SunnysGlimpse]

Weird... so you can stream music with the 1020 via bluetooth and can you also do it via USB?

 

[Justin429]

I was traveling last week and had a 2013 Ford F150 as a rental. The truck had Microsoft sync installed. My Lumia 920 paired up easily and I was able to make/receive calls and texts, but I was perplexed that Here Drive+ didn't work through sync. Interestingly, because the phone had a Bluetooth connection, Drive didn't play through the phone speaker either. I had to disable Bluetooth on the phone in order to hear the directions. Pretty disappointing. I don't use my phone for music in the car, so I can't comment on the ability there.

 

[Daniel Rubino]

Honda 2013 Accord connected up nicely

Same here, works fine. Doesn't work with USB...not sure WP does with any car, but BT is just fine. Heck, with GDR2 my contact photos now download to the car to show up in the dash when on a call, which is awesome.

 

[reapershouse]

I don't know if this will help you, but when i picked up my 1020 I was having issues with it connecting (would not connect for about 5 min every time) and streaming in my 11' WRX. I did some research and found this to be the problem. When you sync your phone to the car's bluetooth you could do so by the going through the setup on the actual stereo, which is how i set it up the first time on the 1020. The other way is by sync the phone by using only the voice command buttons on the steering wheel. After deleting the info and re-syncing this way i've had nearly 0 issues. Occasionally the phone will play a song and when it goes to the next song it says its playing the song but nothing plays, it usually resolves itself by going to the next song or quick disconnect and reconnect. Also a side note it doesn't except it through the USB, probably due to older software.

 

[Daniel Rubino]

I should also point out that GDR3 has a big focus on the Bluetooth stack, including making it work better with cars. I'd wait a few months for that if possible as every GDR update so far has improved Bluetooth.

 

[tgr42]

Occasionally the phone will play a song and when it goes to the next song it says its playing the song but nothing plays, it usually resolves itself by going to the next song or quick disconnect and reconnect.

I had this problem in my 2011 WRX as well. I gave up and went back to playing from a USB flash drive which works 100% reliably. FWIW I paired via the head unit and have never had any trouble connecting, but I've only used Bluetooth in the car maybe 10 times total due to that other problem and the hassle of needing to manually initiate the connection when getting in the car.

 

[reapershouse]

Thats how i paired my ip4 and it gave me no issues but you may try syncing via the voice command and see how it does. For me this was a big issue due to driving 40 min to work every day so i listen to audio books.

 

[SunnysGlimpse]

When you sync your phone to the car's bluetooth you could do so by the going through the setup on the actual stereo, which is how i set it up the first time on the 1020. The other way is by sync the phone by using only the voice command buttons on the steering wheel. After deleting the info and re-syncing this way i've had nearly 0 issues.

Thanks, I'll give this a try. I also did the sync through the stereo/navigation and from there it always paired automatically when I got in the car. I'm going to try the 1020 again as none of the other new phones that were released recently won me over - LG G2, Xperia Z1, and the 5S. I'm going to suck it up and pray GDR3 fixes any and all Bluetooth connectivity with the cars (and maybe even USB).

Occasionally the phone will play a song and when it goes to the next song it says its playing the song but nothing plays, it usually resolves itself by going to the next song or quick disconnect and reconnect. Also a side note it doesn't except it through the USB, probably due to older software.

I had this issue in one of the cars only it happened pretty much constantly. I believe it was the Infiniti. I'd have to hit pause/play manually on the phone before it may start playing the next song.

Thanks for all the ideas and advice everyone!

 

[SunnysGlimpse]

Same here, works fine. Doesn't work with USB...not sure WP does with any car, but BT is just fine. Heck, with GDR2 my contact photos now download to the car to show up in the dash when on a call, which is awesome.

Thanks for the clarification on the USB. It's bizarre to me that something prevents this from working as I figured this would be a no-brainer functionality. With USB connections to my current iPhone and former Androids, I get album cover art, coming up song titles, and a lot of features in both my cars that Bluetooth doesn't provide. But, I'd just be happy to have either methodology working though (for music, that is...voice and text works fine for me, from what little I've done).

 

[thoughtfix]

2013 Toyota Scion iQ with the Pioneer head unit. This isn't the "big display" head unit, but the lower end one. The USB port worked with a mess of files copied to a flash drive and it worked with my iPhone 5, but it does not work with the Lumia 1020. When I plug in the Lumia via USB, the USB port powers up, gives a "connection error" after a few seconds, then powers off. I can tell because I have one of those neat lighted USB cables. This means I cannot even use the USB port for charging and I have to use a regular +12V accessory adapter or mod a USB cable to drop the data lines.

Bluetooth works fine and the on-wheel audio controls work.

 

[humblehyper]

Honda 2013 Accord connected up nicely

Does your text aloud works with your car? I have the same car but mine prompt me but no sound coming out of the speakers to read or ignore text but it play music and calls fine.

 

[T Moore]

Try putting the music on the root of the phone memory. It should play through USB

 

[Anglerdk]

I have kind of the same problem on my parrot mki9200. I can fix it by choosing to connect to the phone again in the Bluetooth audio menu, even though it says it is connected...

The first few seconds is a bit laggy though

Sent from my RM-875_eu_euro1_267 using Tapatalk

 

[JonBergdahl]

Hi,

I picked up my 2014 Jeep Compass (2.2 Diesel CRD Limited).

I can play music and calls using my Nokia Lumia 1020 no problem - one problem (and it's a phone problem) - the bluetooth doesn't seem to turn on, on occasion - frustrating! Anyone else encountered this?

Thanks