For the first time in 28 years of JD Power’s car owner survey, there is a consecutive year-over-year decline in satisfaction, with most of the ire directed toward in-car infotainment.
I purposely bought the base dash on my Focus ST. Screen is smaller than a phone like 4 inches at most, has no apps. It Bluetooth syncs my phone for music and calls. There’s no touchscreen, all interactions are dedicated knobs and buttons.
For GPS I just use my phone and audio directions, my smart watch has the upcoming direction as well. If I really don’t know where I’m going I have a dash mount for my phone if I need it. But that’s not often.
It’s great honestly and the dash doesn’t blind me driving at night.
I was also looking at a Mazda before I got this car and their dash is absolutely horrendous. It’s like they just took a Alibaba knock off iPad and welded it on top of the dash. It’s literally in your view of the road causing a small blind spot.
My 2012 Mazda uses a SD card for the maps and last I looked it was over $100 for updates. I wouldn't buy a car without carplay or android auto these days.
Wait until you see what it takes to do so! I had an OEM nav unit in one of my cars, and the map update is sold on a DVD (!) and costs something like $400. I'm going to go with... no. (And yes, I checked to see if an .iso was available on any pirate sources; it wasn't.) I'll just run Google Maps or an OpenStreetMap client on my phone, thanks.