Trailer tech group and Nav questions

[Texagonian]

Hello,

I'm in the final steps to order my PW after the July incentives hit.

I am at the point where I'm shaving off all the little doodads that inflate price up.

I'd like to ask for feedback on these 2 options.

Fist the trailer technology group. I'm really just after the front camera here. That's all I want, and it can't be broken off by itself. It lives in the surround camera view option, that lives in the technology towing group....

So I badly want to cut this one off. My question though, is at what speed does the front camera shut off? Trying to gauge how useful this will truly be for offroading. I see the obvious benefits, but if I can only use to like 10mph, not near as useful as I may have thought.

Second, the nav. I'm sold on the 8.4 and staying away from the 12. But I'm not sold on the nav part. Adds nearly $800 for something that can be replicated by Android and apple auto.

How has people's experience been with the built in nav vs the phone alternatives?

Thank you in advance.

 

[DannyMc]

Hello,

I'm in the final steps to order my PW after the July incentives hit.

I am at the point where I'm shaving off all the little doodads that inflate price up.

I'd like to ask for feedback on these 2 options.

Fist the trailer technology group. I'm really just after the front camera here. That's all I want, and it can't be broken off by itself. It lives in the surround camera view option, that lives in the technology towing group....

So I badly want to cut this one off. My question though, is at what speed does the front camera shut off? Trying to gauge how useful this will truly be for offroading. I see the obvious benefits, but if I can only use to like 10mph, not near as useful as I may have thought.

Second, the nav. I'm sold on the 8.4 and staying away from the 12. But I'm not sold on the nav part. Adds nearly $800 for something that can be replicated by Android and apple auto.

How has people's experience been with the built in nav vs the phone alternatives?

Thank you in advance.

Front camera goes off about 5mph. Useful for crawl, but not available driving at normal speeds. Rear camera can be turned on for 10 seconds or so at highway speeds.

CP ans AA are fine IF you have a cell connection. We have dead zones on highways (near forests) here in Florida. Without the built in nav, the truck gets “lost”. (Happened to my daughter in a Cherokee a few weeks back. It tried to turn her back to where it last had a signal.) I use the built in nav unless I’m in a new construction area.

 

[troutspinner]

You'll lose HD Radio and some Uconnect features like remote starting from the phone if that is important to you if you do not get the nav radio. Personally, I never use the remote features, my truck is close enough with my FOB. I do however like HD Radio and would not skip on that myself. For navigation, Google maps is king, it just can't be beat. As for losing signal on the phone, just download the map when you plan the route, signal not required.

 

[RebelRam]

I think I read somewhere up here that the maps in the NAV are from 2017 or something. That seems to be true since it didn’t recognize roads near me that have been built for a year and a half now. I’ll stick with Apple maps through CarPlay. I’m not sure if the NAV can be updated or not right now. Seems like it should have the most updated maps since it’s on the most updated vehicle for thee Ram lineup

 

[StuartV]

Hello,

I'm in the final steps to order my PW after the July incentives hit.

I am at the point where I'm shaving off all the little doodads that inflate price up.

I'd like to ask for feedback on these 2 options.

Fist the trailer technology group. I'm really just after the front camera here. That's all I want, and it can't be broken off by itself. It lives in the surround camera view option, that lives in the technology towing group....

So I badly want to cut this one off. My question though, is at what speed does the front camera shut off? Trying to gauge how useful this will truly be for offroading. I see the obvious benefits, but if I can only use to like 10mph, not near as useful as I may have thought.

Second, the nav. I'm sold on the 8.4 and staying away from the 12. But I'm not sold on the nav part. Adds nearly $800 for something that can be replicated by Android and apple auto.

How has people's experience been with the built in nav vs the phone alternatives?

Thank you in advance.

You said PW, so I assume you're talking about a Power Wagon, which is a 2500. So, maybe the options and packages are different.

On my 1500, I do not have the Towing Group and I do have the 360 camera. In fact, on the 1500, if you get the Tow Group package, it includes the trailer tow mirrors, which causes you to lose the 360 camera.

I have just the trailer brake control, but still the regular, power folding mirrors.

As for a forward camera and using it over 10 MPH, what do you think you're going to see in front of you on that camera, when you're going over 10 MPH, that is going to be useful to you? I think if you go drive one and look at what you see, you will find that the view is not one that would lend itself to driving by that view at any kind of higher speeds. And by higher speeds, I do mean anything over 10 MPH in this case.

I don't know about the 8.4. I have the 12". I am big on Android in general. But, I am not using Android Auto. The unit does not support wireless screen projection. What that means is that I can run Android Auto on my phone and set the head unit to Android Auto and then hear my music and navigation prompts over the truck's stereo, but I can only see stuff on the phone.

If I want to see the Google Maps on the truck's stereo screen, I have to connect the phone via a physical cable. That kinda sucks. A lot. Plus, on the 12", Android Auto will currently only display using half the screen. So, you only get half the screen AND you cannot see Maps and your music player info at the same time.

To me, the Uconnect Nav is not bad for doing the actual navigation. The kinda sucky part about it is when you are trying to find the destination that you want it to take you to. You can't type in anything while you're moving, and the voice searching usually just doesn't find what I want. If I dictate an actual address, it does okay at finding it, but that kind of defeats the purpose. I want it to find things that I generally do not know the address of off the top of my head.

But, there is a solution that works somewhat decently - using Maps on my phone to find the destination. I can even use the Google Assistant to do a voice search. Once I have found my desired destination in Maps on my phone, I do Share (in the Maps app) and share the destination to the Uconnect app (on my phone). When it pops up in the map side of the Uconnect app on my phone, I tap the icon to send the destination to my truck's Uconnect. As long as I have cell reception for my phone and the truck has satellite reception, the destination will pop up on the truck's screen in just a couple of seconds. Then I can tap the truck's screen to tell Uconnect to navigate me there. So, voice search to find the destination, then 3 taps on the phone screen and 2 (I think) taps on the truck's screen and it is navigating me where I want to go.

It's not as easy as it should be. I should be able to press the steering wheel button and tell Uconnect to find the destination I'm looking for. But, that pretty much just doesn't work (for me, anyway - when I'm trying to use a Point Of Interest name - e.g. Tin Cannon Brewery). So, this is a couple of extra steps, but it works pretty well. And the fact that Maps on my phone knows my search history and my saved places actually makes it pretty easy most of the time.

For the overall price of these trucks, I would rather get the Nav. If I don't use it, it's what? $5 per month extra in my payment? But if I don't have it and then end up wishing I had gotten it, I'd be kicking myself every time I drove my truck.

Also, I think the 12" is awesome. I wouldn't have bought my truck without it.

 

[Texagonian]

Interesting points, especially about the Nav.

It's not that I am a novice to off-roading, rather if I am going to drop that kind of coin on a bunch of other features I don't want, to get to the one I do, just to find out anything past idle speeds it won't work.... I am not looking to do 30mph, but I do expect some minor speed allowance while in 4WD to allow for overlanding and still keeping an eye out of hidden debris that a cam may see that I did not.

If it's just to idle over big rocks, that's an easy pass.

The nav however, sounds like reliance on the carplay or AA has it's own issues. I am thinking this one I will go ahead on. Make it a little easier to get directions on the fly.

 

[Texagonian]

Oh, the 12in for me was an easy pass. It looks great, but after playing with it I was not a fan of putting the HVAC controls behind a touch screen menu. Just my own preference, not like a terrible burden. I am just used to being able to instinctively turn a knob without even looking.

 

[drush]

Personally I find the nav to be almost useless. Very outdated maps, terrible voice recognition and searching capabilities are extremely poor. I seldom use it.

 

[StuartV]

Interesting points, especially about the Nav.

It's not that I am a novice to off-roading, rather if I am going to drop that kind of coin on a bunch of other features I don't want, to get to the one I do, just to find out anything past idle speeds it won't work.... I am not looking to do 30mph, but I do expect some minor speed allowance while in 4WD to allow for overlanding and still keeping an eye out of hidden debris that a cam may see that I did not.

If it's just to idle over big rocks, that's an easy pass.

The nav however, sounds like reliance on the carplay or AA has it's own issues. I am thinking this one I will go ahead on. Make it a little easier to get directions on the fly.

If you can use it up to 10 MPH, is that really too slow for your purposes? 10 MPH seems like way more than just idling over big rocks. But, my offroading experience is really on motorcycles, not 4-wheelers.

Oh, the 12in for me was an easy pass. It looks great, but after playing with it I was not a fan of putting the HVAC controls behind a touch screen menu. Just my own preference, not like a terrible burden. I am just used to being able to instinctively turn a knob without even looking.

There are 12 physical buttons for controlling the AC. 6 on each side of the 12" screen.

On the left, top to bottom:

Driver temp Up
Driver temp Down
Mode - select where the air is coming out, press repeatedly to cycle through the options
Fan speed Up
Fan speed Down
Auto - turn on Automatic Climate Control

On the right, top to bottom:

Passenger temp Up
Passenger temp Down
Front windshield defrost
Rear defrost (not sure what this actually does)
A/C - compressor on or off
Recirculate

I think the only things I have to actually use the touchscreen for are controlling the seat heater/cooler and the steering wheel heater.

My '09 had Dual Zone with Auto and so does my new truck. I leave it on Auto (as I did in my '09) and virtually never touch any of it. It keeps me comfortable.

I would not skip the 12" because of a desire for physical AC controls...

Personally I find the nav to be almost useless. Very outdated maps, terrible voice recognition and searching capabilities are extremely poor. I seldom use it.

I find the searching to be pretty bad. But, once it knows where I want to go, it seems pretty good. So far.

What I think is funny is that there is a local scuba shop that has been around for at least 5 years. I search for it (typing in the name) and it does not know it (but it does know another local scuba shop). But, there is a local brewery that has been in business for less than a year, and it does know that. So, it isn't that the map data has not been updated recently...

 

[drush]

My map shows 2018, that’s pretty old!