More money but after trying and returning several others I'm happy with these and that includes two cross country jaunts:

Amazon.com: Wireless CarPlay Adapter 2023 Newest Version, Hieha Wireless Apple CarPlay Dongle & 5.8GHz WiFi & 5G WiFi Online Update Plug & Play for OEM Factory Wired CarPlay Cars (Model Year: 2016 to 2023) : Electronics

Buy Wireless CarPlay Adapter 2023 Newest Version, Hieha Wireless Apple CarPlay Dongle & 5.8GHz WiFi & 5G WiFi Online Update Plug & Play for OEM Factory Wired CarPlay Cars (Model Year: 2016 to 2023): In-Dash Navigation - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases

www.amazon.com

 

I purchased a Ottocast Model U2-Air, as of today Amazon is selling for $70 normally $109. Fast to set up, loads car play in 20 seconds, and has not locked up yet. Even Hondas wired CarPlay has lock up problems, so I think the U2-Air is doing OK. I just like the idea that iPhone stays in my pocket and does not have to be plugged in. Good luck on your decision!

 

Will second the Hieha. Previosuly had the Ottocast and hated that thing as it constantly froze while using maps and occasionally when listening to music. Switched to the Kieha in October and have had zero problems while the Ottocast sits in the junk drawer. Anyone interested in it, let me know and you can have it and only cover the cost of shipping.

 

I tried the CarLinkKit 4.0 and the Autosky. The CarLinKit 4.0 actually would crash the head unit, give a pixelated display, etc. I found this one to be the least reliable on the Ridgeline. These devices have tons of settings for the refresh, resolution, timing, etc. so I do think a CarPlay unit that works on one vehicle may not work well on another. And updating the firmware on a working unit could make it worse. The AutoSky would simply not connect or hang connecting sometimes. The Eleacc unit has worked flawlessly for me so far ( 1 month). I believe it is a Hieha because I think it says that somewhere. And the Eleacc does not allow you to do a firmware update without contacting them. I think this is by design. Most of these devices say do not update the firmware if the device is working fine. So I think their intention is, if you have issues you reach out to them. This helps them tweak any settings for your vehicle and supply a firmware update if needed.
Here is a link to it, it was $59 after coupons and discounts when I got it.

 

I just got one of the CarLinkKit 3.0 mini adapters... after trying two others. The first was a SuperiorTek thing... it worked fine for a couple days, then the display would freeze up and at least once the whole head unit completely reset. I sent it back to Amazon and got some no-name brand one... it wouldn't play more than .5 sec of audio before pausing. If you tapped the play button, it would play .5 sec of audio then pause again. Sent that one back. Got the CarLinkKit one this Thursday and have tried it a few times.

It's had a frozen display and caused the head unit to reset at least once. Just today it was working fine, then the display (I had it on Waze, same happens with Google Maps or Apple Maps) locked up. I can touch the Home button and get back to the HU home menu, but it won't go back into CarPlay. Unplugging it for 10 seconds or so then plugging it back in did nothing "No Device Detected". (A buddy of mine has the same CarlinkKit Mini thing in his Mercedes and has zero problems with it)

I've recently switched back to Apple (with 14 Pro) from Android... and it seems Android Auto was much more stable. I was using the AAWireless adapter and really had no issues with it with a Pixel 6 Pro and a Samsung S22.

With the iPhone, it's been unreliable and a really shit experience. Even wired!! I have MFI certified cables, and the maps will still freeze up once in a while.

I'm more inclined to believe it's the head unit that is the culprit. It's sluggish and takes forever to load, and CarPlay has been much worse than Android Auto, both wired and wireless.

I'm on the wait list for a Toyota Rav4 Prime, which might get here in June or July.... but I'm on the fence about it. If I decide to keep the Ridgeline, I think I will replace the head unit. I'd love to get one that is fast and reliable that has wireless AA and CarPlay built-in.

 

Am I correct that there is only one place to plug these units in? The single USB port in the area above the wireless charging pad?

 

Yes, the USB port there is the one connected to the head unit.


As an update, I went out and checked to see if the CarPlay adapter had any firmware updates available, and there were THREE of them. Check the instructions that came with your units if they are having any problems. On mine, when I was connected, go to 192.168.50.2 in a browser. It started with a popup that asked for the vehicle make, model and year. I filled that out, then it said there was a firmware update and (in Engrish) indicated that it would update and it would take a while. You can accept or decline the update. Accepting showed a loading bar, then a spinny status thing. It took a few minutes, then the unit restarted. I had to flip it over as the LED indicator is on the bottom. Watch the WiFi networks available in Settings and once you see the WiFi network show up again, connect to it and refresh the page in the browser. I had to do that 3 times total until it did not find another update. I didn't catch the dates on the first two, but the interface showed the "original" firmware dated July 2022. The latest update was dated December 2022... so that must mean they're putting out updates pretty frequently.

I don't have anywhere to go for a couple days, so I won't know if it's behaving any better. I'll update after I get a couple drives in.

 

Another vote for the Hieha. I've got it in my '23 RTL-E and it has been flawless - it just works. Currently $57 at Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09YYMW1SW/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_image?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

The update to the CarLinkKit mini looks to have improved things. I did go into the settings after a ~30 minute drive to set the frame rate to 20. It did have some stuttering before that. On the way home, it behaved almost perfectly. Just one little audio stutter, and I did not notice any video stutters at all. I hope it stays that way!

Point being: Check your devices to see if it's capable of being updated, and then update if you can, it might help with behavior.

I found the framerate suggestion in the Amazon Questions under the product. I wonder if the head unit is just a bit too slow with the video refresh.

 

After having tried 3 different models, I am convinced that each model year from Honda has it's own unique quirks, likely due to different software versions running on the head unit. That, combined with the various versions of IOS or Android can make it difficult for us to compare apples to apples, as some units work fine on some trucks, while others have no luck.

I tried the Autobox, returned that for an Ottocast, had that unit for just over a year with some annoying dropouts, bought another one on Amazon and returned the year-old one, that stopped working completely after 5 months. I'm trying the Autosky now. It won't launch the web page to update the unit (I DM'd the Autosky account on this site for help), but it does work in my truck, so we'll see how that goes.

YMMV

 

... I'm trying the Autosky now. It won't launch the web page to update the unit (I DM'd the Autosky account on this site for help), but it does work in my truck, so we'll see how that goes.

YMMV

I wasn't able to get a response back from the Autosky account here, but after sending them an email I had a reply in 15 minutes. Jonathan told me the easiest way to access the setup screen is to do it while it's active in your vehice. Great customer service!
I'm going to play around with various startup delays to see where the sweet spot is.

EDIT: I like how the config screen offers a bunch of options and access to logs files.

 

2020 Ridgeline Touring, bought recently.
Just bought the Carlin kit 3.0. Was 50% off on Amazon last week.
Plugged in, took a minute to initially setup last night.
Today out and about, seems to work perfectly, about 15 seconds to connect to phone.
Received an ESR magsafe charging vent mount, great for just mounting my iphone 14 Pro Max.
Wanted wireless Carplay to keep cables to minimum.
This seems to fit the bill..

 

STILL issues with the adapter. It seemed to work fine for a bit. Now it will run, audio plays, but the display will go black then come back on quickly. Sometimes I'll see the HU menu for a moment before it goes back to the CarPlay display. After doing that a few times, it will either completely lock up the head unit, or will just completely disconnect and the head unit then will not recognize anything, even if I plug in a cable. It will not until the vehicle is stopped and restarted.

Frankly, I really think the headunit is the weakest link in this setup. It's an ancient unit with an ancient underlying OS, and it locks up and it fails to recognize anything plugged in.

Android Auto functioned much better and more consistently, but I'm now back in the Apple world. I guess replacing the head unit is probably going to end up being the best solution, although it's not the cheap solution.



Being a glutton for punishment (and experimentation)... I ordered yet another adapter, the CarLink 4.0 adapter, which looks pretty much identical to the one cruise_carter posted above. It should get to me tomorrow, but I might not end up driving anywhere for a few days. I've had a flu and might avoid going to the 'office' this week.

 

My $60 Autobox still works perfectly fine in my 2022 RL with my Apple iPhone 13 Pro.

 

They work pretty solid, I just cant stand the phone audio quality. It doesn't bother a lot of people (like my girlfriend), but I guess being most of my professional work has been low bit rate audio codecs, I'm just too sensitive to those things. Shrug

 

Well, the newer CarlinKit deal still had issues. Similar issues. No upgrades were found for the new one, so I ran it. It seems to run fine... for about 10 minutes, maybe? Then the video starts showing artifacts or corrupting, or it just freezes. Audio continues to stream normally, though. Hitting the Home button on the HU goes back to the Honda home screen. Tapping on the CarPlay button causes a complete disconnect of the CarlinKit unit, but often times it will restart itself, reconnect, and then resume.... for a few minutes until the whole shebang repeats. At least once it has completely caused the head unit to recognize anything, including a wired connection to my 14Pro. A complete shutdown and restart is needed.

I went ahead and ordered the Hieha WIreless Carplay adapter and tried it out this morning.

It would play audio for about .1 second, then pause. Tapping the Play button would cause this to repeat as many times as you want to tap the play button. Video seems to be OK, but I didn't let it run while driving without audio.

BUT... I think I found the issue. The adapter does not like it if your phone's bluetooth is connected to the vehicle's head unit. If I disconnect, audio then plays normally. But then the phone reconnects to the head unit and the audio pauses. I'm guessing a lot of people haven't encountered this because they simply didn't have their phones paired to their vehicle's head unit before setting up the Wireless CP adapter. I had to 'forget' the vehicle's BT to get it to work.

So I'll run with the Hieha adapter for a bit and see if it works well. I haven't tried a phone call on it yet, but I don't get a lot of calls at all, so I don't care all that much if the phone audio quality isn't that great. I can live without that. I just want maps to display properly and audio to play properly.

That's the FIFTH adapter I've tried. The first one had the same "plays audio for .1 second" issue, but I didn't figure out that if I removed the BT connection to the car, it probably would have worked. The CarlinKit units I tried all freeze up video and need to be reset, and they occasionally completely disable connection to the head unit.

I'm still of the mind that the ancient head unit in our trucks is a huge contributor to the issues. I think eventually I will want to replace the head unit with something more modern, faster, that has built-in wireless AA and CP.

 

@FrayAdjacent I'll be very interested in hearing any updates regarding the Hieha Carplay Adapter. I too ordered the Carlinkit 3.0 and it's been hit or miss. I just ordered the Hieha to see if it's any better.

 

Drove to the 'office' today and back, probably in the car for 40 minutes or so. It worked fine. The only thing I noticed is that the map orientation rotated out of whack a couple times, but came back. That's a very minor thing.

On the way home, I used Siri for a voice command and it worked fine.

So far, so good. I'll be going to the office again on Thursday. Each way is only 15-20 minutes in the car, but all of the other adapters would have issues within that short timeframe.

 

Another day of several drives with the Heiha. It seems to work pretty well so far. Only once did it seem to fail to start up when I started the truck. I haven't looked into the start delay, but will probably set that to a few seconds if needed. Otherwise, my phone connects after a few moments, audio plays well and the maps (either Google, Waze or Apple) run well and update normally. I only observed one video stutter and a couple audio stutters, but that's it.

So far, I'm pretty pleased.

It allows me to use the RAM ball mount thing with the Apple MagSafe charger. I can just stick my phone on it and go, then grab my phone and get out when done. I love not having to connect cables and such.

 

Another day of several drives with the Heiha. It seems to work pretty well so far. Only once did it seem to fail to start up when I started the truck. I haven't looked into the start delay, but will probably set that to a few seconds if needed. Otherwise, my phone connects after a few moments, audio plays well and the maps (either Google, Waze or Apple) run well and update normally. I only observed one video stutter and a couple audio stutters, but that's it.

So far, I'm pretty pleased.

It allows me to use the RAM ball mount thing with the Apple MagSafe charger. I can just stick my phone on it and go, then grab my phone and get out when done. I love not having to connect cables and such.

Thanks again for taking the time to update us!

 

Did you update it before installing or use it as it came delivered ?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Wow, the Heiha is much better. I've only had the Heiha for a couple of hours, so I'll give another update in a couple of days.

 

Today on a run out to actually return one of the CarlinKit adapters to the local Amazon warehouse... the Heiha did disconnect, but it reconnected and resumed everything decently quickly. It's done that once in about 8 trips. I'll have to run a couple errands over the next few days, with a couple being on the other side of Austin, so I'll get some longer drives in. Hopefully no more issues.

I'm also trying out Apple Music since they gave me 6 months free. I had been using Amazon. The issue with Amazon was that it would start playing in the same playlist I had previously been using, but it would skip to a random song and disable shuffle. I always had to open the app on the car display and tap the shuffle button. Apple Music resumes and shuffle is still enabled.

 

Update after a couple weeks, the Heiha has not had any issues. It connects and runs reliably. I have seen a couple weird issues with Google Maps (just a blank blue field with the position marker on it) and Waze (draws map and location, but shows me at home, not where I really am)... opening the corresponding app on the phone seems to nudge them into working. I think that's more of an issue with CarPlay on the phone than the wireless adapter.

So overall, I'm pretty happy with the Heiha unit.

Apple Music also works pretty well. It picks up where I last left off and aside from a couple occasional stutters (happens with all BT connections, in my experience) it works fine.

 

Waze (draws map and location, but shows me at home, not where I really am)... opening the corresponding app on the phone seems to nudge them into working.

Yeah, I've seen that too, in multiple vehicles. One time when it flaked out in my brother's Dodge, it took fully rebooting his iPhone to restore Waze functionality.

 

Just ordered the Hieha on Amazon for $57, hoping to have no issues with our '23 RTL-E, it's arriving on Friday and will report back our findings after we run around this weekend.

 

I currently have the Hieha and it appears to be working fine on my 2018 RTL-E.

 

The new Apple CarPlay is coming out at the end of the year. I wonder if any of the Honda lineup will be set up to use the available features.

Apple Launching All-New CarPlay Experience Later This Year With These 5 Features - MacRumors

 

I’ve tried a bunch of devices listed here. They all suffer the same thing. They work like poop if you use 2 phones. many work well if you have just the one phone, but if you share the truck, it just doesn’t work.

Sometimes one of the devices will work, but the other needs to disconnect and then reconnect its Bluetooth and it may or may not then work. Other dongles work like that and kind of reset the “default user”.

Anyway, I’ve given up and gone back to the cable.

 

Happy to report the Hieha device worked great all weekend, noting we only plan on connecting 1 phone to the Hieha. I also know I can simply swap the cable and connect to the another phone and use wired Apple CarPlay when sharing the truck. There is a slight delay getting connected, maybe 30 seconds, but it is so nice to just jump in the truck, wait for Apple CarPlay to launch and enjoy a cable free life, not to mention I don't worry about using the wireless charger with a wired phone connected anymore. I do plan on running a longer USB-A to USB-C cable so I can hide the little adapter behind the dash.

 

Glad to hear your Hieha CarPlay adapter arrived and is working. I also received mine on Sat. opened box up and there was no usba to usbc cable. I ordered a 1ft cable from Amazon and received on Sunday. Had to upgrade software, then it worked. This is my 3rd CarPlay adapter so getting familiar with their faults. If it doesn't work check your iPhone settings for both Bluetooth and WiFi connection. Any choppy audio reset your iPhone and adapter. None of these are perfect,
and you have to live with their imperfections. I am using a new iPhone SE Gen 3 IOS 16.3.

 

Glad I found this thread!

I agree with most of what's been posted, it is so hit or miss from truck to truck, it is impossible to say "do this because it works."

I tried Carlinkit3.0 and it was garbage. Updated through like 4 software revisions and that made it only slightly less bad. Tweaked every setting individually and again, only slightly less bad. Ran out of options with it, so I figured the Carlinkit 5.0 might be better and it is just as bad, but is already up to date.

So now I ordered the Teeran, and so far, it has worked flawlessly, with the only problem being that it doesn't show me the song name on the gauge cluster when I change songs, and it also doesn't show the song name on the composite CarPlay window that shows the map, Music and the calendar stuff in the upper right. I am going to email them and see if there is anything I can do, because the settings on this one are very limited. At least it connects and runs consistently though, so in the grand scheme of things, that is a win.

To be honest, at this point, I am seriously considering buying the 2024 unit and seeing if it will retrofit into the truck so that it has native wireless car play, which seems to work much better. I am just not sure if the CANBUS codecs will be the same or if I will lose my truck bed audio, but at this point it seems like it might be worth a shot.

With regard to wired car play, for some reason, mine has been mostly rock stable. I only occasionally have issues with WAZE freezing, which is apparently a known offender across many brands and models. Other than that, I haven't really had many issues, but I just prefer not having to have my phone tethered to the truck all the time. I have also thought about burying this unit out of view, provided I can find one that actually makes that chore worthwhile.

 

To be honest, at this point, I am seriously considering buying the 2024 unit and seeing if it will retrofit into the truck so that it has native wireless car play, which seems to work much better. I am just not sure if the CANBUS codecs will be the same or if I will lose my truck bed audio, but at this point it seems like it might be worth a shot.

I know it's infuriating, to the point to spend cash and see. But the units are very expensive, and I don't believe that they are compatible. In another thread somewhere, believe @zroger73 posted that there are wiring interface differences. I concur on WAZE, as you say... it is the biggest offender of lockups, especially if you have Apple maps with an active route at the same time as WAZE.