Everything works in Apple CarPlay except navigation apps

The installer followed the Alpine installation instructions to the letter.

I spoke to an Alpine customer service today.

He asked me

1) to reset the unit to factory settings

2) relocate the antenna outside the car (not in their installation instructions).

Will try this tomorrow. Wish me luck.

Then yes, moving the antenna outside the car is the next step (as stated in the last instruction.)

Some cars have enough bits of metal in the pillars or there is metal in the windshield glass, reducing GPS reception.

It also could be a bad antenna or antenna cable.

If not connected to CarPlay, is your location accurate on your phone while the phone is inside the car?

William Kucharski I think you are not quite right. My car has integrated antenna and the carplay is still not working on my newest iphone. Anyway I have iphone X and iphone 5s I bought an app called GPS diagnostic. The truth is iphone 5s has 90% signal most of the time does not matter the location of the phone, iphone X has 50% most of the time as signal improves if you move the phone to a better place. Iphone 5s is working great on my carplay Iphone X is not. Iphone 5S is running ios 10.2.1 iphone X is running latest ios 12.1.2. Definitely is a software problem or poor quality of hardware used in the new iphones. I think it has something to do with the power management in ios 12 as I tried few things to prove it. on iphone X - If you turn your phone in landscape mode it improves the GPS signal(i guess the software thinks you are not using that much power) also it works better on specific spots in the car. For me apple needs to sort out their software first as many many people complaining about it. Google the problem and you will see how many people are struggling

We have this problem with a 2018 VW Tiguan and our two iPhone SEs. Maps, Waze, or Google Maps mostly work fine, but periodically it will randomly place us somewhere several miles away in the middle of a trip. Problem disappears when we disconnect from CarPlay.

The first time it happened, iPhone GPS thought we were driving around in circles at the local civic center parking lot, even though we were several miles away. Quite amusing if it weren't so maddening.

Took the car to the local VW dealer for a different issue, and it did the same thing in the parking lot. Tried different iPhones from dealer staff and it still didn't work. Will try an Android phone as soon as possible. We gave up at the dealer, but at least they saw it and realized we weren't insane.

Both phones are updated, and we have tried rebooting, etc.

The car has NO built in GPS, so that cannot be the problem.

Sure Hope Apple is checking this out.

peacefulshade wrote:

The GPS position in the car is correct, I know this because the car always displays the map in the digital dashboard correctly even when waze goes crazy in the infotainment display (the bmws have this digital dashboard with speed, tacometer and map)

No, what you are seeing is that the head end is interpreting GPS data correctly.

What you do not know is whether the head end is mangling the GPS data when it transmits it to CarPlay, and that's the problem.

It's kind of like if you are using degrees Fahrenheit and are telling someone in Europe it's 70 degrees outside. You know what you're saying, you display it properly, but if the person in Europe is looking up what 70 degrees Celsius feels like, they will have a quite different opinion on the temps outside.

Folks,

Apple just released IOS 12.1.3, let me know if it fixed your GPS location issue with Alpine ILX-107 head unit.

1. We're fellow users, not Apple. Complain to Apple here.
2. The phone can only go by what the head end is telling it for its GPS coordinates. Even if the car doesn't have navigation, if it supports CarPlay it often has a GPS antenna and is required to if the CarPlay connection is wireless,

A quick update from me. So I updated my iPhone 5s to the latest ios 12.1.2 and the apps like waze, google maps and maps are all working great now. So i guess is not an iOS software problem it is more like a hardware used in the newer iphones. I think apple switched hardware providers especially for the GPS modules on the new iPhones. So all working great on my iphone 5s on is os 12.1.2 and nothing works on my iphone X on ios 12.1.2....

Alpine is sending me a new GPS antenna. Will give that a try but am doubtful. I’m also going to try a few more mounting locations including on the roof, just to rule out all possibilities. It still seems like it might be software related though. Even when it is very inaccurate, my GPS diagnostic app claims the signal is strong and accurate within 17 ft. It is possible that the GPS diagnostic app is reading the phones GPS and not the CarPlay unit, unlike Apple Maps/Google Maps/Waze.

To be fair, I'm highly skeptical the new antenna will do anything. The one it came with looks fine, no damage. There is a small change it'll help but I think it is more likely there is an issue with the connection in the head unit, so you may be better off sending it in from the start.

I moved the gps antenna to the roof and it did not resolve the issue. So, it’s not a windshield/wiper/pillar interference problem. It does seem to work fine for a while and then 5-10 minutes into the drive it just can’t pinpoint my location precisely. I tried the gps diagnostic app and i did notice a difference on and off carplay. Signal from alpine head unit seems worse than testing the phone alone. Not sure whether carplay disables other methods of triangulation that assist gps signal and it’s still reading the gps from phone without wifi/compass/cellular assist or if it’s truly reading the head unit’s gps signal. I tried same test in my other carplay unit and that signal also looked worse than the phone alone. Anyway, I’m extremely ****** off at alpine at the moment. This head unit was very expensive. With all the necessary accessories it cost a grand, not to mention all my time installing and troubleshooting this problem. My same phone works fine in my other car with pioneer app radio carplay unit. I guess I’ll try upgrading iOS now but I am not optimistic since it works on another system.

I've tried just about everything to resolve this GPS issue and nothing works. A few minutes into every trip, the radio nags me "proceed to the route", shows my location on a neighboring street, and starts telling me to turn left or right to get back onto the street that I am already physically driving on. I'm pretty certain the problem is with the Alpine iLX-107 head unit itself. I have a different CarPlay (USB-only) unit in my other car and the GPS antenna is mounted on the dashboard. I have never had any problems with that unit, a Pioneer AppRadio.

-I have tested with my primary iPhone X running iOS 12.1, iOS 12.1.2 & iOS 12.1.3

-I have tested with an iPhone 6 running iOS 11.4

-I have tested with an iPhone SE running iOS 12.1.2

-I have tested both wired and wireless.

-I have tested with the GPS antenna mounted on the passenger side dash with a clear view to the sky (Alpine's recommended location).

-I have tested with the GPS antenna mounted in the center of the dash with a clear view to the sky.

-I have tested with the GPS antenna mounted on the roof.

-I have reset the head unit to factory settings.

-I have re-paired the phone to the head unit and denied wireless (usb only).

-I have unplugged the GPS antenna and tested in USB-only mode. This experience was predictably terrible, but at least that means the head unit's GPS antenna was partly doing its job, though still terribly.

Other than navigation, this Alpine is wonderful. It never drops connection for me. Phone calls, music, Siri, Onboard diagnostics, regular radio, everything else is perfect. But navigation is an absolute core functionality that must work close to 100% of the time or it is unusable. This doesn't even work 50% of the time with the antenna on the roof!

If your unit provides wireless CarPlay connectivity, it must provide location information.

If your unit provides wired CarPlay, it may or may not, but the phone will use information provided by the head unit if it tells the phone it does.

New update:

I replaced the original iLX-107 with a new one (thanks Crutchfield!). Unfortunately, there has been no change in GPS accuracy. I’m still having the same problems. It’s worth noting that I also updated my iDatalink Maestro in the process but that didn’t help anything. I still haven’t tried cutting the speed wire as one Crutchfield support rep suggested (I did confirm it is part of the wiring harness), but that seems like an odd intervention.

At this point I’m thinking about replacing the head unit with a different brand. I’ve tried everything with the iLX-107. Either it’s internal GPS system is really weak, or it was designed and tested on earlier generations of iPhones. It could also be that the wireless CarPlay protocol itself is flawed. It’s frustrating because GPS works so well on the phone when not connected to CarPlay. The Crutchfield support person I talked to said that he had indication in his system that Alpine is working on a firmware update, but there is no timeline. I’m not sure I believe it. Hearing that others are having similar issues on other head units makes me think CarPlay itself is flawed, but you’d think more people would be complaining. It isn’t usable.

Other than spending more money on a different head unit or hoping that Apple/Alpine/both issue software updates, I’m not sure what else to try.

I highly doubt it’s the head unit being an issue as there seems to be a mixture of aftermarket and factory units having the same issue.

The common thing seems to be iOS.

I’m also keen to try a genuine cable as was mentioned in an earlier post.