To all those looking to retrofit the Combox Telematics—look no further than Patrys@BimmerTech!
Here is a brief synopsis of my story:
I ordered a 2011 335i coupe in July of 2010. It arrived in August. In the envelope my October bill I noticed a little announcement from BMW about the new “Office” features and the expanded iPod controls available in the 2011 cars. I was furious when I called and was told that not only was it a hardware update (I thought I would just need to update my vehicle’s software), but that retrofitting my car with the “Combox” was “not possible.”
I was so mad that I set out to prove those bastards wrong!
I joined this forum specifically for the purpose of contacting Patrys@BimmerTech and inquiring about his retrofit after seeing a couple of his posts.
1.) He replied to my email very quickly
2.) We discussed the pros and cons of retrofitting either the Media version of the Telematics version of the combox
3.) I ordered the Telematics version from him, which arrived in a few weeks’ time
4.) We set a time to complete the installation and he was prompt and patient with my questions and whining throughout
5.) I spent a few hours in the trunk doing some easy wiring
6.) THE MAGIC IS IN THE CODING. Once I finished the grunt work, he logged in via the internet to a laptop plugged into my car (with a cable he provided) and coded the various features we discussed.
7.) Voila, it friggin works!!
I am happy to say that I can now stream Bluetooth audio from my iPhone (including Pandora), I can select songs/albums/artists from my iPod using voice control, and I can see the album art on the display. Numerous other improvements are also evident (e.g. I can also now mute phone calls, numbers show up on the display when dialed from the phone itself). He also CODED video in motion so I can navigate and watch DVD’s while driving—NO NEW HARDWARE REQUIRED!
All that’s left for me now is getting BMW Assist to recognize the new hardware. I will update this post when I know more (fingers crossed).
IN SHORT: For any of you considering whether or not the combox retrofit works, or whether or not to use Patryk to do it, I can attest to the simple facts that IT DEFINITELY WORKS, AND PATRYS@BIMMERTECH IS THE MAN!
