iPhone X cannot find iMiEV Bluetooth

[RobbW]

My wonderful wife surprised me with a new iPhone X yesterday! I was very shocked and happy with this gift. I spent the evening gleefully getting everything set up and transferred over from my old iPhone. Everything was going great with the new phone until I got in my Meepster this morning to drive to work. Turns out, the new iPhone X cannot find the Bluetooth connection in the Meep!

I've tried everything: deleting my old iPhone from the Meep's memory, restarting my Meep (3x), restarting the new phone (2x), leaving it sit there for the entire 30-minute commute to work, etc. Nothing! In the Bluetooth settings on my X, it just sits there spinning unable to see the Meep's BT connection. I was able to successfully connect my new phone to the BT system in my Pacifica Hybrid van last night. And every other smartphone we've had has been able to connect to the Meep with no problems.

Has anyone else here had any issues connecting the iPhone X to their iMiEV's stereo? If you've been able to pair your X to the iMiEV successfully, was there anything special you had to do? Any setting somewhere that I'm missing?

My Meep is a 2012 SE edition. Thanks.

 

[RobbW]

Back and forth with Apple Support via Twitter DM. They keep trying to get me to contact support for the vehicle manufacturer (i.e. Mitsu) instead of continuing to bother Apple with it. They say that since my new iPhone X has successfully paired with other BT devices, then the issue is isolated to the i-MiEV.

I am trying to argue back with them that it is, in fact, an Apple problem since every other iPhone and Android phone in our household can successfully pair with the i-MiEV. That this issue is isolated to the iPhone X. Every claim they make to try and push this off on Mitsubishi, I can easily turn it around and say that it's an Apple problem.

Is it possible that the BT transceiver in the i-MiEV is just too old technology to work with the iPhone X? Apple claims the X uses BT 5.0, but they also state that it is backwards compatible with older BT tech.

I just don't know which direction to go, Mitsubishi or keep hammering away at Apple. I can only imagine that a BT issue should be easier to correct with a phone than it would be to address in a vehicle's head unit, right?

 

[jray3]

Me and my iPhone 4S are on your side Robb- must be the phone's fault!

 

[RobbW]

I just emailed the service manager at my dealership that helped me with my i-MiEV battery replacement. I asked if he's heard any compatibility issues between the i-MiEV's head unit and any newer phones, including the X. I asked if there are any firmware updates available that might help the BT audio pairing, and if so, if that's something I can update myself or if I'd need to bring the car in.

Will wait for a response from Mitsu, but will also keep pushing Apple. I don't want to have to go too long without listening to my podcasts in my Meepsters!

 

[RobbW]

The service manager emailed me back last night. He said I can bring my Meepster in any of the nights next week when the service department is open late. He said he'll take a look at it, and it's possible there may be a firmware update that can be applied.

If it's just a firmware update that needs to be done to make the BT in the i-MiEV compatible, anyone know if this is an update that we customers can do ourselves? I'd prefer to not have to take my car in and pay the service tech if it's something I could do.