Prospective Buyer - How Does Media from Phone Work?

[BigSkies]

Honestly, it's not a deal breaker. I just installed a phone mount that I 3D printed and I can run anything from my phone right there via Bluetooth. I'm not sure why everyone has such a hard time with this. If you love something, make it happen!

Picture notes:
- the color is nasty and the cable is loose. This is just the beta run. I've already purchase the EveryAmp OBD2/USB adapter.
- yes, I'm driving in a river. Cheating cause it's winter time. Rivians are so much fun!

My insurance (USAA) is 27% cheaper because I install an app that verifies I don't interact with my phone while driving.

I get that it's solvable, but those are some real dollars.

I'm also enjoying being in my grumpy-old-man yelling at clouds phase of life. I hate a lot of things about streaming and it gives me something to vent about while avoiding politics.

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[Rade]

(and so is the FM radio app, for that matter, but in different ways

That too! I thought it was just whatever is being used for an antenna. I can't get a solid lock on any of the regional stations I want to listen to. Net: I never bother to listen to FM as a result.

 

[Rade]

My insurance (USAA) is 27% cheaper because I install an app that verifies I don't interact with my phone while driving.

We have USAA, and I initially used the app. During the TRIAL period, I got "Good job! You scored 98% good driving!", and I felt great about it. But as soon as it came out of TRIAL period, "Your score is 67% (this number went down consistently in the days off trial), let's give you some tips on how to improve your driving. This is used to calculate your premium" when I know damn well that I drove the same all along. I disconnected from the app.

 

[P.S.Mangelsdorf]

That's amazing. If you have a link to any posts or media on it I'd love to check it out.

Build thread: https://openinverter.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=358
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@mangelsdorfspeed

Anyway, regarding the quality of the sound.

First, to be totally fair, the OTA tuning updates have vastly improved things pretty much across the board over time, from what I hear in mine and what I've heard from others.

Good to hear

One of members of this board has engaged in some highly professional in-car testing and measurements and offered EQ settings to help maximize the various models' capabilities, which further refines the quality you can get in the cars. But the onboard EQ UI is pretty minimal, with only a few channels,

Interesting. Come to think of it, I probably have the tools to do similar tuning.

Moreover, the built in streaming apps (Tidal Apple Spotify etc) all seem to have different data throughputs, which could affect to greater or lesser extents the quality of the sound experience.

Likewise, in my experience the UI quality of the built in apps could also be improved—e.g., the Apple Music app is pretty poor in terms of its seach functionality and other playlist capabilities, and (minor annoyance) doesn't display the jacket artwork consistently or, in my case, hardly ever.

Ok question on Apple Music (the integrated app): Is that just the streaming side, or can it access your library? Sounds like just the streaming side, but wanted to clarify

Finally, the subwoofer in Gen1 and Gen2 R1 is just anemic, and coupled with the lack of clear guidance from Rivian for third party aftermarket work and wiring diagrams and so forth, it gives me the willies when it comes to paying a sound shop to replace the sub and amp with better equipment, although I know others have done so. And given our conversation above, perhaps you have the expertise and internal fortitude to undertake a hardware improvement!

Yeah lack of service/wiring information is a general problem for non-legacy automakers (and newer Stellantis stuff too. But in theory a driver with similar impedance and/or a change to the enclosure design would be possible without disrupting the rest of the system. But I also try to not modify stuff until its fully paid off, so it'd be a while before I did that.

And, for those who require it, there is now an integrated CarPlay solution from EVPlay. I have it and it works really well, but note that the audio will ALL come through Bluetooth so you're not changing that quality. It does turn the infotainment screen into the CP screen with the touch of a button (and back again with another push). I really only use my EVPlay unit for Waze and continue to stream other audio through Bluetooth.

Good to know, I'll need to read up on that option.

 

[higrob]

I have had a different experience than a lot of the others here on this thread. Bluetooth works extremely well for me for audio. If I use the in car apple music app and then run the exact same song over bluetooth from my phone the sound quality is superior with the bluetooth. The sound is much fuller and richer. My guess is the in car app has a little different compression involved which takes out a lot of the bass. With the recent update where the phase of the sub was inverted my Gen 2 R1S with premium audio now sounds very good and it's not to far behind on my Gen 2 that does not have premium audio. I don't know how the update affected Gen 1's or R1T's but I am now very pleased with the audio and have zero issues with running bluetooth from my phone.

 

[JM.]

which is a major step backwards in terms of phone/media integration if I don't want to give in to streaming.

Even if you DO give into streaming, it's garbage unless you only just use Apple Music. Then it's mediocre on the UX, with exceptionally great sound, passable usability.

 

[mkhuffman]

Build thread: https://openinverter.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=358
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@mangelsdorfspeed


Good to hear

Interesting. Come to think of it, I probably have the tools to do similar tuning.


Ok question on Apple Music (the integrated app): Is that just the streaming side, or can it access your library? Sounds like just the streaming side, but wanted to clarify


Yeah lack of service/wiring information is a general problem for non-legacy automakers (and newer Stellantis stuff too. But in theory a driver with similar impedance and/or a change to the enclosure design would be possible without disrupting the rest of the system. But I also try to not modify stuff until its fully paid off, so it'd be a while before I did that.


Good to know, I'll need to read up on that option.

You are invested in your Apple Music library, so this probably won't help, but I find Spotify to work very well in the Rivian interface.

And I can tell the difference in sound quality between the native Spotify app and streaming Spotify via Bluetooth from my phone. The sound qualify of Spotify in the truck is excellent. Comparatively, Bluetooth sound quality sucks IMO.

As far as general sound quality goes, prior to the last OTA update the front speakers were out of phase with the rear speakers, at least in the Gen2 models. They fixed that and now the sound quality is almost on par with older Meridian system. I say "almost", because that is only subjectively when listening to music.

When I run test tones through the two systems, the Meridian handles the bass much, much better. It isn't even close. If you like loud bass, the Meridian is much better. I guess I don't listen to music as loud as I used to.

 

[BigSkies]

We have USAA, and I initially used the app. During the TRIAL period, I got "Good job! You scored 98% good driving!", and I felt great about it. But as soon as it came out of TRIAL period, "Your score is 67% (this number went down consistently in the days off trial), let's give you some tips on how to improve your driving. This is used to calculate your premium" when I know damn well that I drove the same all along. I disconnected from the app.

I've had mostly good experience with it. I'm nowhere near their perfect score, but pretty good.

It gives me motivation to interact with my phone less, which is a net positive for me. And there's still net savings even if the score is imperfect.

It also seems to be less sensitive on the harsh braking metric than it used to. It used to ding me anytime I had to aggressively slow for a yellow light, and I haven't seen that in a while.

 

[teartags]

I have had a different experience than a lot of the others here on this thread. Bluetooth works extremely well for me for audio. If I use the in car apple music app and then run the exact same song over bluetooth from my phone the sound quality is superior with the bluetooth. The sound is much fuller and richer. My guess is the in car app has a little different compression involved which takes out a lot of the bass. With the recent update where the phase of the sub was inverted my Gen 2 R1S with premium audio now sounds very good and it's not to far behind on my Gen 2 that does not have premium audio. I don't know how the update affected Gen 1's or R1T's but I am now very pleased with the audio and have zero issues with running bluetooth from my phone.

I don't agree with this at all. Maybe it's a Gen2 thing or an R1T vs R1S thing, but my Bluetooth (that I use a lot) sounds pretty lifeless. Back when I had streaming, I compared them a lot and the BT was always significantly less dynamic. I don't have streaming anymore because I'm in the mountains frequently where there is no coverage and my "adventure vehicle" won't play my music so I won't pay for it. I'm pissed that there's no still USB plug in. Technological adventure vehicle my a**.

 

[mkhuffman]

I don't agree with this at all. Maybe it's a Gen2 thing or an R1T vs R1S thing, but my Bluetooth (that I use a lot) sounds pretty lifeless. Back when I had streaming, I compared them a lot and the BT was always significantly less dynamic. I don't have streaming anymore because I'm in the mountains frequently where there is no coverage and my "adventure vehicle" won't play my music so I won't pay for it. I'm pissed that there's no still USB plug in. Technological adventure vehicle my a**.

There used to be the ability to download music to the R1 in the Android phone Spotify app. I downloaded a bunch of tracks for just the reason you describe. And then guess what happened? It didn't work when I was in the mountains with no cell signal. WTH?

Now I don't even see the option to download tracks to my R1, so I guess they disabled it since it does not do anything. It is downloaded but you still need a cell signal for it to work.

In that situation, I used Bluetooth from my phone and listened to Spotify tracks I had previously downloaded to my phone. Just like you do.

On a good note, the fact that I could download music to my truck may mean that it will actually work in the future. The capability is there, it just needs a little software engineering work.

 

[higrob]

I don't agree with this at all. Maybe it's a Gen2 thing or an R1T vs R1S thing, but my Bluetooth (that I use a lot) sounds pretty lifeless. Back when I had streaming, I compared them a lot and the BT was always significantly less dynamic. I don't have streaming anymore because I'm in the mountains frequently where there is no coverage and my "adventure vehicle" won't play my music so I won't pay for it. I'm pissed that there's no still USB plug in. Technological adventure vehicle my a**.

Perhaps we have different phones and that is why appears different to us. It is quite noticeably better for me. I am using an I phone 11 on IOS 26.

 

[teartags]

Perhaps we have different phones and that is why appears different to us. It is quite noticeably better for me. I am using an I phone 11 on IOS 26.

Doubt that would be a factor? I would think BT would be the same regardless of the source. In general, BT streaming is considered subpar to almost any other modern source as far as I know.
There are quite a few complaints on this forum on the quality of the BT music. Yours is the 1st I've seen saying it sounds good. Though I'm glad it does it for you.

 

[higrob]

Doubt that would be a factor? I would think BT would be the same regardless of the source. In general, BT streaming is considered subpar to almost any other modern source as far as I know.
There are quite a few complaints on this forum on the quality of the BT music. Yours is the 1st I've seen saying it sounds good. Though I'm glad it does it for you.

It's a shame that a lot of people have that experience. I have been in audio for over 40 years and I'm not misleading you that mine sounds better with bluetooth.

 

[therealcmj]

Your experience with Bluetooth will very much depend on what parts of Bluetooth your phone and the car support and what the music service supports.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Bluetooth_profiles#Advanced_Audio_Distribution_Profile_(A2DP)

If you had lossless or AAC files on the phone but your car (or headphones) only supports MP3 then the phone would have to transcode the files. And it would likely do that in real time which results in worse audio output.

I don't know what codecs Rivians currently support, but there was a discussion here a while back

https://www.rivianforums.com/forum/threads/apple-music-over-bluetooth.3601/

 

[JM.]

Direct Apple Music streaming is vastly better than Bluetooth. If this isn't obvious to you, I strongly recommend a hearing exam.

Since the built in system is such dumb garbage, I often get reverted to music via BT instead of the last thing I was playing. Every single time I wonder what the hell happened to the audio quality until I process the fact that the stupid thing went to some random BT song from my phone.

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