fenechy

Just got rid of my 530d for the L&K estate. The BM was 12 years old so on the tech front there is no comparison. But what surprised me is the difference in power between a 500nm torque BM and the 150 Skoda. Not that much of a difference considering the numbers. But what difference there is has saved me a stack of money on fuel! You seem the BM just begged me to floor it in every situation. In the Skoda I go for the Eco setting as often as I can and love aiming for that 60mpg figure. It is comfy, limo like and such a pleasure. The BM was fun but the wife and kids are grateful of my chauffeur driving style these days. If you want fun go with the BM. If you want relaxation... And just about everything else, go with the Skoda.

Hi. I have park assist. I don't know how the sensors differ if you don't have park assist but I can confirm the 'wrap around' sensors with park assist. My guess would be the sensors are the same and the extra you get with assist is the steering wheel control and radar scanning. Either way, having never had parking sensors and never having hit anything - till I hit 3 things in a week with sensors, I'd opt for no sensors at all and good old fashioned judgment! Not really, I quite like them but it is important not to rely on tech too much. When lane assist started telling me to take over the steering on the motorway, it took me ages to climb back out of the boot where I was happily making a cup of Bovril!

Thanks guys. All great suggestions. I found the issue in the end and not sure how I got there! I had an app called Onavo which routes all your data through a VPN and compresses downloads to save your data allowance. I noticed one issue with CarPlay was that Siri would not work but worked when disconnected. Knowing that CarPlay is quite reliant on Siri I wondered if this was the issues and it drove me to delete the app and VPN profile. All working great now. Have fed all back to Apple too. Thanks for the help and ideas.

Hi guys. I stupidly updated to the beta of iOS 10 because I wanted to check out the new maps navigation and how it worked with the Columbus CarPlay. ALl worked fine for a while until one day it started crashing. What happens is a mixture of either being asked if I want to connect my phone to CarPlay, I say yes and then it cycles back to asking the same thing again. Or, if I reset medialink in the settings of the Columbus, it connects the phone but after a few minutes of music the CarPlay iterface seems to freeze. I can see music still playing on my phone but no audio. Eventually it kicks me out, tries to connect the phone by USB and then connects back to CarPlay to go through the cycle of crashing again. Since moving to the beta I am now on the 3rd release and the issue has been there with all 3 - but I don't know if it is the beta or the Columbus. If it all started going wrong the second I went beta then I'd be more certain but it all worked fine for weeks and then went wrong with no changes or updates. Is anyone else having the same issues or similar?

Might be more relevant than you think. I checked my estate L&K (with Canton) and it seems that the door hinges or bends just above the Velcro things. So the door bends about an inch up from the boot floor. The bottom inch feels quite anchored to the boot floor. I'd say if I gave it a yank I'd uncover a similar couple of tabs with some plasti retainer clips on the other side but I don't want to yank it to find out. Hope that helps a little anyway.

It is the free colour in deed.

Mine arrived on Friday just gone. I needed it quick so went with someone else's cancelled order hence no choice in colour. Quite like the blue though. The surprise was the interior. Thought I was getting beige but got brown. Had not seen brown but really like it. So very chuffed in deed. Except the 5.1 surround is actually 5.0 surround - check my post in this part of the forum. Opinions welcomed.

Thanks. Would be interested to know what you think. Not sure I'd say the sub is feeble though? What are you used to? I've come from a 12" Genesis sub and am really impressed with what this little 6" is capable of. Just wish I could get someone to wrap the car in sound deadening - but with it being a lease car I'm not inclined to spend that money on 3 years of ownership. Would make such a difference though. Anyway, pretty sure the sub is not working as the same track on an audio source is much better. I should try a different DVD maybe so will give that a go too. But yes, I was excited about 5.1 - not 5.0! It might only be a 0.1 but I happen to think that 0.1 is exceptionally important!!

Hi guys, Stuck this in the tech forum too but no answers there so thought I'd come here instead. Having read people complaining about the rear speakers in the Superb III, I'd defended Canton suggesting they might just be intended as rear surrounds for when playing 5.1 surround from say a DVD. Tonight I decided to test that out and sure enough they appear to play the surround channel but to my dismay, the sub did nothing! I was playing a Faithless DVD and if you go into settings from media and then DVD settings you can select the language. It has stereo, DD 5.1 and DTS 5.1. Was impressed to see that it had DTS as an option but no sub playing on either 5.1 option - only stereo and even then it is very low bass compared to straight audio. Does anyone know their stuff on this or fancy trying to replicate my issue? If I am even in the right forum for this. Let me know your thoughts anyway. Thanks team!

Thanks guys. Will talk it through with my broker. Haven't felt much of a sense of urgency but that may just be because they can't do much at this stage. Will let you know if I have any success.

At the risk of sounding like a petulant and impatient child, anyone know how to get an S3 quicker?! I've ordered through a broker as a leased vehicle and I went for a cancelled order as I needed the car before a certain date. Was given end of June as a rough guide (about 4 weeks back). The car appears not to be in the country yet as the broker has not been given a delivery date yet. I'm trying to see if once it comes on the various systems and info is available on which dealership have it etc, there is a way to speed things up a little. Has anyone had success in this area? I'm thinking things like collecting it instead of having it delivered, trying to negotiate with the dealer, pleading etc. Thought one of you might know the system well enough to highlight possibilities in this area. Would kill me to know it was sitting in a car park somewhere for 3 weeks while I haemorrhage money on a hire car. Any thoughts gratefully appreciated.

Thanks guys. So do we think and end of June delivery must mean an original order date of before May based on their lead time and therefore TV included? Suppose I'm asking you to guess but and I could just blinking we'll wait and find out... But I don't much care for waiting and I'm climbing the walls waiting for this car - first EVER new car. Ever. ever. evs.

Hi guys, I've got 2 brochures for the Superb and one says the L&K has TV tuner and the other doesn't. April 2016 - TV June 2016 - No TV I've got one on order due at the end of the month. I'm getting it through a leasing company and it was a cancelled order. I've asked the broker what equipment it has and they've confirmed it has DAB radio but not listed TV. Both brochures list TV and DAB together. This is a UK order. Any ideas friendly people? J

Ok, so Canton supply the speakers. I wonder who makes the amps and sound processor. It is funny how hard it can be to get this info. Or is it just funny that we're such nerds that we pursue it?! Sorry, I speak for myself only as being a nerd.

I hear you and as a father of two young girls, I know that what you actually mean is that if one wants to fade to the back and then turn up full volume to drown out the whining and arguing so mum and dad can actually talk - Canton has let us down on this front. Agreed!

Got talking about the Canton in another thread and it got me thinking that it could just be that the system is set up for either front stage sound imaging or 5.1 surround. One school of thought with car audio is that you want all the sound coming from the front. Because bass is omnidirectional the sub can go in the back where there is space but your mid bass, mids and treble you want in the front so as to create a sound image across the dash. That's for audio reproduction but the Canton system is also able to do DD 5.1 surround. In that case the 'rears' would come from the passenger doors and wouldn't need to be able to produce the same depth as the fronts. In short, I'd say the system is designed with only the driver and front passenger in mind (and the 'driver' profile backs this up). The 'all speaker' profile is probably intended to provide a bit more volume only. I've installed audio in every car I've had and I've never put speakers in the back. It is virtually impossible to give the rear passengers an accurate sound stage so in my cars, they've always had to suffer bag loads of bass (from a 12" sub in the boot) and very little of the balanced sound from up front. I could be completely wrong on all of this. It is just a theory but if you are asking Skoda, you could also try Canton. Probably be harder to find the right person at Canton but easier to get an accurate answer. Can imagine some 'fobbing off' from Skoda if they don't know - which they are unlikely to. Let us know how you go though.

It is all subjective of course but in general, car audio is designed for stereo reproduction and sound stage imaging. You're trying to recreate sitting in front of a stage. The music is meant to come from up front. The sub can go in the boot because the frequency range is omnidirectional (not supposed to be able to tell where it is coming from). The fact that the Canton system can do 5.1 surround too (seeing as Canton do home cinema too) probably explains the rear speakers. I wonder if they are really intended for surround fill when watching something on the little 8" screen. It would be good to know what the rear speakers do when the listening profile is set to driver position. I imagine they are virtually turned off. I never used to put speakers in the rear of my installs. If I did I'd only ever have the rears on for passengers - and only if I was feeling very kind! Of course, if you are listening to dance music then one could argue that most clubs are playing mono from ever corner of the room so the whole sound stage goes out the window. FRSkoda - could you do us a favour and find a higher quality, more efficient sub, swap it out for the Canton sub and stitck a load of wadding in the plastic sub enclosure and let use know how that sounds first. Then do the dynamating and let us know the difference then? If you could do it in the next couple of weeks that would be great! One of these maybe? https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/262452740320 Or this http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Focal-Utopia-Be-13WS-Compact-13cm-5-Car-Audio-Subwoofer-/161830526916?hash=item25add9dfc4:g:fVYAAOSwQTVV~AbP Or you could tell me to crack on and do it myself! Which I might once I get the car. Good to hear your thoughts though. Let us know if it gets better with time in your opinion.

20-30 hours typically runs in speakers with them getting better and better up to 100 hours - all depending on how you play them of course. I had a quick listen to the Canton system in a demo car. Sounded ok but was not ideal testing environment. I can't put anything aftermarket in mine as am leasing so hoping the Canton system does ok. This will be the first car I've not done an install on. Think I'm probably going to miss my 12" sub...

It will be awful if cats find out about this. Imagine, hot summers day, dog in car, windows down. Cat walks past, full bladder, sees dog - game over!

Hey guys. So, is it only NCD and is it just straight purchases of new cars? I'm hoping to lease an L&K from Jet finance. It was a cancelled order so is built but not yet in the country. Not quite clear on the exact circumstances/criteria leading to cancelled orders. Any thoughts welcomed.

Thanks guys. Never heard of Android. What's that?! (Yes, I am one of those stupid Apple fans who even in the face of complete incompatibility with anything other than Apple products hangs on to my ithings for dear life! Hopefully the iPhone will work with the Apple Car when it comes out...) So yes, I hear you all. It's not looking good basically. Oh well. I didn't buy it for its satnav. At least I can watch movies now as I queue for the Blackwall Tunnel.

Hi All, My first post here and first time dabbling with Skodas. Firstly I'd like to say how disappointed I am at this forum. Having mainly spent time on tech forums where lonely computer geeks explode into trollish rants at the simplest of things, I see no such behaviour here. Not one stupid question has been shot down in flames and I've yet to see any posts shut down by moderators because 2 people had, wait for it, a difference of opinion! Skoda drivers are clearly far to relaxed and happy with their cars and lives to understand how forums work. Anyway, with that said I shall now ask my question with a heavy heart, knowing that the likelihood of being told I'm an idiot is as likely as Clarkson having anything good to say about the Superb. So, I'm waiting on an L&K estate which I will be leasing from Jet at a very reasonable rate. Having never had a new car I'm ever so slightly excited! But my tech demands always lead me to a slight bit of disappointment as whatever area of technology it is, we're never quite as far forward as I wish we were. My concern is the satnav. For me, the most important feature of satnav is to warn me about traffic jams, police, accidents, small pieces of plastic in the hard shoulder and maybe ghosts on the road at Halloween (that one is a nod to other Waze users). I know the Columbus has TMC but I'm not hearing the best things about it. What I'd love is if Apple Car Play allowed Waze to work or even if the Columbus system could tether to my phone and get data updates about traffic to supplement TMC. I drive into London a lot and Waze does an excellent job of taking me the quickest route. Very seldom am I much later than the estimated ETA. I know I can use Apple maps through CarPlay but I'm not convinced that works too well either. For example, when I left work last night Waze gave me an eta of 5.25pm. Apple maps said 5.08pm. Pretty sure if I'd listened to Waze it would have got me there close to that. I listened to Apple instead and got home at 5.50pm Question is therefore, how do the rest of you (people who like me value not sitting in traffic) do things? Do you just go with TMC and enjoy watching TV in the traffic or flick between Apple maps and Columbus or do you - shock horror - have your smartphone in a cradle and still use Waze? Answers and insults anxiously awaited. Thanks all.