lpfb

Team,

trying to determine if the 2015 Allroad MMI hardware has the MMX board configuration, allowing for the 3G chip to be replaced by a 4G LTE equivalent. Any thoughts? The Audi Connect features and WiFi hotspot are great, but the 3G can hardly keep up with modern bandwidth requirements.

Otherwise, anyone know of any aftermarket solutions for this?

superswiss

No, there is no LTE upgrade available for B8.5 MMI, however as of MY14 it has been upgraded to 4G HSPA+ and full support for AT&T. Audi offers a hardware upgrade for MY13 to get the same support. If you want faster speeds, switch to AT&T. I've been on AT&T since the beginning of this year and it's noticeably faster than it was on T-Mo.

lpfb

Thanks for the response! A few follow up questions:

Can you share some estimate improvement in speed?

Are you inferring the unit in the car is MMI, not the modular MMX unit (also referred to as MIB...)

What steps must I take to obtain an AT&T sim to work? My impression was that the new deal announced was only for MY>15...

Thanks!

superswiss

From doing a few speed tests, the actual download speeds are about the same, but AT&T has much better network latency, which makes it faster. T-Mo at least around here has terrible network latency, which makes everything sluggish. The download speeds heavily depend on your signal strengths, so that can vary widely. I tested in my garage, which is probably not the best place. Some others have seen significantly higher download speeds as well compared to T-Mo.

Yes, I'm talking about the MMI, not the MMX.

You can officially sign up for AT&T service now by calling the dedicated Audi Connect phone number. The following PDF was included with a letter from Audi informing me about the modem upgrade (my car is MY13).

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_P...ew?usp=sharing

BTW, LTE doesn't make as much of a difference in the MMI unless you use the Wifi hotspot a lot. The other Audi Connect services aren't any faster. I took the new MMI in an A3 loaner for a full spin and I don't notice much of difference between it and my car when it comes to loading the Google Earth Maps, Online Destinations etc. Seems the system is mostly hamstrung by Audi's Cloud infrastructure.

lpfb

Thanks a lot!!

My biggest use Apple Music streaming.

Thanks.

superswiss

Why don't you use the phone's own data connection for that?

lpfb

My data plan is a corporate account, so I try to respect my quota. Given that T-mobile has "unlimited", my hope was to figure out a way to use my car as a true wi-fi hotspot, but the non-LTE speeds are, well, not what quite what I'm accustomed to on my smartphone.

I figure there must be some sort of plan downstream to change out the hardware - figers crossed. Given I'm planning on holding onto this car for a while (4-6 years), it'd be nice to know I can, as the MIB intends to, keep up with the times/technologies.

LP

superswiss

I see. Yeah, that is a good use case for the Wifi hotspot in the car. The fact that MY13 can be upgraded to the latest modem signals that if Audi so chooses, they could offer an LTE upgrade at some point in the future. Question is, whether they gonna bother. The current upgrade was forced by T-Mo changing their 3G bands in several markets. Owners of MY13 vehicles in those markets found themselves being downgraded to 2G, because the old modem doesn't support the new 3G band T-Mo is moving to. Unfortunately, my pessimistic view on this is that T-Mo and AT&T would have to shut down their 3G networks to force Audi to offer an LTE upgrade for the non-MIB models.

f_399

AT&T sim just plug and play?

superswiss

Yes, if you have an activated AT&T SIM from a tablet for example, just put it in, give it a minute or so to configure itself, and you should be up and running. That's what I did when I switched. I took the activated SIM from one of my spare tablets and put it in the car.