mapelle621

Here's a noob question. I'm a big fan of Ford and usually go for that brand when offered a choice (I also bought my own A3 nav card off ebay, so I can have in car GPS). Recently, I've been renting GMs, but it seems like the ONstar system is never active no matter how new the car or what model. When you guys want to use it, do you press onstar and get it activated with your name and address and everything, or am I just unlucky? How long does the trial period last? Thanks all!

IsleOfMan

Sounds like you're unlucky, as I have almost the exact opposite experience... that said, my GM rentals tend to be PXAR and up, and even the highest mileage GM car I've had in the last 12 monthe (a '13 ATS over 20k miles) had working OnStar (but no SXM).

How is your experience with your eBay Ford Nav SD Card working? Does it need to match the model year you're driving? I've thought about going this route but hadn't had a Ford rental recently... then last week I got a '15 Navigator on an LCAR res at FLL... only 242 miles on the ODO, but no SD Card. If I could buy a '13 or '14 card and expect it to work for a couple of years, I really might consider it... if I'd need a specific card for every model year, I probably wouldn't go through the hassle.

On an unrelated note, I recently had a '14 XTS at LAX that only had On-Star (no stand-alone Nav). It had previously been reported that the XTS was stand-alone... is there a trim level differentiation, or is it On-Star only? I'm going to ad "???" to its designation for now...

piper28

Looking at the Cadillac site, looks kinda like the "Standard" trim level of an XTS does not have built in navigation. The "Luxury" trim level has it an an option, and "Premium" has it standard.

IsleOfMan

Updated OP.

mapelle621

The nav card works great. So far, all Fords equipped with GPS hardware were able to use my A3 SD card (2012 ish generation I think) regardless of the car's model year. So no, one doesn't need to have a matching year's SD card. There was one single exception where it didn't work in a 2013 Avis C-Max hybrid, fortunately I was in my local area and didn't really need it. The easy way of knowing if the car has GPS capability is if the GPS quadrant says "insert nav SD card", as opposed to "information". In almost all cases I try the SD card before driving off to be sure.

The current SD card version is A5, which have been going for ~$75. I've seen A4 cards going for around $20 but prices fluctuate quite a bit. FWIW I'm considering getting a newer card, not sure which yet. It's so convenient and pays for itself pretty much within 1 or 2 rental days.

IsleOfMan

Awesome feedback! I may look for an A3 or A4 card on the cheap... since I stepped up to almost exclusively PCAR/LCAR rentals I haven't seen as many Fords in general (strangely I see way more ATS and SRX than MKZ/MKX/MKT), but the Navigator I has last week reminded me it might be a good thing to keep in my bag of goodies. Thanks!

piper28

I haven't actually run into many fords that have nav in them, otherwise I might have considered doing this. None of the Fusion Titanium's we've had have had it.

IsleOfMan

I've had some Fusion Titaniums, at least in Canada, that had it but were missing the SD Card... and a few Taurus Limiteds, at least one Flex, a Navigator, and maybe an MKT (boss was driving).

iluvdoco

Picked up a '15 Caddy XTS4 Luxury Trim; factory nav is standard

drchrysler

I picked up a 2014 Toyota 4Runner SR5 in GTF last week with built in standard Nav and satellite radio.

IsleOfMan

Updated to include the '14 4Runner SR5 and '15 Corvette Stingray Convertable (picked one up at WDW yesterday). The 4Runner is either an addition for '14 or only on some SR5s, as I had a '13 last summer that did not have nav. Anyone else who's had nav on a 4Runner, please report back with the details.

Thanks!

Nitehawk

BMW 320i xdrive had factory nav, also the ghibli is not on the list.

piper28

At least early in the model year the 4Runner definitely didn't have nav. It wasn't mentioned in the review that drzoidberg did, and I had one back in April that also definitely didn't have nav.

Drchrysler, sure it wasn't a 2015? Looks like the 2015 SR5 Premium includes nav, while the base SR5 doesn't.

IsleOfMan

Added the Maserat Ghibli.

At the complete other end of the spectrum, do any of the '15 Sonatas have BlueLink?

whimike

The Buick Enclave is hit or miss. I had one at SJC that had stand-alone navigation and one at FLL that didn't.