[billgti]

Originally Posted by 777ER

What does it look like?

just put your visor down and look at the plastic surrounding the mirror. you'll see that one side sticks out more and actually allows u to slot tickets or pieces of paper in there.

[rit]

I read it somewhere on this board, but it was news to me and had previously been a real head scratcher:

Comfort Access Users: If the trunk won't open while the key fob is in your pocket, step back just a little bit and try again. Works every time.

[TiAg335i]

Originally Posted by bigdeal

here is another one, while in the "Check" Mode if you press the BC button and hold it for 5sec it will display the fault code. assuming you are looking at a fault (my car keeps telling me a light bulb is out!!! I pressed the button long enough hoping the fault will reset instead I got the fault code)

I have the same problem with the lightbulb warning...and all of the exterior bulbs appear to be working...does this get rid of the warning?

[BMW320i]

Originally Posted by jmonier

Ummmm....not exactly. Pulling the stalk is momentary and flashes the lights (which, I believe, are separate from the headlights). This works at any time. If the headlights are on they stay on low beams. If the headlights are off they stay off.

Pushing the stalk switches from low beams to high beams. This, of course, works only when the headlights are on.

Both of these features have been common to many car makes and models for many years (although most of these DO use the headlights for the flasher).

This, like almost everything in this thread, was already known to those of us who read the Owner's Manual thoroughly.

what i meant was: other than the difference that pulling is momentary and pushing is constant, there's also a difference in the lighting power...

if you pull it: you switch on the high beams, if you push it, you switch on the high beams+the xenon itself becomes stronger...

i had to let my brother wait outside the car to check if it's true or not

[cntlaw]

never knew this, thx.
our Winter this year has an unusual 26c, probably never need to use this feature.

[froman]

also, the anti-pinch feature works, but not before crunching your figure pretty good! I was showing my daughter how it worked, and I stuck my left index finger in the way. The window stopped and went back down after squishing my finger, but the f***er still hurts a little, and that was three months ago! That's what I get for being an idiot.

First car I had with this feature was a 1997 528i. The salesman demoed it using his forearm. Then I tried it, and it worked. That's how I usually demo it, and there's enough other tissue there that it doesn't hurt at all.

Yeah, in retrospect, that would've been smarter!

Sorry if this was posted earlier in the previous 19 pages of this thread.

If you want MP3 information to be displayed in your head unit but don't get any data, convert the ID tags on your MP3s to V1.1 from V2.

[FIREBALLER]

Originally Posted by rit

I read it somewhere on this board, but it was news to me and had previously been a real head scratcher:

Comfort Access Users: If the trunk won't open while the key fob is in your pocket, step back just a little bit and try again. Works every time.

or just turn your pelvis slightly

[Russellnyc]

Originally Posted by BMW320i

what i meant was: other than the difference that pulling is momentary and pushing is constant, there's also a difference in the lighting power...

if you pull it: you switch on the high beams, if you push it, you switch on the high beams+the xenon itself becomes stronger...

i had to let my brother wait outside the car to check if it's true or not

This is definitely not true for the e92 xenons where the low and highbeam are both coming from the outer projector. There's no difference in intensity.

[jmonier]

Originally Posted by BMW320i

what i meant was: other than the difference that pulling is momentary and pushing is constant, there's also a difference in the lighting power...

if you pull it: you switch on the high beams, if you push it, you switch on the high beams+the xenon itself becomes stronger...

i had to let my brother wait outside the car to check if it's true or not

I guess that I didn't explain myself well enough. My point was that you are activating entirely different lamps and NOT changing the intensity of the high beams.

When you pull the stalk, you're activating the headlight flasher. This actually turns on the INNER lamps which are NOT the high beams. This is somewhat confusing because the inner lamps are the high beams if you don't have the xenons (or with xenons prior to 2002). With xenons 2002 and later the inner lamps are for DRLs and headlight flasher ONLY. They are intended only for signaling other drivers and NOT for illuminating the road.

2002 and later xenons are both high and low beams. They get the low beams by putting a shield in front of the upper part of the light. When you push the stalk forward you raise this shield and get the full effect of the xenon. More of the light is sent to the road so it appears brighter although the xenon intensity itself is not changed.

So, pulling back activates the INNER incandesent lamps at any time. Pushing forward changes the OUTER xenon headlights from low to high beams when the headlights are on only.

[BMW320i]

Originally Posted by jmonier

I guess that I didn't explain myself well enough. My point was that you are activating entirely different lamps and NOT changing the intensity of the high beams.

When you pull the stalk, you're activating the headlight flasher. This actually turns on the INNER lamps which are NOT the high beams. This is somewhat confusing because the inner lamps are the high beams if you don't have the xenons (or with xenons prior to 2002). With xenons 2002 and later the inner lamps are for DRLs and headlight flasher ONLY. They are intended only for signaling other drivers and NOT for illuminating the road.

2002 and later xenons are both high and low beams. They get the low beams by putting a shield in front of the upper part of the light. When you push the stalk forward you raise this shield and get the full effect of the xenon. More of the light is sent to the road so it appears brighter although the xenon intensity itself is not changed.

So, pulling back activates the INNER incandesent lamps at any time. Pushing forward changes the OUTER xenon headlights from low to high beams when the headlights are on only.

now that's a nice review, thanks man, i think i understand it now...

so when you are in normal mode, not all the xenon is activated, but when you push it, it is right??
anyway we don't have DRL here, so i skipped that part

i just wanted to say that there's a difference between pulling and pushing, but i ended up knowing new info, thanks

[777ER]

Originally Posted by ezatnova

Maybe it's just random luck for me, but ANY car I've been in that has a digital odo will do that (sort of the same thing with the clocks).

My '99 Z28 doesn't do that. The key has to be turned to RUN for it to show.

[777ER]

Originally Posted by bigdeal

here is another one, while in the "Check" Mode if you press the BC button and hold it for 5sec it will display the fault code. assuming you are looking at a fault (my car keeps telling me a light bulb is out!!! I pressed the button long enough hoping the fault will reset instead I got the fault code)

A Service Engine Soon light came on yesterday and I went to check mode, it showed 'CHECK OK' and I held it down for 5 seconds, still the same thing.

Gotta make a service dept appointment...light came on at 2034 miles...pretty sure it's not the gas cap...I double checked.

[ElCapitan]

Originally Posted by BMW320i

now that's a nice review, thanks man, i think i understand it now...

so when you are in normal mode, not all the xenon is activated, but when you push it, it is right??
anyway we don't have DRL here, so i skipped that part

i just wanted to say that there's a difference between pulling and pushing, but i ended up knowing new info, thanks

When your headlights are on, the xenons are always fully activated. The lever controls a shutter that restricts the light beam when on low beam and gets out of the way when you activate (push the lever)your high beam. This prevent the xenon bulbs from burning out by flicking your xenon high beams frequently for short periods of time.

[Disco Stew]

At least I didn't know this... Saw this at the dealer the other day. They have a key fob receptor conected to the service computers. They pull all your owner info out of the fob as well as any error codes and general operational data from the onboard computer. Not sure how much they can pull from the fob. Nice time saver for the service guys.

[d3l0n]

yeah, they did that with mine, that was pretty darn cool.

Originally Posted by Disco Stew

At least I didn't know this... Saw this at the dealer the other day. They have a key fob receptor conected to the service computers. They pull all your owner info out of the fob as well as any error codes and general operational data from the onboard computer. Not sure how much they can pull from the fob. Nice time saver for the service guys.

[Iceberg]

Originally Posted by Disco Stew

They have a key fob receptor conected to the service computers. They pull all your owner info out of the fob as well as any error codes and general operational data from the onboard computer.

Now we just need to be able to buy one of those readers for the home computer.

Hmm, wonder if the fob can be triggered to turn off service lights when it is reinstalled? What else could we hope for the fob to do?

[d3l0n]

i wish that when i park and walk out the car. Holding down the lock button would lock doors, roll windows up and close mirrors!

[Luwi25]

QUICK SUMMARY SO FAR OF ALL THE DISCOVERIES

I MAY HAVE MISSED 1 OR 2 BUT I GOT MOST OF THEM. ONLY CONFUSING DISCUSSION WAS THE DTC STUFF THAT YOU CAN REVIEW ON YOUR OWN!

The reset button on the A/C when pressed after the car is off will use residual heat from the engine to keep the car warm. It really helps out in the winter when you have to make a 20-30 min stop inside a place.

Hidden trunk latch
Hold unlock button to open all widows + moonroof

Press the fold button (to fold) of your side mirrors before driving. At the speed of 25MPH it resets back to open position.

Like the E46's when the temperature drops below 37F you get a warning light about possible ice on the road.

After turning off the car flip the headlight stalk back and your headlights will stay lit for a few seconds after you lock the car.

Throw your keys into the trunk then close it, it will magically open again. Safety feature that makes it impossible to lock your keys in the trunk

Pushing your turn signal up or down after shutting off the car (and opening the door) will cause the front and rear blinkers on one side to stay illuminated. I use this when I park along a busy street and want to make sure people see my car parked on the side of the road. Pushing up on the stalk illuminates the right side, pushing down illuminates the left side.

I think it's cool that each key remembers the radio presets, seat and mirror positions, and climate control settings from the last time you used that key.

Ventilated cup holder in center console

Timed venting option. I can access the Climate menu in my iDrive and set the car to vent the air at certain times, say when I get off work, so the car will be cool. Dunno if this is available in non-iDrive cars

There is that volume/drive sensitive setting where the faster you go, the volume adjusts accordingly automatically, and also when you slow down it goes down to the starting volume it was set at. IIRC you can't even turn it off, you can only keep it at the lowest setting.

-With CA, car will only let you open the door you are closest to, so if you are at the drivers door, and someone places their hand in the passenger door, it wont open.
-Leaving your keys inside the car and trying to close the door with finger on door handle wont work, car is stopping you from being an idiot and locking yourself out.
-With CA, if you are trying to open the trunk, press the trunk button on the underside next to your license plate and then move your palm (immedietly after pressing) closer to the BMW emblem. This will cause it to open faster. Well, it does for me, thats my story and I'm sticking with it.

-Stupid North American people cannot be trusted to hold the lock button on the key fob to close windows/sunroof/mirror as can be done with CA by holding finger on lock position.

-The cruise control system actually applies your brakes and turns on brake lights if you are going downhill or lower your CC speed setting.

Instead of pushing right to go to "Navigation" each time, HOLD the controller to the right for approx. 2 seconds. It will go to your last nav screen (even if you've turned off the car in between). Same deal for "Entertainment" or "Phone." It saves you making the same old menu choices every time. EDIT - I should add, you can hit the voice command button and say "Map facing north" anytime, too. Personally, I prefer "Map, direction of travel.

CA fobs have a regular battery that you replace every so often.

First aid kit has everything but band-aids (at least mine never had any)

car can play MP3 cd's (i didnt know until a month or so ago)

E46 when you turn the ignition on to setting 1, whilst the obc is displaying miles remaining to next service, press the knob which you use to adjust the clock. This will then display the next due date for your brakes to be serviced.

The volume knob (Next to the CD slot) is also a mute button, at least for iDrive L7 system. Push it once and (on iDrive) a symbol of a speaker with a slash through it appears on the bottom of the display about a third of the way from the left. Push it again and the symbol is replaced with the sound.

If you have the lights set to auto and you want them on during the day, just tap the fog lights button.....all lights come on.

Pressumably the feature is supposed to assist in parking next to a curb. Most of the time the curb will be on the passenger side . . . so only that mirror will angle down to assist with parking.

IDRIVE hold the controller in any of the four directions to immediately jump to that section (specifically, to the last page you were at in that section)

If you use the actual key to lock the front driver door, hold the key rotated to right for a few seconds and all 4 windows (if open) will close. This might be handy if you had a bunch of passenger exit your car and forget to close the windows. For those of us with CA, we can do this without disassembling our key fob just by touching the "lock" ridges a second or two longer than normal. Besides the 4 windows, the sunroof also closes. For the 2006 models, the mirrors also fold in.

Another one... the volume knob (and on the steering wheel) will adjust the navigation speaking directions. Just dial the volume while directions are given. Same thing for the phone function (yeah, that one's a little more obvious)

here's another......lift the spare tire compartment cover up all the way to the roof of the trunk...it will click and lock in place to stay up

iDdrive only w/voice control. Some probably know this, and it is really more of a 'cool' feature than convenient. While in FM Radio or CD mode: (1) hit the voice button, and then (2) specify the radio station or CD track number. Example, "1" "0" "4" "." "3" and then 104.3 will come on. Also, while in CD, speak "track 14," then track 14 will come on. Comes in handy on big CD's, but now hardly use this since I mostly listen to Sirius. Try saying "CD Track 1" or "FM 104 point 3" or "FM Frequency 104 point 3" or whatever from any other iDrive screen. It works!

A tip to voice command users who get a lot of "I'm sorry, I didn't understand you" responses: don't talk after the beep, talk after the little icon for voice entry appears in the lower left corner of the iDrive screen (about a second after the beep). I went from a 75% success ratio with the voice recognition to near 100% when I started doing that.

when you use cruise control when the headlights are on a little marker slides around the speedometer to the speed you have set...pretty nifty

When using the MP3 player you can skip ahead 10 songs at a time by pressing the M button (I think for Manual) followed by the regular skip buttons, instead of just one at a time.

To cancel the turn signal, you don't push it the opposite direction. You push it slightly (not beyond the resistance point) in the same direction as the blinking side.

I didn't know that the car will automatically disconnect the battery if you left your lights on. It will work when you start the car again and all you have to do is reset the time and date.

Of course you can add POI to the BMW nav with a bit of know how:
http://www.bmwnavaddpoi.co.uk/

All this time, I have been saying "Map, Direction of Travel" or "Map, Facing North" at the voice entry to get the map screen. It turns out all you have to say is "Map." The computer will turn on the map in the view you used last

Pull back for flash-to-pass, the halgons will come on (quicker flashing and harmless). Push foward: Shield in xenon headlights retracts allowing full output to be released foward (that's why the cutoff is there when the low beam are on and the shield is blocking it) If xenons were used in the high beams flash-to-pass, they would have a shorter lifespan due to flashing and a longer warmup meaning they would need a few cycles or a short time of staying on to get full output. I like the BMW's flash-to-pass feature, it works good and very easy to use on those idiots cruising in the left lane when the 2 right lanes are empty.

did you guys now about the overdrive feature , the is a button behind the pedal.
if you floor your at highways speeds and click the pedal once while being floor it will make the car change to the next lower gear. It is called a kick-down switch. What it does is at wide open throttle it will down shift to the lowest possible gear (without going over the redline) in order to achieve maximum acceleration.
Very cool I love it and I probably use it almost every day.

I learned today that if I hit the cruise control lever hard it steps in 5mph increments, which essentially solves my problem for "active" cruise control.

The mirror will only tip down in reverse if you have the switch to adjust the mirror on the left mirror. You probably never noticed it until recently because you had the switch to the right mirror...

This is probably common knowledge but when at high speeds (100+), the brakes tighten up significantly and have much more race-like stopping ability. This can actually be a lifesaver, because I was hitting 120+ one time and had to stop short. The brakes were PHENOMENAL in their ability to quickly and precisely stop the car. The same goes for the steering which is absolutely wonderful at high speeds. It will tighten up automatically.

With iDrive you can set speed limit warning using voice command. Just press the voice command button, say limit and it takes you to the limit setting screen. however voice command goes inactive at this point which typically means youcan't use any more voice commands on this screen. however you can press the voice command button again and speak out the speed limit like 60 mph etc.

The odometer read out normally switches off when you stop the engine and remove the key. If you want to check the current mileage you don't need to start the engine again - just push the little black button on the instrument cluster

Do you guys know about the slots to hold toll tickets and other papers in the sun visors? I like that feature.

there are 2 ways for using high beams, either pull the lever or push it...if you push it, it will give higher beams (more than if u pull it)

If you want MP3 information to be displayed in your head unit but don't get any data, convert the ID tags on your MP3s to V1.1 from V2.

They have a key fob receptor conected to the service computers. They pull all your owner info out of the fob as well as any error codes and general operational data from the onboard computer. Not sure how much they can pull from the fob. Nice time saver for the service guys.

[sbw]

Originally Posted by ElCapitan

This prevent the xenon bulbs from burning out by flicking your xenon high beams frequently for short periods of time.

Also, for safety, BMW doesn't want you flashing your xenon high beams at people — so this way the inner halogen flashes and gets your message across without dazzling the driver.

The same is true with other carmakers' bi-xenons. There is a separate halogen for flashing.

[azbmw]

Originally Posted by jmonier

With xenons 2002 and later the inner lamps are for DRLs and headlight flasher ONLY. They are intended only for signaling other drivers and NOT for illuminating the road.

On the e92 the inner lamps illuminate the road for short periods of time when adaptive headlights are in use (turning corners). In this case the outside lamp (xenon) turns slightly illuminating around the corner while the inner lamp turns on to illuminate directly in front of the vehicle.

[BMW320i]

nice job luwi, many members needed that, no need to read the full 20 pages!!

hmmm, mods, can this thread be a sticky??