Infotainment much playback having random skips - help?

[Kapn_Krump]

Hi there,

I'm a new maverick owner have the 2026 XL and I really like it, but I have had one issue that driving me crazy - ever since I drove it off the lot when I am playing amazon music I am having random microskips, more like a hiccup, every 30 seconds or so. There's just a micropause to the music, maybe a quarter of a second, but it is very distracting and annoying. This happens with both bluetooth and wired connection. Sometimes it seems like it works great, sometimes it is really common - there just seems to be no pattern other than it always comes back.

I have had 2 other cars with android auto and this same phone with no issues.

I have searched all over to find fixes and can't find anything helpful, and everything I have tried hasn't worked.

Here's what I've tried:

Soft restart of infotainment
forgetting and re-pairing phone
turning off truck wifi (thought that would do the trick)
turning off network scanning on my phone

Lately the only thing I have found that seems to work is a complete reset of my phone every time I use the vehicle, which is annoying.

It is still under warranty, but the dealer wanted a $250 diagnostic fee which may or may not apply so I'm trying to exhaust all options on my own.

I just know this is some stupid software button and there's probably some little button I need to click off or on somewhere, but I have no idea where or what.

Any thoughts or suggestions? I'm fairly tech savvy but I cannot figure what is going on.

Sponsored

 

[El Kabong]

What phone are you using? Do you have a different phone you can use to test with?

 

[ZABSMAV]

Hi there,

I'm a new maverick owner have the 2026 XL and I really like it, but I have had one issue that driving me crazy - ever since I drove it off the lot when I am playing amazon music I am having random microskips, more like a hiccup, every 30 seconds or so. There's just a micropause to the music, maybe a quarter of a second, but it is very distracting and annoying. This happens with both bluetooth and wired connection. Sometimes it seems like it works great, sometimes it is really common - there just seems to be no pattern other than it always comes back.

I have had 2 other cars with android auto and this same phone with no issues.

I have searched all over to find fixes and can't find anything helpful, and everything I have tried hasn't worked.

Here's what I've tried:

Soft restart of infotainment
forgetting and re-pairing phone
turning off truck wifi (thought that would do the trick)
turning off network scanning on my phone

Lately the only thing I have found that seems to work is a complete reset of my phone every time I use the vehicle, which is annoying.

It is still under warranty, but the dealer wanted a $250 diagnostic fee which may or may not apply so I'm trying to exhaust all options on my own.

I just know this is some stupid software button and there's probably some little button I need to click off or on somewhere, but I have no idea where or what.

Any thoughts or suggestions? I'm fairly tech savvy but I cannot figure what is going on.

Who is your cellular service provider. Most likely a cellular problem not a thing to do with the vehicle itself. Have you tried playing a mp3 music file directly from your smartphone into Android Auto? If it doesn't drop out like you are saying Amazon Music does, them you will have confirmed it is either the Amazon app or a cellular network issue.

 

[Kapn_Krump]

Who is your cellular service provider. Most likely a cellular problem not a thing to do with the vehicle itself. Have you tried playing a mp3 music file directly from your smartphone into Android Auto? If it doesn't drop out like you are saying Amazon Music does, them you will have confirmed it is either the Amazon app or a cellular network issue.

I have 2 other cars where the android auto works just fine, and it does sometimes work fine on this one which leads me to believe it is the car, not the phone.

 

[Kapn_Krump]

What phone are you using? Do you have a different phone you can use to test with?

testing it on another phone is a good idea, I'll try that, but my phone works just fine on 2 other android auto cars and does sometimes work fine in the truck which makes me think it is not the phone.

 

[AVC]

Does the 30 second interruption happen on ALL phone audio sources; Spotify, podcasts, music library local to your phone?

The 30 second regularity would seem to be some disagreement between Mav and phone on directing audio sources, or a BT buffering issue between the phone and Mav.

I don't use Android Auto as it insists on directing all Bluetooth streams/calls to the vehicle, vs a BT headset I wear. BUT, if we're spitballing, here, I recall you can turn off receiving calls, getting notifications, etc in the vehicle settings and/or on the phone BT settings.

 

[RebellaE]

My base (non-sync) stereo had occasional "pops" followed by a second or 2 of no sound, maybe once a week. I was not sure where they were coming from within the system, but I did upgrade to a Panda Motorworks Sync 4 system about 2 months ago and the issues seem to have disappeared.

For way less than the $250 diagnostic fee, you may be able to get a replacement head unit off Ebay. There are videos on YouTube showing how to open the dash and replace the unit, swapping mine with the Panda Motoworks kit took about an hour.

 

[Tbone289]

I have 2 other cars where the android auto works just fine, and it does sometimes work fine on this one which leads me to believe it is the car, not the phone.

That might be the case, but I can tell you that I used to have issues like this when I first got my Maverick and had an Android 12 phone. That phone always worked fine in other vehicles. When I upgraded to a more powerful Android 15 phone, all of my Connected Touch Radio issues with Android Auto went away.

EDIT: Disregard, @Kapn_Krump has Sync 4

 

[El Kabong]

For way less than the $250 diagnostic fee, you may be able to get a replacement head unit off Ebay. There are videos on YouTube showing how to open the dash and replace the unit, swapping mine with the Panda Motoworks kit took about an hour.

O.P. @Kapn_Krump has a 2026 which is the new Sync 4 system. This for me works flawlessly with Amazon Music and with music I have stored locally on my Pixel 6 Pro, both wired and wireless.

O.P. therefore has a warranty should it actually be a problem with the infotainment unit.

O.P. still has not mentioned the model of phone they are using. The fact that "it works" on other Android Auto setups is a clue but not knowing what the model of phone it is prevents further armchair troubleshooting.

E.g., look at the first response here:

Sponsored