[Chiuy]

Anyone else have the Live Cockpit Pro in their BMW? I just recently got my windows tinted and the display is way dimmer than usual even though it's extremely bright. I know that there is a sensor on the left of the cockpit because when I shine the light to the sensor, my displays all gets brighten up.

Is there a way to work around it? It would suck to remove my tint after installing, but I can barely read my digital speedometer.

[thatg20guy]

See this thread (https://g20.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1628439). A lot of people with the same issues! There hasn't been a true fix from BMW but some people say dyed films work better since they do not block IR light (which is what the auto-dimming feature uses).

What type and percent tint do you have?

[GreyLVKnight]

Yupppppp. Tinted my windows to 20%. I chose non-ceramic because I had heard that would help, but it didn't. Shit is still dimmed. But to be honest, it doesn't bother me as much as I thought it would because I mostly look at my HUD instead of the cockpit. Hoping that BMW either comes out with a brightness level option in the iDrive one day (doubtful) or that someone creates a code.

[TiMSport]

It seems to be so random because I have had zero issues with it and I have a 25% ceramic tint on my car.

[Datemike]

This might be a Japanese car thing but I've seen pretty much all Hondas/Toyotas/Nissans include a physical adjustment switch for instrument cluster brightness.

Sounds like I'll have to go for a lighter tint than usual to avoid this issue. Although it seems like people have reported varying experiences, be it lighter or darker tint.

[TiMSport]

Originally Posted by Datemike

This might be a Japanese car thing but I've seen pretty much all Hondas/Toyotas/Nissans include a physical adjustment switch for instrument cluster brightness.

Sounds like I'll have to go for a lighter tint than usual to avoid this issue. Although it seems like people have reported varying experiences, be it lighter or darker tint.

Not sure what you mean because my car has a brightness adjustment switch as have all of my German built vehicles. Definitely not limited to Japanese cars.

It doesn't seem to have anything to do with the lightness/darkness of the tint. There was a conversation about this in one of my threads regarding tint for my car. It's a mystery though.

[Datemike]

Originally Posted by TiMSport

Not sure what you mean because my car has a brightness adjustment switch as have all of my German built vehicles. Definitely not limited to Japanese cars.

It doesn't seem to have anything to do with the lightness/darkness of the tint. There was a conversation about this in one of my threads regarding tint for my car. It's a mystery though.

Interesting. One of the posters above said they wish bmw would come out with an option for brightness adjustment in iDrive, and I assumed that meant there was no way to adjust brightness period aside from the sensor, my bad. Clearly shows I don't have my car yet or else I would have known

And as for tints, yeah that is what i was alluding to when I mentioned people have reported varying experiences. Some folks with darker tints don't have issues and some with lighter ones do, and there's also cases of vice versa.

[Chiuy]

Originally Posted by thatg20guy

See this thread (https://g20.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1628439). A lot of people with the same issues! There hasn't been a true fix from BMW but some people say dyed films work better since they do not block IR light (which is what the auto-dimming feature uses).

What type and percent tint do you have?

35% tint

[TiMSport]

Originally Posted by Datemike

Interesting. One of the posters above said they wish bmw would come out with an option for brightness adjustment in iDrive, and I assumed that meant there was no way to adjust brightness period aside from the sensor, my bad. Clearly shows I don't have my car yet or else I would have known

And as for tints, yeah that is what i was alluding to when I mentioned people have reported varying experiences. Some folks with darker tints don't have issues and some with lighter ones do, and there's also cases of vice versa.

If only you had your car to be able to confirm these things, huh?
As for having the ability to adjust brightness through iDrive, I have no comment on that as it never occurred to me nor do I understand what the advantage would be.

[Chiuy]

Originally Posted by TiMSport

If only you had your car to be able to confirm these things, huh?
As for having the ability to adjust brightness through iDrive, I have no comment on that as it never occurred to me nor do I understand what the advantage would be.

That would be nice if we could manually control the brightness. I would like mine at full brightness at all times even when I'm driving in the dark.

[TiMSport]

Originally Posted by Chiuy

That would be nice if we could manually control the brightness. I would like mine at full brightness at all times even when I'm driving in the dark.

We can! Do you have your car now? It's a dial to the left of the steering wheel below the air vent that allows you to manually adjust brightness.

You guys must know this!

[Datemike]

Originally Posted by TiMSport

We can! Do you have your car now? It's a dial to the left of the steering wheel below the air vent that allows you to manually adjust brightness.

You guys must know this!

Yup that's how I've seen it implemented on most cars. I never bothered to change the brightness of my instrument cluster on my F30 with tints because it worked great. But if G20 has it, I'm sure F30s did too.

[Burrcold]

Originally Posted by TiMSport

We can! Do you have your car now? It's a dial to the left of the steering wheel below the air vent that allows you to manually adjust brightness.

You guys must know this!

This does not change the brightness of the displays, only all of the other interior lighting (hvac controls, etc). And how dark the tint is absolutely has an effect on the dimming issue. It's a combination of the IR rejection and darkness of the tint. The lighter the tint and less IR reflection (I.e. non ceramic tint) and you will have a better chance of not having dimming issues.

[Chiuy]

Originally Posted by Burrcold

This does not change the brightness of the displays, only all of the other interior lighting (hvac controls, etc). And how dark the tint is absolutely has an effect on the dimming issue. It's a combination of the IR rejection and darkness of the tint. The lighter the tint and less IR reflection (I.e. non ceramic tint) and you will have a better chance of not having dimming issues.

This. It does not change the brightness of the displays. Only the interior lighting climate controls and shortcuts. Mine is non-ceramic tint.

[Datemike]

Originally Posted by Chiuy

This. It does not change the brightness of the displays. Only the interior lighting climate controls and shortcuts. Mine is non-ceramic tint.

Looks like I'll have to wait for my car and confirm it myself

Chiuy Burrcold What % tint are you guys running?

[Burrcold]

Originally Posted by Datemike

Looks like I'll have to wait for my car and confirm it myself

Chiuy Burrcold What % tint are you guys running?

I don't have my M340i anymore. If you read through the link above you will see my adventures in tinting lol. I went through 5, 6, maybe 7 tint jobs? Varying degrees of tint percentage, tint type, and tint brand.

[TiMSport]

Originally Posted by Burrcold

This does not change the brightness of the displays, only all of the other interior lighting (hvac controls, etc). And how dark the tint is absolutely has an effect on the dimming issue. It's a combination of the IR rejection and darkness of the tint. The lighter the tint and less IR reflection (I.e. non ceramic tint) and you will have a better chance of not having dimming issues.

Wrong. It most definitely does control the brightness of ALL of those items you mentioned including the displays. It wouldn't make any sense if it didn't control the brightness of the displays in addition to everything else. That's the way it has been on every car that I've owned.

I don't know if the 2020 model is different or not but I literally just went to my garage to confirm it just in case. If so.....

+1 for 2021 model M340i !

BTW, Burrcold I was trying to remember who mentioned that the darkness of the tint didn't make a difference and discovered it was you that said that. Lol.

Originally Posted by Burrcold

Tint looks great on your MW!!
The problem with the screen(s) dimming is not related to the tint percentage as much as it is related to the IR blocking percentage of the tint. Generally a higher quality ceramic tint will cause more of an issue than a dyed film will, regardless of how dark or light you go. Some people are even having the issue with no tint at all! It is still an issue, but definitely no understanding or resolution at this time. If you aren't experiencing it, great! I went through 5 maybe 6 different tint applications while testing the issue out...sucked.

[TiMSport]

Originally Posted by Chiuy

This. It does not change the brightness of the displays. Only the interior lighting climate controls and shortcuts. Mine is non-ceramic tint.

What model year is your M340i? It works for my '21.

[premier3is]

Originally Posted by Burrcold

I don't have my M340i anymore. If you read through the link above you will see my adventures in tinting lol. I went through 5, 6, maybe 7 tint jobs? Varying degrees of tint percentage, tint type, and tint brand.

Wait what? You got rid of the car? When did this happen lol?

[TiMSport]

Lol. Rumor has it he went with an Audi.

[TiMSport]

BTW guys, I'm still waiting to hear back from you about the inability to dim your displays! I find it hard to believe I'm the only one that can do that. Lol.

[Burrcold]

Originally Posted by TiMSport

Wrong. It most definitely does control the brightness of ALL of those items you mentioned including the displays. It wouldn't make any sense if it didn't control the brightness of the displays in addition to everything else. That's the way it has been on every car that I've owned.

I don't know if the 2020 model is different or not but I literally just went to my garage to confirm it just in case. If so.....

+1 for 2021 model M340i !

BTW, Burrcold I was trying to remember who mentioned that the darkness of the tint didn't make a difference and discovered it was you that said that. Lol.

If you read my quote, it clearly says "dimming is not related the tint percentage AS MUCH as it is related to the IR blocking...". If you actually read through the tint thread you will see that in my testing, I found, IR blocking of ceramic tint caused the most dimming effects. That being said, going from 35% to 20% (17% VLT) caused some dimming as well.

You can say "+1 for 2021 model" all you want, but 2021 models are still having the same issue across many BMW models. Just like many 2020 owners didn't notice an issue, you obviously got lucky if yours doesn't do it.

The problem isn't with the brightness wheel anyway. That can be set to max. The issue is with the auto-dim feature that uses the light sensor built into the gauge cluster. Close your doors and shine a flashlight into the upper left corner of the gauges and tell me if your digital cockpit brightens up a bit.

As I mention before, this is happening on bone stock no tint models as well, so there is obviously an issue that BMW has yet to address.