In this review, I look at the MAYTON Auto Pro X Adapter, a wireless Android Auto adapter with a laptop-inspired power feature.
You can buy this dongle for $142.48 (with a 5% voucher) from their store on Amazon US – https://amzn.to/3YvyCNN. Other Amazon regions will likely follow soon.
TLDR: The Mayton Auto Pro X is a wireless adapter that allows you to use both Android Auto and the full Samsung DeX desktop experience on your car’s infotainment display. The slim, circular adapter connects wirelessly to your Android phone and provides a good experience for Android Auto, with low latency and responsive controls. However, the DeX mode has some performance issues, including audio/video sync delays and lag in fast-paced games. While the ability to use DeX in your car is convenient, the overall wireless performance could be improved. Overall, the Auto Pro X offers a novel way to bring your phone’s features to your car’s display, but some refinements could make the experience even better.
The Auto Pro X from MAYTON brings something new to the table when it comes to wireless adapters. Inside its slim Apple-like, circular puck design isn’t just a wireless Android Auto adapter, it also offers the ability to wirelessly connect your Samsung phone to display the Samsung DeX laptop-like platform onto your car’s infotainment display.
Features & Design
In the box, you get an instruction manual, the Auto Pro X adapter, two USB power cables and two cable straps. The design of the Auto Pro X adapter is a slim round puck shape, with a white-coloured silicone top and bottom casing.
A silver aluminium edge wraps around the adapter and features a single USB-C port, and a small status light sits alongside it. On top, the X of the Auto Pro X logo also acts as a button to interact with the Dex system UI.
Boot-Up & Main Menu
When you connect the Android Auto-only adapter to your car’s Android Auto USB port, it powers up and displays its main menu interface in about 21 seconds. From this menu, you can switch back to the car system, view the Bluetooth ID for phone pairing, and see the firmware version and language toggle (between Korean and English) at the top of the display. Below these elements, there are two large buttons for selecting the main functions: Android Auto and Auto Pro X (Samsung’s DeX mode). The Auto Pro X option includes a small configuration button. Pressing it reveals three options: adjusting the display configuration between full-screen and a forced 16:9 ratio for portrait displays, and configuring the touch input of the adapter UI.
The adapter manual states that you first have to connect the adapter to wireless Android Auto. After connecting to its Bluetooth profile on my Samsung S22, I soon saw Android Auto on my car display within 17 seconds.
Wireless Android Auto
Android Auto over wireless was great. It was quick to respond to my touches and felt very native. It had under 1-second delay in audio feedback, wheel controls worked just fine and the Google Assistant could hear my voice through my car’s built-in microphone.
The audio sounded great, the call delay was very little and its quality also sounded good too. Overall I was impressed with its Android Auto performance and I soon felt it was time to dive deeper into its DeX mode.
Auto Pro X (DeX) Mode
I next turned to my Samsung S22 and selected the DeX option from the pull-down control panel screen after selecting the Auto Pro X option from its main menu. Since I had already connected to the adapter over Android Auto, DeX already had the adapter listed as an available connection. Tapping the discovered adapter soon saw Samsung DeX fire up on my car’s display in no time. I was now looking at the Samsung DeX laptop interface, full of its many opportunities!
The resolution feed of DeX was rather high on my VW Golf 9.2” Discover Pro Display, which made the DeX desktop look a little small and it made it hard to interact with through touch input alone. Sadly, heading over to the Settings app left me with no option to change it to anything lower, so I carried on regardless. But being able to change the DPI or be able to select a range of resolutions would have been a better experience here.
From here, you can use DeX as you would if you had it connected to a display monitor, albeit with some connectivity limitations on the car display. You can still connect to the mobile’s Bluetooth to connect a Bluetooth keyboard or mouse, and you could also connect a wireless BT wand remote for easy interaction with the platform. Touch pass-through is supported by default, but as I mentioned earlier, it can be a little tricky to interact with its smaller UI elements.
App Performance
I fired up the YouTube app to playback my audio delay test video, which displayed a result of +400ms of audio delay. This means there will be some slight noticeable audio-to-video sync delay, which is mostly ok for casual viewing. Using DeX, I could view the video in several ways: windowed, pinned, snapped to the side, or full screen. All of these methods can be done by dragging the app window to the top or sides of the display and having the app window snap to the selected area of the screen. You can also fire up the Auto Pro X Android App on the phone, and in its Remote section, you can also toggle fullscreen, snap left and right and minimise selected app windows running on the car display.
Netflix seems to ignore this behaviour, ignoring full screen when viewing its main menu until you start a video. This is likely a limitation of the app in DeX mode rather than an issue with the adapter itself. Netflix showed some frame drops in its video playback, and like YouTube, there was also a slightly noticeable audio-to-video delay. Again, nothing drastic enough to distract from casual viewing, but the delay over Wi-Fi is certainly affecting the overall enjoyment this adapter can offer.
Gaming on the Auto Pro X
The lag issue continues when playing fast-paced games over the Auto Pro X adapter. Racing and FPS games are very sensitive to any form of lag in controller input as well as audio and video delay. Games such as Call of Duty and GRID were far from playable and you’ll have a better experience playing more casual and less intense games over the Auto Pro X connection. Artefact compression was also present and generally a little bit of a disappointment overall.
My Impressions
Using DeX wirelessly on the Auto Pro X did sound like a great idea. However, I do think it might have been better if MAYTON added a second USB-C port on the adapter for a direct phone connection and cut the wireless functionality for a faster, less laggy experience for those demanding it.
Would I buy this over an Android AI Box? Possibly. The Auto Pro X has some nice features, such as having all my apps readily available and synced from my wirelessly connected Android phone. Security is also a benefit of the Auto Pro X over an AI Box, which could be stolen from the car with all accounts and apps already signed into it. Not having to think about an internet connection is also an advantage over supplying an AI Box with a tethered phone or separate SIM card.
So there are plenty of positives going for this Auto Pro X adapter. Perhaps a wait for version 2.0 (if that ever comes our way) could be a better outcome here. My suggestions for version 2.0 would be a little more attention to its general wireless performance, and screen resolution options, and offer a lag-free wired mode by directly connecting the phone to a second port on the adapter.
TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 – Brief overview
0:51 – Unboxing
1:16 – Features & Design
2:13 – In-Car Demo Install
2:28 – Main Menu Interface
2:50 – Wireless Android Auto
4:40 – Auto Pro X (DEX) Mode
5:26 – Auto Pro X App
6:28 – YouTube App
8:08 – Windows & Screen Split Modes
10:02 – BT Controllers & Gaming
12:31 – Netflix App
14:39 – Spotify App & Wheel Controls
15:09 – Calling via Dex
15:47 – My Impressions
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