Android Auto - playing music from phone

[bazzabear]

I wasn't sure whether to put this into here or mobiles, but here will do!

M-I-L has just got a car with Android Auto. She doesn't want to pay for any subscription based music service, but would quite like to be able to play music she already owns (on CD) via her phone.

So, we've got an external CD drive so she can rip the music to her laptop in the first place ready to copy to her phone.

But I'm used to Apple infrastructure, so a couple of tips are needed so I can help her accurately.

Firstly, the ripping to the laptop. I would normally just use iTunes. But is there a better choice because she's android based?

And then I assume her phone will have a built in music player. But is there going to be an optimum way of getting the music files on to it? Maybe an app for windows? Or is the music folder on the phone going to be obvious so I can just copy the files across myself?

I'm trying to find out from her what her phone is for sure, but I think I remember it being a Samsung of some kind.

Thanks for any advice!

 

[nlel1975]

Regarding the music player, I use the free Pulsar app under Android Auto. You can download it from the play store.

 

[5abr3]

Assuming that the laptop is Windows then I know that the following workflow works as its what I use:
- Rip CD to computer WITHOUT DRM ENABLED (if you have DRM on then the phone will flat out reject to work with the file). I use Windows media player to do this as I'm not in Apple's walled garden.
- Quick note: sometimes WMP doesn't like ripping discs in quick succession on my W10 install so you might need to close and reopen WMP between CDs
- Copy the files to the phone, most Apps will search the Music folder first so just copy them there
- Once on the phone Android auto should offer you any compatible Apps to launch and play media from
- I use VLC as my default media player on my S21 as Samsung music won't run some file types (they seem to have an on/off relationship over wma files. using VLC is less effort than re-ripping CDs)

Edit: various typing errors as usual...

 

[jpaul]

I'd used foobar for ripping and labelling and re-encoding cds/vinyl as 256aac V
if you use itunes can't you rip with itunes and then copy files onto her phone though ... or? put the tracks on a usb drive and plug that directly into car HU ?

have used foobar 2000, with the discogs plugins when digitizing vinyl, this enables you to manually identify the source media and then associate the correct track names/metadata.
maybe the releases of the discs/cd's that did not work are not in the database (seems unlikely) but there must be other releases that could be used in the like of foobar 2000

 

[nlel1975]

Once you have ripped the files from CD in mp3 format, you simply plug your Android phone into the USB port and copy and paste the files to the phone which will appear alongside your drives. For example this is how my Samsung Galaxy A34 shows when plugged in...

The Pulsar music app will allow you to select files and folders and allow you to create playlists.

 

[Resident]

Presumably if it's AA enabled there's also a USB port somewhere so a much easier option would just to rip the CDs to MP3 and bang on a usb stick.

On the subscription music platform side of things. I was reticent about doing it but then my phone provider offered Spotify Premium as part of the deal for 2 years. Now I wouldn't be without it. Currently on the Family plan so everyone in the house has it

 

[nlel1975]

Presumably if it's AA enabled there's also a USB port somewhere so a much easier option would just to rip the CDs to MP3 and bang on a usb stick.

Yeah but what if she wants to use Android Auto for other things such as Google maps as well as music. There’s also Google assistant for hands free control of everything, just say “Hey Google” followed by your voice command. Needs an active data connection though for Google Assistant to work.

 

[ShivP]

Regarding the music player, I use the free Pulsar app under Android Auto. You can download it from the play store.

Just go for this with the physical files on the phone, or you can even use Spotify with the 'Local Files' folder

 

[jpaul]

would be interesting to know what kind of productivity you achieve for ripping, all told best I could achieve was maybe 3-4 cd's an hour - becomes pretty tedious,
such that free/advert spotify might seem an ok compromise for car use,
adverts don't seem to be that intrusive from limited trial use I made of it

 

[ianh]

would be interesting to know what kind of productivity you achieve for ripping, all told best I could achieve was maybe 3-4 cd's an hour - becomes pretty tedious,

Back in 2002 I ripped 6100 files (song and album art) from 332 CD's into 192k MP3's using media player on WinXP - it took about a 3 months to finish and was the most bored I've ever been on my PC. I know the exact number (6122 files from 332 CD's) because I still have them all and even have them backed up twice as I absolutely hate relying on having an internet connection for music, even though its "the modern way" I suppose - I'm old enough to remember the pre-internet days

If I lost everything tomorrow I'd just have to "download" them instead as I'd never waste all that time ripping ever again.