Playing CDs in a car without a CD player

[MagicBoy]

I can't speak to Android phones, never owned one. The Apple gear when presented via the USB will present the music as it appears on the device as long as the music has the correct tags. So Artist, Album, Genre etc plus custom playlists.

 

[whitecrook]

You don't need Android Auto to do this, any phone that you can connect via USB, AUX or Bluetooth will suffice, you create everything on the phone so no need to mess about creating playlists on a USB stick.

yeah but you still have to put the music on to the device. A phone used in this way becomes a glorified USB stick anyway. Plus you need to charge it etc etc.

A usb stick - copy mp3s on, plug in . That's it.

The OP was looking for a solution to play CDs. I would say a phone if you wanted to access all the goodness on a phone like bbc sounds, apple music/spotify/amazon/podcasts, etc etc where the user might already have invested into a system of some sort.

But in this case a USB stick seems like the most logical solution .

I used USB stick, and phone for most of my car entertainment. Pressing voice control and asking for almost* any song to play was pretty neat trick. you could say to passengers name some music and it's would bring it right up. I also used a CD about twice. and my bw would rip the CD to the hard drive as well which was pretty neat. But i only did one cd. Phone was easier for me. But not a solution in this case either.

 

[dlockers]

Download 'Casette' (or whatever the latest incarnate is) and get the music from Mexico. Saves ripping it yourself and is roughly legal.

 

[visibleman]

Download 'Casette' (or whatever the latest incarnate is) and get the music from Mexico. Saves ripping it yourself and is roughly legal.

What's "Casette"?

 

[MagicBoy]

yeah but you still have to put the music on to the device. A phone used in this way becomes a glorified USB stick anyway. Plus you need to charge it etc etc.

A usb stick - copy mp3s on, plug in . That's it.

OPs already said it's not practical.

So after spending ages organising the MP3s in folders, etc. in Windows, everything is organised by artist/album in iDrive Not so practical for classic music.

I don't suppose there's a way of showing files by folder? My 2010 Audi does this, but it's ancient.

1) OPs parent is likely already carrying a phone around with them.
2) The car will charge/power it via the USB port.

 

[dlockers]

What's "Casette"?

Not called Casette (and may not have ever been ) but I meant Lidar:
https://github.com/Lidarr/Lidarr

 

[jpaul]

So after spending ages organising the MP3s in folders, etc. in Windows, everything is organised by artist/album in iDrive Not so practical for classic music.

are you tagging using an online database ?
maybe need make up playlists with your/his favourite groups of pieces - piano concertos, symphonies, choral ....

 

[mjt]

are you tagging using an online database ?
maybe need make up playlists with your/his favourite groups of pieces - piano concertos, symphonies, choral ....

Aye it’s using CDDB or whatever EAL uses. I was just expecting to be able to organise/view the MP3s via a folder structure, but I don’t think it’s possible on the latest iDrive. We didn’t bother creating m3u/playlists.
If it’s by album/artist then so be it. At least we copied the CD photos into each folder.

Maybe I’m just old fashioned. Even on Spotify I look through an artist’s discography and play albums.

 

[nlel1975]

I was just expecting to be able to organise/view the MP3s via a folder structure.

As I mentioned earlier when I copy my folders onto the microSDXC card in my Android phone, they appear as folders in the Pulsar music app I use. It’s then just a case pressing on a folder to create a playlist.

Easy peasy, I don’t really like the way iOS handles music as you have to do it all through iTunes.

 

[mjt]

As I mentioned earlier when I copy my folders onto the microSDXC card in my Android phone, they appear as folders in the Pulsar music app I use. It’s then just a case pressing on a folder to create a playlist.

Easy peasy, I don’t really like the way iOS handles music as you have to do it all through iTunes.

I’m talking about iDrive. He’s not using apple CarPlay.

 

[nlel1975]

I’m talking about iDrive. He’s not using apple CarPlay.

I’ve never heard of it, is it some kind of cloud service? Would you not need a data connection to use it?

 

[jpaul]

I’ve never heard of it, is it some kind of cloud service? Would you not need a data connection to use it?

Idrive the moniker for the bmw infotainment ecosystem ?

if you don't want to link up a phone everytime you get into your bmw you have to live with its restrictions, like, it not being, a nativeAndroid system,
but , I am intereseted to know if you do want to use car play or AA, whether the infotainment experience is way better, perhaps using itunes to index your personal music.

 

[nlel1975]

Idrive the moniker for the bmw infotainment ecosystem ?

Yeah here’s the wiki for it...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDrive

 

[whitecrook]

What version of i drive is it

what car is it

i find it hard to believe you can’t select mp3 by folder

 

[jpaul]

interesting https://www.bimmerfest.com/threads/music-from-usb.1396168/

I just received my 2021 M550 and again, no success on the drive. I tried the five drive swap trick, nothing. I reset the car (nothing). Never more than a few songs and no playlists at all. I even called Genius ... I'll stop there.

THE FIX
iDrive 6.0 will read an iTunes library with nested folders (..\music\artist\album\song). As long as they are formatted properly (ANSI - no UTF8), it will read playlists in a playlist folder off the root. iDrive 7.0 doesn't like that format. All playlists have to in the root of the USB - no subfolders. And the songs can only be one folder deep (actually two). Using my original iTunes library I removed the album folders and moved all of the songs under the artist (over 9000 tracks - I used a script). To modify the playlists, I imported the new library into iTunes (turn off music management) and double-click my old playlists. Using Notepad ++, I was able to quickly modify the playlists so that they matched the new library.


...
My opinion at this point, it takes the album artwork from Spotify. That’s the only thing I can figure. As an example, I loaded Tom Petty‘s Damn the Torpedoes Deluxe onto my USB Drive. The artwork has the Deluxe logo. The BMW shows it without. I NEVER loaded a Tom Petty album before, nor did I ever use the artwork it’s displaying. Where else could it have found it? I will try changing the album name and track names to see if I can ”fake it out” LOL.

 

[mjt]

interesting https://www.bimmerfest.com/threads/music-from-usb.1396168/

Interesting indeed. Why the **** is everything so complicated these days?

Just give me a list of tracks in the folder structure that I created

 

[Clarkey]

I think it's fair to assume that it's part of their deal with Spotify to make it difficult to listen to music from other sources.

 

[mjt]

I think it's fair to assume that it's part of their deal with Spotify to make it difficult to listen to music from other sources.

Cynical, yet interesting, take. I use Spotify on occasion in my i3 if I don’t want the radio, but the fact I have a phone signal dead spot on my way to work is a problem and I’m not going to make everything I might listen to in Spotify available offline..

Money talks I guess.

 

[OllyM]

I think it's fair to assume that it's part of their deal with Spotify to make it difficult to listen to music from other sources.

I doubt it's anything to do with that, in reality the number of people who play music from USB is probably minuscule these days so little time will have been spent coding the functionality for the newer iDrive software. To be honest I assumed the USB ports were for power only!

Spotify isn't the only online music service available via ConnectedMusic anyway, there are a few choices - it's meant to be an open platform.

 

[jpaul]

I think it is ... but I learned google/android-automotive as used in polestar 2 and new renault appear to be ***-over customers - I'd thought it was the white hope.
they don't have a usb media player, at all ! just nice nav

https://www.polestar-forum.com/threads/audiowagon-usb-media-player-for-android-automotive-os.3450/

Indeed... best not dwell on yet another broken promise from Polestar. This app proves it's entirely possible which makes it even more inexcusable that a year after first deliveries a third party app is needed!

Article discussing BMW adoption of Android Autmotive OS : From Product to Platform: How can BMW compete with Platform Giants?

...
Even though the advantages of Android Automotive OS appear to be magnificent, several BMW experts raised doubts against the option. BMW would lose control over the development and rollout of a central component of its cars and would have to rely on Google’s decisions regarding new features, bug fixes, and also new version rollouts. Moreover, Google would control which models or markets should first receive any OS version. Besides these strategic decisions, experts mentioned that BMW would lose an important customer contact point. While Android Automotive OS provides options for user interface customization, customers might think of Google, not BMW, as the system’s provider. The customer experience during a car ride would no longer be exclusively designed by BMW, but a large part would be determined by Google. Strong brand bonding is especially important in the automotive market because cars and driving are especially associated with customer emotions.

Furthermore, experts elaborated that the implementation of Android Automotive OS implicates relinquishing any ambition on digital business model implementation inside BMW’s cars. Since Google would manage all transactions on its platform and capture a predefined percentage of each transaction, the car manufacturer would not be involved. In line with the smartphone market in which manufacturers’ value capture is limited to the sale of the device itself, BMW’s business model would be limited to the sale of the individual car and several associated maintenance services. The role of a platform owner with scaling platform businesses is obsessed by Google. Experts from BMW’s strategic departments link this aspect to the changing nature of the automotive market. While large parts of this business are conducted with sales or lease contracts, an evolution toward a more usage-based business model is expected. Even though selling cars is expected to remain as a lucrative business in the future, the market share of mobility services will grow. Independent of specific solutions such as car-sharing, ridesharing, and ride-hailing, these businesses are usually used and managed via online apps. As soon as digital platforms are available, the integration of these services with cars appears as logical step. However, the implementation of Android Automotive OS would mandate these transactions to be exclusively managed by Google. BMW would not be involved in such business models.
- dollars count above, potentially, more efficient engineering solution.