Car stereo with USB stick- off-topic maybe?

[Fahzz]

Apologies if this is too off-topic for this forum. I have tried to find
some answers elsewhere but have been unsuccessful.

I have been using a 64 GB USB stick in my car stereo system to play
MP3s. I have a 2013 Acura TSX without the topline navigation technology
package.

The music plays, but for whatever reason it only plays about half of the
tracks on the stick. By that I mean it will only play artist folders 1
through 433,when there are probably 700 such folders. I always set it
to random, and eventually I noticed that I wasn't hearing all of the
music.

When I was troubleshooting this the other day, I played the folders
sequentially and at the end of the album in folder 433 it reverted back
to folder 1 rather than going to 434.

I use the same folder structure that I used for my squeezeboxen and I'm
wondering if there are certain limitations for using a USB stick that I
don't know about.

Any tips or suggestions would be deeply appreciated. Thanks in advance.



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[DJanGo]

Hi

use / trial a smaller (like)32gb stick



Gruss

Jan
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[bonze]

Post by Fahzz
Apologies if this is too off-topic for this forum. I have tried to find
some answers elsewhere but have been unsuccessful.
I have been using a 64 GB USB stick in my car stereo system to play
MP3s. I have a 2013 Acura TSX without the topline navigation technology
package.
The music plays, but for whatever reason it only plays about half of the
tracks on the stick. By that I mean it will only play artist folders 1
through 433,when there are probably 700 such folders. I always set it
to random, and eventually I noticed that I wasn't hearing all of the
music.
When I was troubleshooting this the other day, I played the folders
sequentially and at the end of the album in folder 433 it reverted back
to folder 1 rather than going to 434.
I use the same folder structure that I used for my squeezeboxen and I'm
wondering if there are certain limitations for using a USB stick that I
don't know about.
Any tips or suggestions would be deeply appreciated. Thanks in advance.Some car stereos have a restriction on the number of folders that can be

'supported' by their software.
I had the same experience with my wife's Sony stereo, it would only see
a number of artists and then ignore others.
She only ever uses random mix, and so it does not really matter how the
stick is organised.
I combined albums into one folder per artist.
i.e. instead of:
Artist A - album 1
- album 2
- album 3 etc.

I just have one folder for Artist A, the software still recognises the
separate albums from the tags and it frees up a few folder entries.

Try reducing the number of folders and see if other artists re-appear.
Bit of a pain, but it may help.

Try looking in the manual to



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[bakker_be]

My car (Renault Grand Scénic) only sees ± 255 files/folder in ± 255
folders, so I made Mediamonkey create 100 folders (00 -> 99) into which
it randomly distributes the songs, artwork removed, converted to 192kB/S
ABR, ReplayGain hardcoded into the files. This works perfectly for my
16GB sticks and no need to have the headunit handle the random play, as
it's unable to do this from all folders at once ...



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[foxx]

There is a very simple answer to this problem. Car stereo systems
usually only support the FAT32 file system. And most of them take this
literally, which means that they will only read the 'first' 32 GB.
I stumbled into the exact same trap when I tried to be absolutely
super-smart by investing into a 256 GB stick ... grrrmpf ...


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[cliveb]

Post by foxx
There is a very simple answer to this problem. Car stereo systems
usually only support the FAT32 file system. And most of them take this
literally, which means that they will only read the 'first' 32 GB.
I stumbled into the exact same trap when I tried to be absolutely
super-smart by investing into a 256 GB stick ... grrrmpf ...

Where'd you get that info?
My understanding is that FAT32 has a maximum volume size of 2TB



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[foxx]

Post by cliveb
Where'd you get that info?
My understanding is that FAT32 has a maximum volume size of 2TB

It has a 2GB-per-file restriction. I think you must have mixed that up.


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[foxx]

just to clarify: You can store more than 32GB on a FAT 32 medium, but it
will not necessarily be recognized by FAT32-only devices.


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[cliveb]

Post by foxx
It has a 2GB-per-file restriction. I think you must have mixed that up.

This is also at odds with my understanding:

1). I was not getting mixed up between a 2GB file size limit and a 2TB
volume size limit in FAT32.
2). I thought the file size limit for FAT32 was 4GB.



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[DJanGo]

Post by foxx
It has a 2GB-per-file restriction. I think you must have mixed that up.

grmblfix..

FAT had a 2 GB per File restricition
FAT32 has a 4 GB per File restriction



Gruss

Jan
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[foxx]

I stand corrected!


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[alfista]

I can only agree with others, car stereos are pretty useless at this.
A few ideas:
If you remove one of the working folders, are you then able to play
folder #434? That would suggest a limit to number of files/folders.
For LMS to work well tagging is essential, car stereos can be even more
finicky, checked tags for the first non playing files?
Any "odd characters" in file/folder name for the folder where is goes
wrong.


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[Mnyb]

Thanks to everyone that replied to my question. I knew I could count on
the illustrious members of this group for information. It appears that I
have run into the folder limitation problem. I understand that I have to
reduce the number of folders under some magic number, but I have
questions.
If I reduced the number of artist folders less than the magic number,
and insert each track by that artist into the artist folder, without
using separate album subfolders, that this should solve my problem. i.e.
If I have 500 artist folders with 22 to 30 each I should be okay?
Or can I just dump 500 tracks each into 10 folders?This would be the
easiest way to get this accomplished.
My guess is that since the tag information is already in the tracks I
don't have to worry about album designation, and I only listen to the
music on random play anyway. The head unit in the car is extremely
primitive in this respect.
Thanks again!

Does it recognise the tags while browsing or does it just see the file
names ? I are you in reality browsing albums or folders from the head
unit ?



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Bedroom/Office: Boom
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[Fahzz]

Thanks to everyone that replied to my question. I knew I could count on
the illustrious members of this group for information. It appears that I
have run into the folder limitation problem. I understand that I have to
reduce the number of folders under some magic number, but I have
questions.

If I reduced the number of artist folders less than the magic number,
and insert each track by that artist into the artist folder, without
using separate album subfolders, that this should solve my problem. i.e.
If I have 500 artist folders with 22 to 30 each I should be okay?

Or can I just dump 500 tracks each into 10 folders?This would be the
easiest way to get this accomplished.

My guess is that since the tag information is already in the tracks I
don't have to worry about album designation, and I only listen to the
music on random play anyway. The head unit in the car is extremely
primitive in this respect.

Thanks again!



Living Room: Duet, Adcom GFA 545II, Adcom GFP 555II, Polk SDA 2B
Dining Room: Paradigm Atom Monitor v.5
Bedroom: SB3, Pioneer VSX 5700S,Pinnacle PN 5+, M&K VX-7 Subwoofer
Anywhere Else As Needed: Boom
Router: Asus RT-N56U
Server: LMS Version 7.8.0, Acer Aspire Laptop (Wired...Finally), Windows
7 Home
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[toby10]

My current and previous Cadillac DTS audio systems both used USB and
both have the restriction of 255 files.
Seems to be a rather common restriction.


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[jimbobvfr400]

I'd say it depends on the head unit. In my experience most of them I've
had have had some sort or weird limit or idiosyncratic behaviour.

I've had a few USB capable aftermarket ones in various motors. A
surprisingly large proportion have read the tags OK, but playback the
tracks in whatever order they were copied to the stick, most
infuriating, or have limits on either the number of folders or levels of
folder they can cope with.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk




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[Mnyb]

Post by jimbobvfr400
I'd say it depends on the head unit. In my experience most of them I've
had have had some sort or weird limit or idiosyncratic behaviour.
I've had a few USB capable aftermarket ones in various motors. A
surprisingly large proportion have read the tags OK, but playback the
tracks in whatever order they were copied to the stick, most
infuriating, or have limits on either the number of folders or levels of
folder they can cope with.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Yes you browse to and start to play a folder but sees the tag on the
display .
That's when file names with track numbers in front actually become
usefull , since I got squeezeboxes and LMS software I don't preceded
file names with track number anymoore but the practice have it uses with
more primitive equipment . Like my own cowon MP3 player ( been in a
drawer a long time now ) that's do play flac but can only handle mp3
tags ?



--------------------------------------------------------------------
Main hifi: Touch + CIA PS +MeridianG68J MeridianHD621 MeridianG98DH 2 x
MeridianDSP5200 MeridianDSP5200HC 2 xMeridianDSP3100 +Rel Stadium 3
sub.
Bedroom/Office: Boom
Kitchen: Touch + powered Fostex PM0.4
Misc use: Radio (with battery)
iPad1 with iPengHD & SqueezePad
(in storage SB3, reciever ,controller )
server HP proliant micro server N36L with ClearOS Linux

http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html
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[w3wilkes]

My car plays in the order the songs are recorded. It has a multidisc
CD/MP3 player so I am careful to burn discs with albums/songs in the
order I expect to hear them in. The only other option I have is to set
playback to random.



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[Fahzz]

Just getting back on this.
Based on reading in this and some other forums, I determined that my
system had a limit of 512 folders. I then eliminated individual album
folders, and put the tracks for each artist into one folder for each
artist. After this drudgery, I got the number of artist folders down to
508, and all is well.
My system doesn't read tags very well and only shows artist name but
that's not a problem for me personally.
Couple of things I learned:
There's a free application called Mp3Gain that levels the gain (really
necessary for car audio), and there's another one that I've used that
solves the problem of USB ordering of folders by ripping date/time and
changes to alphabetical, but I can't find the name of it right now. Do
some googling and you'll find it.
Thanks again for the input.
Now on to my wife's new Mazda 3 with a fancy/schmantzy "infotainment'
system that does not like to play music from a USB...



Living Room: Duet, Adcom GFA 545II, Adcom GFP 555II, Polk SDA 2B
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[Dogberry2]

Interesting topic. I use a 128GB stick, but it's far from full, because
my Ford SYNC system seems to have a limit of 10,000 tracks. I have just
about 9600 tracks (over 900 albums, all in separate folders by artist)
and it can play any of them, but if I add enough to hit the 10,000 mark,
it weirds out. When I add new albums, I have to decide which older ones
to remove, to keep the total tracks within that limit. It also does okay
with the basic tags - album/artist/track/genre - but has no use for
anything else. That's okay; it's all I really need in the car. I usually
just say "play album <whatever>" or "play playlist <whatever>" and that
works great. The only complaint I have is that it apparently has some
sort of memory leak or something, because after several weeks of use it
suddenly starts proclaiming that its index is full (though I haven't
changed anything or added any music), and then it won't recognize any of
my playlists. I have to reset the system and let it re-index everything,
which takes about 15 or 20 minutes. But then it's okay again for another
month or two.

Overall, it still beats the hell out of all the other ways I've used to
get music in the car: 4-track tapes (yes, they existed), 8-track tapes,
AM radio (yikes!) and FM (bleah), boxes of cassettes, and big fat books
filled with CDs. No more fumbling through physical media trying to find
the album I want: I just tap the "speech command" button and tell it
what to play, and it starts playing instantly. Beautiful!


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[jimbobvfr400]

Well my Sony unit displays the number on the filename but ignores them
for play order, even windows doesn't necessarily copy in the right
order, I ended up using a small piece of software called copy in order,
which was specifically made with that in mind.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk




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[Mnyb]

Post by jimbobvfr400
Well my Sony unit displays the number on the filename but ignores them
for play order, even windows doesn't necessarily copy in the right
order, I ended up using a small piece of software called copy in order,
which was specifically made with that in mind.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Wow :D interesting ,
http://www.softpedia.com/progDownload/Copy-In-Order-Download-208798.html

Copy in order I'll remember that one .my MP3 player atleast respect
alphabetical,order



--------------------------------------------------------------------
Main hifi: Touch + CIA PS +MeridianG68J MeridianHD621 MeridianG98DH 2 x
MeridianDSP5200 MeridianDSP5200HC 2 xMeridianDSP3100 +Rel Stadium 3
sub.
Bedroom/Office: Boom
Kitchen: Touch + powered Fostex PM0.4
Misc use: Radio (with battery)
iPad1 with iPengHD & SqueezePad
(in storage SB3, reciever ,controller )
server HP proliant micro server N36L with ClearOS Linux

http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html
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