Playing my own music in a car?

[clockworks]

For nearly 20 years I've been playing ripped mp3 files in my cars. This is music that I own on CD, and have ripped myself.
Back in the day I had it on mp3 CDs that I burnt, then on USB memory sticks that I could just plug into the car.

It seems like car manufacturers are starting to make this more difficult, with some being completely unable to read mp3 from a USB drive - seems to be an Android Automotive thing?

Is there an easy way to do this wirelessly via Apple Carplay, from my iPhone, on an Android Automotive infotainment system?

The music that I want to play is several thousand individual tracks in one big folder.

[Mandat]

Which car do you have?

I have over 5,000 mp3's on a usb drive that is permanently plugged in the USB slot in both my cars. These play through the in car audio system (Ford & Mercedes) and don't interact with Android Auto, which I also use all the time in both cars.

[NDA]

clockworks said:

Is there an easy way to do this wirelessly via Apple Carplay, from my iPhone, on an Android Automotive infotainment system?

The music that I want to play is several thousand individual tracks in one big folder.

I use Roon to manage a large music library from a NAS drive at home - it's also how I control various speakers around the house. It links seamlessly with Qobuz too - providing liner notes, artwork, credits (and bios) on your own library.

One of the features with Roon is their app called Roon ARC which enables access to your library whilst on the move - very simple to set up and I've used it all over Europe in the car without an issue. Quite weird (to me at least) to be listening in rural France to music that's being accessed from a drive at home in the UK.

[Ham_and_Jam]

NDA said:

Quite weird (to me at least) to be listening in rural France to music that's being accessed from a drive at home in the UK.

That’s pretty much how the internet works

[dundarach]

I've a massive flac library on a NAS

I just use Spotify now, took me a while to embrace it, however it's just so much easier

Just make to jump, it's honestly really worth it!!

[NDA]

Ham_and_Jam said:

NDA said:

Quite weird (to me at least) to be listening in rural France to music that's being accessed from a drive at home in the UK.

That s pretty much how the internet works

Yes I know - but it did strike me as a bit novel to be spinning a disc at home from the middle of nowhere.

I am easily impressed.

[clockworks]

Mandat said:

Which car do you have?

I have over 5,000 mp3's on a usb drive that is permanently plugged in the USB slot in both my cars. These play through the in car audio system (Ford & Mercedes) and don't interact with Android Auto, which I also use all the time in both cars.

I've ordered a Cupra Raval. Posts on Facebook owner's groups and elsewhere suggest that playing mp3 via a USB memory stick is very flaky, and some owners in the EU are saying they can't get it to work at all.

I know that it couldn't be done at all on Volvos that used Android Automotive screens 2 years ago.
I was considering buying an EX30, and there was no option to play via a USB stick.


Both our current cars (Kia EV3 and Hyundai Inster) can do it, as could all of the other new cars that I've owned since a 2007 Fiat Qubo.


Note that the issue I'm talking about is with infotainment systems that run Android Automotive as an operating system, not Android Auto that is just a method of mirroring Android phones to infotainment systems in general.

Quite a few car manufacturers seem to be giving up on creating their own infotainment OS, and just licencing in Android Automotive OS.

[Cloudy147]

I’ve not tried this but think it’ll work:

Copy the music onto your phone
Download vlc app
Point vlc to your music library

Connect via car play and use the vlc app in the car

[Condi]

Cloudy147 said:

I ve not tried this but think it ll work:

Copy the music onto your phone
Download vlc app
Point vlc to your music library

Connect via car play and use the vlc app in the car

This is the best way.

If you copy the music to your phone and use a music player app (I use Musicolet) then you can use Carplay with all the map functions and use the touchscreen to play your music as well.

To speed up copying the music, depending on what phone you have, you could save it all to a micro SD card and put that in the phone. Would give you a huge capacity as well, your music collection is not going to be 120GB!

(EDIT - just seen you have an iPhone, I would guess you could use the Apple cloud storage as well, maybe save the music to that and stream it? I'd still probably put it on the phone, its a neater solution and doesn't require constant internet).

[Cloudy147]

Yep, just tried it and it works.

I have an iPhone and this is what I did:

1) Download vlc

2) Put your music onto a cloud solution of your choice. This is so that vlc can access the music and download them to your phone. There are other options but I did it this way as it was quicker for me.

3) Open vlc on phone and choose the browse menu, then choose the songs you want.

4) Vlc downloads them to your phone.

5)Connect phone to car with Apple CarPlay.
Vlc appears as an app.

6) Open it and play your tunes!

Edited by Cloudy147 on Thursday 17th September 21:46

[xx99xx]

I have mp3s (and other audio files) on my phone which are then played in the car through the normal android auto connection method. Admittedly it's only about 100 files but it works.

Can you not transfer your files to your phone?

Alternatively, listen to the radio if music is your thing. Thousands of stations to choose from if your car has internet radio.

[dhutch]

Spotify user here.

[the-norseman]

I use spotify but for random albums that aren't on spotify, I upload them to Youtube music and then use that app.

[jimmyjimjim]

Another vote for musicolet and playback through Android Auto.

[Paul Drawmer]

My car has a hard drive, I've copied loads of music from USB drive to the car's hard drive.
I just select 'Music Collection' to access it. It will store video too, but can't play it on the move obv.

[clockworks]

Sounds like VLC is the answer - thanks.

I do sometimes listen to radio at home, but DAB and Internet reception is a bit sketchy in the car here, and I don't want to listen to ads and DJs.

I object to paying subscriptions when I just want music that I've already bought on CD.

[Suspicious_user]

Plexamp?

https://www.plex.tv/plexamp/

I use this - there's a CarPlay app. Download to your phone to play locally or you can stream from your NAS/storage at home.

[clockworks]

Suspicious_user said:

Plexamp?

https://www.plex.tv/plexamp/

I use this - there's a CarPlay app. Download to your phone to play locally or you can stream from your NAS/storage at home.

I've already got plexamp on my phone, I think I must've tried it before.

I can't find any way to add files, except from a plex server.
Googling suggests that it isn't possible to play files that are stored on the phone, only files that are on the plex server.
No good, unless the phone is on my local network.


I've installed VLC, transferred the music folder via USB from my Mac, and it automatically got added to the Carplay app list.
I'll try it in the car shortly.

[Suspicious_user]

clockworks said:

I've already got plexamp on my phone, I think I must've tried it before.

I can't find any way to add files, except from a plex server.
Googling suggests that it isn't possible to play files that are stored on the phone, only files that are on the plex server.
No good, unless the phone is on my local network.


I've installed VLC, transferred the music folder via USB from my Mac, and it automatically got added to the Carplay app list.
I'll try it in the car shortly.

I assumed most people had a plex server these days.

But yes it needs a plex media server to add the music to the library, however you don't need one to play the downloaded music to a phone. I mainly like it because you can download or stream to my phone/car, much like the paid for subscriptions.

[catso]

Cloudy147 said:

I ve not tried this but think it ll work:

Copy the music onto your phone
Download vlc app
Point vlc to your music library

Connect via car play and use the vlc app in the car

Why is vlc needed?

I use an iphone and our cars both have carplay and will simply play from the music app with full control via the car if required.

To add, my car (Audi S4) has both USB and 2 x SD card inputs (plus DVD/CD & 'Jukebox') which all work fine but the SD slot is very picky over the type of card that will work.