Bought today - Rapide 2010 - DAB & Bluetooth pse
Bought today - Rapide 2010 - DAB & Bluetooth pse
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Discussion

Jeb291

Original Poster:

138 posts

63 months

Wednesday 18th August 2021
quotequote all
Hello again,

Previous post was which AM should I buy and today I bought a 2010 Rapide. This was best for me within budget. Saw it - loved it; drove it - loved it; easiest sale ever for the dealer!

It's a 2010 model and I get the limitations. It does have a 30 pin ipod adapter on the end of a white wire - from reading this forum I think I can buy a BT adapter that will let me stream music and DAB from my android phone. Does this also become the phone BT?

I have read the threads and it seems like a BT adapter might work - Bovee? But also seems like this option works on some years / makes but not others?

I'm just after any owner tried and tested solutions please? (Links appreciated!!)

Thanks Jeb

EVR

2,245 posts

89 months

Wednesday 18th August 2021
quotequote all
Hello, congrats.

So, here is my thread via some good info, take a look:

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

Keep in mind I have a 2011 Vantage but months later, all is still perfectly working.

Phone & music via Bluetooth will always be separate though; phone is via the in-car module from factory, while music is tricking the car into thinking there is a physical iPod connected with a wire.

Jeb291

Original Poster:

138 posts

63 months

Wednesday 18th August 2021
quotequote all
Thanks, I did read that thread which pointed to the Bovee. Sorry to be thick but my car (collect in a week or so) already has white lead with IPOD connector at end fitted, presumably I just need the gadget that fits on the end? And v.useful ref phone Bluetooth - cheers. Jeb

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Wednesday 18th August 2021
quotequote all
Greetings and welcome.

I would point out that the audio quality of bluetooth streaming is really poor, and assuming you have either the Premium or B&O audio in your new car you really will be missing out on a top notch audio experience if you don't use a decent source.

I would recommend using a USB stick with 320kps MP3 files for the best listening quality.

If you stream via bluetooth is the equivalent of running the car on 95 octane budget unleaded and never going above 30mph. wink

Astontony

522 posts

83 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
EVR said:
Hello, congrats.

So, here is my thread via some good info, take a look:

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

Keep in mind I have a 2011 Vantage but months later, all is still perfectly working.

Phone & music via Bluetooth will always be separate though; phone is via the in-car module from factory, while music is tricking the car into thinking there is a physical iPod connected with a wire.
Yep I had a 2010 DB9 with the same cord. I did some checking around and found a Bovee bluetooth adapter plugs straight in and links with your Iphone and works brilliantly. The site in america redpants sells them or you can get on ebay but I support those who support astons so richard at redpants is great.

EVR

2,245 posts

89 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Jeb291 said:
Thanks, I did read that thread which pointed to the Bovee. Sorry to be thick but my car (collect in a week or so) already has white lead with IPOD connector at end fitted, presumably I just need the gadget that fits on the end? And v.useful ref phone Bluetooth - cheers. Jeb
Exactly.

AdamV12V said:
Greetings and welcome.

I would point out that the audio quality of bluetooth streaming is really poor, and assuming you have either the Premium or B&O audio in your new car you really will be missing out on a top notch audio experience if you don't use a decent source.

I would recommend using a USB stick with 320kps MP3 files for the best listening quality.

If you stream via bluetooth is the equivalent of running the car on 95 octane budget unleaded and never going above 30mph. wink
Actually, in my car with Premium, Bluetooth is way superior to radio & AUX (never tried CDs). If you fiddle in the options menu, you can enable things like Dolby Pro Logic II (unavailable to above-mentioned inputs), resulting in a very rich sound. For the car, that input is treated like an iPod, she does not know it's wireless. And if the phone streaming it and the receiver (Bovee and others) are good quality, I strongly think that this the most high quality way available in the car, bar CDs.

You must be thinking about Bluetooth streaming to the AUX input? That's the poor choice.

Jeb291

Original Poster:

138 posts

63 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
AdamV12V said:
Greetings and welcome.

I would point out that the audio quality of bluetooth streaming is really poor, and assuming you have either the Premium or B&O audio in your new car you really will be missing out on a top notch audio experience if you don't use a decent source.

I would recommend using a USB stick with 320kps MP3 files for the best listening quality.

If you stream via bluetooth is the equivalent of running the car on 95 octane budget unleaded and never going above 30mph. wink
Ah, thanks, two things from this (sound system is B&O)

1. Is there a wired connector adaptor that could take phone output (Spotify) and hardwire to ipod Dock? Though I guess BT would work for podcasts and Talk radio.

2. Learning point 2 on my journey - ummmn, where should I fill up ?? I'm guessing from your post that local Asda is not the answer ??

I'm gonna need a list book and a chequebook aren't I 🤣🤣

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
EVR said:
Actually, in my car with Premium, Bluetooth is way superior to radio & AUX (never tried CDs). If you fiddle in the options menu, you can enable things like Dolby Pro Logic II (unavailable to above-mentioned inputs), resulting in a very rich sound. For the car, that input is treated like an iPod, she does not know it's wireless. And if the phone streaming it and the receiver (Bovee and others) are good quality, I strongly think that this the most high quality way available in the car, bar CDs.

You must be thinking about Bluetooth streaming to the AUX input? That's the poor choice.
The settings such as Dolby Pro Logic are distinct per input if I recal, so you can have it on for one input type but off for another? (At least thats how I remember my AMi I system working...).

Lets put radio to one side, as thats a whole topic in itself and focus just on listening to the music from a source.

I am talking about the wireless aspect of bluetooth transmission as where the poor quality lies. Which input you then use to hardwire your car will then either further diminish or have no perhaps have no impact on quality (at best).

The music goes on a journey from the artists mouth through to your ears. At each stage the quality is only as good as the prior stage captured or transmitted it. Once that quality is lost, there is no recovering it. Things like Dolby will massage the sound to compensate for inadequacies, but it cannot replace what has been lost.

Realisitically the early stages of recording to distribution media dont loose much. However where most people fall down is in using heavily compressed media types such as low quality MP3 files or poor quality connections, such as bluetooth or low quality cabled connections (but these are less common these days).

Bluetooth transmission I am afraid is limited to non HD in our cars. Sure there are now new "HD" versions of bluetooth, but our cars do not support these CODECs, and quite frankly they are debateable anyway as to their actual HD quality - but that's another story. Bluetooth is a convienece protocol, quality was not is primary objective. There is plenty of stuff on the web about bluetooth.

Also be aware that using streaming services like spotify will also offer sub optimal quality source content. OK there is now a Spotify HD, but.... Again if you stream poor qualify SD sounds from such, then transmit them over bluetooth to your car the end result will be way behind an actual CD (the best, but I do accept very limiting on a practical point of view), or 320kps MP3 files on a directly connected USB stick, which is the best compromise of quality and flexibility to use.

If your ears cant tell the difference, then thats fine - but that would be like arguing with somebody who says they cant tell the difference between the handling of an Aston Vantage and their old Citroen 2CV. wink If you cant you cant, and well that's fine for you or the next guy along who can't. But result assured there is a difference, and to my ears and no doubt others, a very noticeable one.

Now queue the usual chip in from somebody else saying "who cares about music anyway, Im listening to the engine".... rolleyes

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Jeb291 said:
Ah, thanks, two things from this (sound system is B&O)

1. Is there a wired connector adaptor that could take phone output (Spotify) and hardwire to ipod Dock? Though I guess BT would work for podcasts and Talk radio.

2. Learning point 2 on my journey - ummmn, where should I fill up ?? I'm guessing from your post that local Asda is not the answer ??

I'm gonna need a list book and a chequebook aren't I ????
1 - see my post above. If you are serious about listening to music and getting the best out of your B&O / Aston experience, dont use BT at all, or spotify for that matter.

2 - I have actually misled you slightly with my post, whilst trying to make a humorous point. The V12 engine in your 2010 Rapide does not have the knock sensors introduced in the later versions, so I am afraid the timing is fixed and set for 95 RON fuel here in the UK. So you will not see any material benefit in putting in 97-100 fuel, however these fuels do have more cleaning agents so they are better for your car. As 95 fuel goes, shell is pretty fair.

HOWEVER - there is also the new dymanic that 95 RON fuel is now E10, whereas 97-100 RON super unleaded is still E5. The E rating being the maximum about of bioethanol that can be in the fuel, which in short is a bad thing for your car and its performance and economy. So in that respect you should go for super unleaded with an E5 rating. It is widely acknowledged that Esso Synergy Supreme + is the very best and is in reality E0 fuel, albeit still branded legally as E5.

Hope that helps.

Jeb291

Original Poster:

138 posts

63 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Hugely helpful and much appreciated - thank you!!

One final point (as you clearly know your musical onions!) Is there a way of hard wiring my phone into the ipod dock and play files off my phone ? Or would that be same loss of quality with files on phone??

(Regardless, I'm actually quite looking forward to getting out some of my old CDs !!)

Jeb

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Jeb291 said:
Hugely helpful and much appreciated - thank you!!

One final point (as you clearly know your musical onions!) Is there a way of hard wiring my phone into the ipod dock and play files off my phone ? Or would that be same loss of quality with files on phone??

(Regardless, I'm actually quite looking forward to getting out some of my old CDs !!)

Jeb
Well there is always the issue of what quality the music is on your ipod, but assuming that you would use the same files anyway on a USB stick (note they must be MP3 not Apple AAC on a USB stick) then the quality is what it is, and there would be no further detriment providing the ipod is connected to the original Apple adapter supplied with the car.

Without getting into neuances of the differences of the types output of an ipod docking station, you really dont want to be using the docking station so park that idea, rather just connect the ipod itself directly to the car.

Does your ipod have the newer lightning port or the old 30pin Apple port? If it has the 30pin port then you have no issues, providing the original cable supplied with the Aston is still there, and if not you just need to source one of those. Jus tplug it into the cable and it should just work.

If it has lightning then I would assume an Apple 30pin to lightning adapter should do the deed, and then use the 30pin to Aston cable again, but I cant vouch for that first hand as I never tried that when I had my AMi I cars. (AMi II and AMi III systems as fitted to later Astons were all USB, so a simple USB to lightning cable is all that is needed.).

As said above, avoid anything that uses the AUX port however.

randlemarcus

13,646 posts

260 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
I know nothing about these cars, but what's at the other end of the old Apple cable? I find it slightly hard to believe that it came from the factory with a hardwired 30pin cable, but its possible.

Just as likely to be a 3.5mm to 30 pin cable, in which case, just search for a 3.5mm to USB C or Lightning cable (depending on your phone).

Jeb291

Original Poster:

138 posts

63 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
[quote=AdamV12V]

Well there is always the issue of what quality the music is on your ipod, but assuming that you would use the same files anyway on a USB stick (note they must be MP3 not Apple AAC on a USB stick) then the quality is what it is, and there would be no further detriment providing the ipod is connected to the original Apple adapter supplied with the car.

Without getting into neuances of the differences of the types output of an ipod docking station, you really dont want to be using the docking station so park that idea, rather just connect the ipod itself directly to the car.

Does your ipod have the newer lightning port or the old 30pin Apple port? If it has the 30pin port then you have no issues, providing the original cable supplied with the Aston is still there, and if not you just need to source one of those. Jus tplug it into the cable and it should just work.

If it has lightning then I would assume an Apple 30pin to lightning adapter should do the deed, and then use the 30pin to Aston cable again, but I cant vouch for that first hand as I never tried that when I had my AMi I cars. (AMi II and AMi III systems as fitted to later Astons were all USB, so a simple USB to lightning cable is all that is needed.).

As said above, avoid anything that uses the AUX port however

Okay thanks, sorry if I wasn't clear I meant use Phone (not Ipod) which has 3.5mm output jack (and USB C) and connect that via adaptor to extant 30 pin wire.

Ta, Jeb

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
randlemarcus said:
I know nothing about these cars, but what's at the other end of the old Apple cable? I find it slightly hard to believe that it came from the factory with a hardwired 30pin cable, but its possible.

Just as likely to be a 3.5mm to 30 pin cable, in which case, just search for a 3.5mm to USB C or Lightning cable (depending on your phone).
This is the Apple cable and input port that cars equipped with "AMi I" came with....



Jeb291 said:
Okay thanks, sorry if I wasn't clear I meant use Phone (not Ipod) which has 3.5mm output jack (and USB C) and connect that via adaptor to extant 30 pin wire.

Ta, Jeb
Yes you could use 3.5mm jack into the AUX port (i.e. an analogue input feed), but that would likely not sound as good as the digital feed via a USB-C adaptor into the original Apple 30 pin cable.

So what about trying an adapter from female 30pin Apple to male USB-C to plug into your phone. I should say again that Ive never tried it, but I cant see why it wouldn't work.

Anyway, like this one:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/143973428534



AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Oh and dont forget to try the AMi I audio settings in the FAQ sticky above. I wrote that section in the FAQ too, FWIW wink

Im a bit of a HiFi geek in my spare time when Im not geeking about Aston's here.

randlemarcus

13,646 posts

260 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
Looking at the picture above, surely a USB A to C cable will sort it?

AdamV12V

5,314 posts

206 months

Thursday 19th August 2021
quotequote all
randlemarcus said:
Looking at the picture above, surely a USB A to C cable will sort it?
Nope you cannot stream music into the USB port on AMi I... Only a USB memory stick can be attached into that.

Astontony

522 posts

83 months

Friday 20th August 2021
quotequote all
I still recommend the Bovee 1000 as far as i am concerned the quality was fine and it connected immediately you chose i phone. It was a lot easier than all this other messing about. Plugged straight in put in the code and away she went and I just left it plugged in and forgot about it. It was about 40 of your pounds.

EVR

2,245 posts

89 months

Friday 20th August 2021
quotequote all
AdamV12V said:
The settings such as Dolby Pro Logic are distinct per input if I recal, so you can have it on for one input type but off for another? (At least thats how I remember my AMi I system working...).

Lets put radio to one side, as thats a whole topic in itself and focus just on listening to the music from a source.

I am talking about the wireless aspect of bluetooth transmission as where the poor quality lies. Which input you then use to hardwire your car will then either further diminish or have no perhaps have no impact on quality (at best).

The music goes on a journey from the artists mouth through to your ears. At each stage the quality is only as good as the prior stage captured or transmitted it. Once that quality is lost, there is no recovering it. Things like Dolby will massage the sound to compensate for inadequacies, but it cannot replace what has been lost.

Realisitically the early stages of recording to distribution media dont loose much. However where most people fall down is in using heavily compressed media types such as low quality MP3 files or poor quality connections, such as bluetooth or low quality cabled connections (but these are less common these days).

Bluetooth transmission I am afraid is limited to non HD in our cars. Sure there are now new "HD" versions of bluetooth, but our cars do not support these CODECs, and quite frankly they are debateable anyway as to their actual HD quality - but that's another story. Bluetooth is a convienece protocol, quality was not is primary objective. There is plenty of stuff on the web about bluetooth.

Also be aware that using streaming services like spotify will also offer sub optimal quality source content. OK there is now a Spotify HD, but.... Again if you stream poor qualify SD sounds from such, then transmit them over bluetooth to your car the end result will be way behind an actual CD (the best, but I do accept very limiting on a practical point of view), or 320kps MP3 files on a directly connected USB stick, which is the best compromise of quality and flexibility to use.

If your ears cant tell the difference, then thats fine - but that would be like arguing with somebody who says they cant tell the difference between the handling of an Aston Vantage and their old Citroen 2CV. wink If you cant you cant, and well that's fine for you or the next guy along who can't. But result assured there is a difference, and to my ears and no doubt others, a very noticeable one.

Now queue the usual chip in from somebody else saying "who cares about music anyway, Im listening to the engine".... rolleyes
Right, I see what you mean now, I was under the impression you were suggesting that AUX cabled was better than the iPod input Bluetooth'd.

You are right in saying you always loose some quality over BT.

BTW, thank you for the EQ values, this is what I use since I bought the car!

CB07

532 posts

262 months

Friday 20th August 2021
quotequote all
Leaving quality aside for a moment. If you want Blutooth and all of the simplicity of just jumping in the car, in a sort of synthetic factory blutooth for 100quid, then Bovee is an absolute winner.

Siri? Spotify? Apple Music? Tune in Radio? Ticks all those boxes. The phone will simultaneously connect to the blutooth phone for the car. It’s plug and play. Hey Siri, play Fleetwood Mac, and off you go. I’ll never know why the Luddites can’t see how that convenience far outweighs the loss of “sound quality”. Leave aside if you don’t have fleetwood Mac CD in the car, or you do and it’s in the sleeve behind the seat, then you have to pull over, go to the boot, muck about in the rain. Just so you can experience nicks in full flow on a 20 min trip! Nonsense.

If you do want quality in say a longer road trip in the car use the 6CD changer. Convenience and variety? Without fail use the blutooth. I get all of the reservations but genuinely unless you back to back CD to Blutooth on every other song, it makes no odds. Blutooth still sounds good enough on both the premium and B&O. Also the vantage radio signal was so bad, but you now have DAB radio via the Internet, at the swipe of a finger! Wonderful.

My view is that audio in a car is all varying degrees of compromise. FWIW I spent hours in my youth mucking with in car audio systems, IASCA UK Ultra SQi (sound quality) competitions, summers lost tuning to Star Wars “the throne room” on the reference competition CD trying to get the magical 25hz subwoofer roll from the organ about 3 mins in, driving to an airfield and losing to some other nutter with even more expensive gear and endless time at his disposal. And no you won’t hear it on the B&O, believe me I have tried!

Unless you want to rip the whole lot out, give 30k to the sound gallery, you are already sadly miles behind a hobbyist with an old Ford loaded up with rainbow, Genesis, JL audio and half a ton of sound deadening etc.

As we know Blutooth is popular not due to its sound quality, it’s due to convenience and accessibility. Faffing about at a laptop adding MP3s (already worse then CDs) to a USB stick? Crikey it’s not 2005!

I say grab your old CDs, buy some new master editions even, collections come up on eBay for buttons because most folk sadly don’t value them. Pick the good ones out and charity shop the rest. Then get a bovee and stream.

Easy life!