Professional Audio - USB issues

[cre8toruk]

Hi All,

a whole month in and I have to say I'm really enjoying my E89 MY2013 Z4 28i.... coming from a Lotus Elise, just having auto headlights is truly luxury.

My only (only) gripe so far is over the Audio. Mine has the professional audio system installed and whilst the sound quality is excellent, my non idrive system doesn't allow me to stream audio via Bluetooth, so I am left currently with just the prospect of the good old USB thumbdrive. I purchased a 32GB from Amazon for not very much and loaded it up with my favourite albums etc.

The stick seems to have sync'd up ok, but I now have this intermittent problem where the tracks seem to jump or stop repeatedly like the player is struggling to read the files. I've checked the stick scanned it on a laptop and played the tracks no problem on a laptop so I know all is fine from a data point of view.

Is it just that the head unit isn't man enough to load the track and play it at the same time or could it be a fault with the USB port?

In utter contempt I've ordered a stream 2 air Bluetooth adapter in the hope that this will resolve the problem.... I had Bluetooth streaming and faultless USB playback on my little £100 stereo in my Lotus and I even had a 250GB USB hard drive working fine in my 2005 Mazda RX8, so why should a 2013 stereo give me such jip? Such a shame when everything else is so right with the car.

Paul.

 

[ph001]

First thing I would do is try a premium usb stick as read speed may be an issue (despite it being ok on your laptop). Make sure its a genuine high quality stick from an established seller.

The market is rife with fakes and cheap Chinese items that have super cheap high latency solid state memory.

 

[tintoverano]

you could use the AUX input directly from your phone (+ cable), no?

 

[AnubisZed]

Sorry to say but the stream2air is fine but you'll have no control of it via your head unit or steering wheel controls, doesn't matter what the advert states!

As for the memory stick it should work fine as long as the bitrate is no higher then 128. I've found higher nitrates are not always liked by older equipment.

If you want full control of streamed music then I have a Tune2Air adaptor that works perfectly.
You'd need the 3000B that has the cable built in as opposed to the one that has the BMW cable plug into it (which is the 1000, i know i bought one!!).

Best price i could find....
ViseeO Tune2Air WMA3000B Bluetooth Adapter for Streaming iPod/iPhone/iPad to BMW/Mini with original AUX/USB Y-Cable Connection https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00TFIPX82/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_taa_YXUwCbMY1S9MS

Hope that helps

 

[del_tl1000r]

I have 2, 32gb hitachi sticks which are both almost full. I always use a 320 bit rate and my head unit has no problems with them.

 

[cre8toruk]

Tune2Air installed and I can even turn up the source volume now.. oh and control it via the steering wheel no problem... I think I'm sorted for now

 

[AnubisZed]

Tune2Air installed and I can even turn up the source volume now.. oh and control it via the steering wheel no problem... I think I'm sorted for now

If you have an Android phone then make sure that the Tune2Air is set as a trusted device, this way it makes sure that it stays connected properly!!
Also if you have an Android phone then I find that Android Auto works great, the screen stays active all the time, you get messages (spoken by Google) and you can have "Hey Google" as your personal assistant while driving all without touching your phone. I'm always using it with Apple Music and find it great to change an album without taking my hands off the wheel.
Photo attached of how it looks while driving (old photo with old dash), I find that on my 30 minute commute to work and then home again at night even with the screen active all the way I don't loose hardly any battery power (for longer journeys I'd plug it in)