Question to Intravee/Dice/OEM iPod users

[Nacho Zits]

Hello All,

I plan on putting an audio system into my Z soon and need to know a few things from you Intravee/Dice/OEM iPod users.

My plan is to install a 32GB iPod and leave it tucked out of the way somewhere where i dont need to see it. As long as i can control it from the head unit.

So my question is regarding the state of the iPod when the car is switched off. Is the iPod still playing or will it shutdown until the car is switched on again ? Or will it continue playing until its battery runs out ?

Is this bahaviour different for each of the three interfaces ? Can anybody tell me how their device behaves when the car is switched off ?

 

[Raify]

Intravee: I'm not sure what happens to the iPod when you turn the car off but I do know that it will not 'wake up' and start charging a completely drained iPod...... Can test it out if you like.

 

[Siftah]

Hello All,
I plan on putting an audio system into my Z soon and need to know a few things from you Intravee/Dice/OEM iPod users.

Intravee II user here

My plan is to install a 32GB iPod and leave it tucked out of the way somewhere where i dont need to see it. As long as i can control it from the head unit.

Sounds like a plan, I have a 5th Gen iPod 20gig which has a broken/smashed screen (bought cheap off my sister!). It lives in the boot.

So my question is regarding the state of the iPod when the car is switched off. Is the iPod still playing or will it shutdown until the car is switched on again ? Or will it continue playing until its battery runs out ?

The iPod pauses as soon as you move to a different input source, turn off the radio or turn off the car. It'll restart when you start up again, just like the cd changer would.

Is this bahaviour different for each of the three interfaces ? Can anybody tell me how their device behaves when the car is switched off ?

When the car turns off the iPod goes into pause mode with the Intravee (as the iPod does anyway when paused) after about 24 hours it'll go into a deep sleep mode. The Intravee can't wake it up from this mode, so occasionally you'll need to wake the iPod by pressing a button on the iPod to wake it up. If you don't drive your car daily this may get on your nerves. It may also influence where you put the iPod, maybe the glovebox would be more convenient.

Personally I drive the car 5 days a week (and usually on the weekend) so it doesn't bother me. I also always put a bag in the boot, so it's no trouble to give the iPod a prod when I know it's probably gone into deep sleep.

There are hacks surrounding using the calendar on the iPod where you set a recurring daily event, that's supposed to keep it from deep sleeping but I've never tried it.

The battery on the 5th Gen's charges from the Intravee II, I believe later than 5th Gen may not charge from the Intravee cable as it needs to see a reference 2.3 v voltage on pins 2 and 3 - you'll need to check this, my memory isn't great. The battery on the iPod is always fully charged for me.

Hope that helps

 

[rasoliman]

I'm looking to get an Intravee II to fit to my car. I managed to get the Alpine KCA unit and cables from my old car (Golf Mk2 GTI 16v - not an M but I loved it!) before I sold it.

Is it difficult to fit?

I'm looking to fit the Alpine unit near the battery and leave the iPod/ Intravee II in the shelf above the Sat Nav.

Raify, am I right in thinking you have a similar set up? I'm sure I read a post about this not so long ago.

 

[jan_tekin]

Intravee: I'm not sure what happens to the iPod when you turn the car off but I do know that it will not 'wake up' and start charging a completely drained iPod...... Can test it out if you like.

There is a pretty easy mod you can do to the KCA 420i to send a pulse to wake up the ipod, thats If your any good with a soldiering iron. Its not so much of a problem in the Z4 because everything is in easy reach, unless you put the ipod in the boot.

 

[petach]

I fitted the DICE. The bloody thing is infuriating! Makes a squawking noise when you start up, so you have to go scroll through radio/cd/cd to get noise to stop. Have tried dip switches in all manner of positions......on my knees with my arse in the air, on my back, on my head!!!!!!!!

Yes, if car left too long ipod goes into deep sleep so you have to wake it up.

Einstein would have destroyed it at birth!

The storage bins behind the seats pull out. I suppose you could drill a small neat hole in one and pass cable through into cockpit?

 

[Siftah]

Is it difficult to fit?

I'm looking to fit the Alpine unit near the battery and leave the iPod/ Intravee II in the shelf above the Sat Nav.

Assuming you have the Analog audio on your HiFi and not digital yes, it's easy peasy.

Fitting the iPod in the shelf above the sat nav will require removing a bit more carpet and possibly drilling a hole, but it should be easy enough (haven't done this, mine's in the boot).

The KCA-420i and the Intravee itself will easily fit into the bracket on the bulkhead where the other audio kit is - it's dead simple to do, 30 mins work at the most and everything appears standard from the outside.

 

[aquazi]

Thanks to the intravee forum i have a calendar entry in my ipod, with a silent alarm every 6 hours so my ipod never goes into deep sleep.. so even if i havent driven my car over the weekend i can use my intravee without touching my ipod.

To fit the intravee in an M is more diffcult then in mine.. due to the battery being in the boot, which makes it easier to access the cd changer cable from the cabin itself. (while on mine it was a 5 min job to lift the boot carpet up, and plug it in without removing anything!)

 

[Raify]

I'm looking to get an Intravee II to fit to my car. I managed to get the Alpine KCA unit and cables from my old car (Golf Mk2 GTI 16v - not an M but I loved it!) before I sold it.

Is it difficult to fit?

I'm looking to fit the Alpine unit near the battery and leave the iPod/ Intravee II in the shelf above the Sat Nav.

Raify, am I right in thinking you have a similar set up? I'm sure I read a post about this not so long ago.

I've done exactly that, see here: http://www.z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=18132

Fitting the alpine next to the battery is a doddle. Taking apart the centre console to get access to the cubby box below the sat nav was relatively easy because I had pvr's expertise. Plugging the cd changer cables into the back of the intravee unit was an absolute nightmare.

 

[Nacho Zits]

When the car turns off the iPod goes into pause mode with the Intravee (as the iPod does anyway when paused) after about 24 hours it'll go into a deep sleep mode. The Intravee can't wake it up from this mode, so occasionally you'll need to wake the iPod by pressing a button on the iPod to wake it up. If you don't drive your car daily this may get on your nerves. It may also influence where you put the iPod, maybe the glovebox would be more convenient.

Personally I drive the car 5 days a week (and usually on the weekend) so it doesn't bother me. I also always put a bag in the boot, so it's no trouble to give the iPod a prod when I know it's probably gone into deep sleep.

There are hacks surrounding using the calendar on the iPod where you set a recurring daily event, that's supposed to keep it from deep sleeping but I've never tried it.

The battery on the 5th Gen's charges from the Intravee II, I believe later than 5th Gen may not charge from the Intravee cable as it needs to see a reference 2.3 v voltage on pins 2 and 3 - you'll need to check this, my memory isn't great. The battery on the iPod is always fully charged for me.

Hope that helps

Thats perfect info. Exactly what i wanted to know. Thanks Siftah

 

[PawnSacrifice]

Nacho Zits, I have the Dension (link in signature). The iPod is left plugged in for months at a time, goes to sleep and wakes up when selected on the headunit. In terms of power drain - I have left my iPod plugged in for a couple weeks without using the car and had no issues. I use the iPod Video - seems not to like my Touch as much when I tried it.

The one thing I can't see is what standard system you have? I'm running the Business CD, text display on the little screen. Scrolling and volume can be done via the MFSW. If that's what you have I'd recommend the Dension. If you have Nav or DSP I'd get the Intravee - I wouldn't consider anything else.

I did try the DICE unit (two actually) and, well, it's a hateful device in my experience - binned for the Dension. petach, it seemed frivolous at the time but so pleased I've done it! I think others have used it successfully but seems to problematic and support is awful.

 

[srhutch]

Like pawn I have the dension, works well with or without Nav, and never have issues with the ipod waking up (5th gen). The older ipod I had though did sometimes need waking up though (2nd gen).

If you can find one on ebay should be a cheap way to get ipod connected.

 

[Taz]

pawn/srhutch, what shows on the display? i have the standard business cd - does it show id tags?

 

[PawnSacrifice]

Yeah... it scrolls the name across the display (if it's too long to fit) - the DICE was the same, when it worked.

I posted some more info on here...
Denison Gateway Question

 

[Nacho Zits]

Nacho Zits, I have the Dension (link in signature). The iPod is left plugged in for months at a time, goes to sleep and wakes up when selected on the headunit. In terms of power drain - I have left my iPod plugged in for a couple weeks without using the car and had no issues. I use the iPod Video - seems not to like my Touch as much when I tried it.

The one thing I can't see is what standard system you have? I'm running the Business CD, text display on the little screen. Scrolling and volume can be done via the MFSW. If that's what you have I'd recommend the Dension. If you have Nav or DSP I'd get the Intravee - I wouldn't consider anything else.

I did try the DICE unit (two actually) and, well, it's a hateful device in my experience - binned for the Dension. petach, it seemed frivolous at the time but so pleased I've done it! I think others have used it successfully but seems to problematic and support is awful.

Thanks for your help Pawn. I do have the Business CD, so the Denison sounds like the trick.

I'm going to complicate things just a little more though. If the iPod is going to be hidden/out of the way then why do i need an iPod at all ?

I have been doing some web searches for i-Bus compatible mp3 players that can take a FLASH thumb drive. That way i can just keep upgrading the thumb drive as prices come down. There seems to be some references to just such a product on the 'HackTheIBUS' yahoo group, but i am still waiting to be admitted into that group for further research.

Has anybody made/bought such a device ? I think with a open source mp3 player i can apply the iBus hacks to make this myself, but it would be nice to see if somebody has already made this. Obviously the cost wuld be much lower than any of the other solutions and the functionality would be identical.

Does anybody know anything about such a beast ?

 

[Taz]

cheers pawn, this is 1 mod i will definately look into, my biggest issue with the zed is that the radio does not show id tags

 

[Siftah]

I have been doing some web searches for i-Bus compatible mp3 players that can take a FLASH thumb drive. That way i can just keep upgrading the thumb drive as prices come down. There seems to be some references to just such a product on the 'HackTheIBUS' yahoo group, but i am still waiting to be admitted into that group for further research.

Has anybody made/bought such a device ? I think with a open source mp3 player i can apply the iBus hacks to make this myself, but it would be nice to see if somebody has already made this. Obviously the cost wuld be much lower than any of the other solutions and the functionality would be identical.

Does anybody know anything about such a beast ?

The next version of the Intravee is rumoured to be on those lines - you still need to do all the emulation of the iBUS code and have an iBUS interface in order to be able to do it. So you're probably looking at something like the Rolf Resler interface and then some sort of Linux device to code on.

My idea was to use a WLAN access point as they can be had with a USB interface, already have a few good Linux distros available for them (DD-WRT or OpenWRT) and they tend to run on 9 or 12v which is quite easy to wire into the car. I've acquired the WLAN AP in readiness and also have the Resler interface, but the code that's out there so far isn't very mature.

I then got offered an Intravee2 for very little and as it works well, never went further

I also happen to manage all my music in iTunes anyway, so having an additional iPod that gets sync'd is no big deal, especially as I can then use Smart Playlists - dragging and dropping files to a thumb drive isn't my idea of a nice way to manage music, though I know other people feel that it's a better way than using iTunes, YMMV etc!

 

[NikB]

Do any of these systems work with non-ipods? I have a Sony Walkman that's not currently in use. It has better sound quality than my iphone and has a standard jack. I assume the simplest way is to fit the aux in but an integrated solution would be a bonus.

 

[Siftah]

Do any of these systems work with non-ipods? I have a Sony Walkman that's not currently in use. It has better sound quality than my iphone and has a standard jack. I assume the simplest way is to fit the aux in but an integrated solution would be a bonus.

In a word, No. The Aux-In cable is your best bet.

The sound quality of the iPod/iPhone is hard to beat, especially when used with the dock connector as it tends to give off much better audio than you get from the headphone socket.

 

[PawnSacrifice]

Do any of these systems work with non-ipods? I have a Sony Walkman that's not currently in use. It has better sound quality than my iphone and has a standard jack. I assume the simplest way is to fit the aux in but an integrated solution would be a bonus.

In a word, No. The Aux-In cable is your best bet.

The sound quality of the iPod/iPhone is hard to beat, especially when used with the dock connector as it tends to give off much better audio than you get from the headphone socket.

Whatever you use try and get a line connection rather than a headphone jack into the aux... have a look for a thread inkey$ started where he was doing a custom dock mod - might be something you could adapt for the Sony?