Car Stereo replaces CD player with flash memory

[hugh]

Blaupunkt is now shipping the Melbourne SD27, an car radio that skips the CD player altogether in favor of an SD/MMC card slot to accommodate the digital-savvy customer who wants to eliminate discs from their music diet.

This is neat.

[NeilN]

Very, very cool. I suppose it's not as easy as taking out the existing CD player and swapping in this (i.e., it depends on the car)?

[hugh]

Hmm, perhaps the title is misleading. The Blaupunkt SD27 is a complete car stereo with SD card slot so you would replace your entire car stereo.

[otown47]

A lot of car radios come with audio jacks so you can plug your mp3 player in. Some have IPod jacks so you can control your IPod from the radio controls in the car.

[NeilN]

Yes, by CD player I meant car stereo, sorry. My 2004 BMW comes with a stock stereo unit, including a "Business CD" player with no MP3 capability or audio jacks. I've been looking to upgrade for a while. Guess I'll have to ask on a car-specific forum.

[i hate tv]

I have a wireless FM transmitter that we use in the car
Plugs into 3.5mm jack of your MP3, laptop, portable dvd player, etc
I'm too cheap to buy a new car stereo, but still wanted the ability to listen to music from my mp3 or laptop
It is a neat feature though, especially with how cheap these memory cards are now

[Paolo]

Well, this idea is not really new. My G/F's sony Xplod deck, has a USB port on the front, which I decided "just for fun" to plug in my USB Mass storage key into, which happened to be "loaded to the max with mp3 files" and the deck played them just as it would if it were to play a "mp3 CD" but the only difference, no moving parts, kinda neat eh. Ipods can plug into the usb port and you can controll the iPod directly from the deck too.

[ZeroGravity]

Originally Posted by NeilN

Yes, by CD player I meant car stereo, sorry. My 2004 BMW comes with a stock stereo unit, including a "Business CD" player with no MP3 capability or audio jacks. I've been looking to upgrade for a while. Guess I'll have to ask on a car-specific forum.

BMW has a 6-disc CD changer (made by Alpine) which you can add to your existing business-cd deck. The older versions only play regular CDs, but the latest one will supposedly play MP3 files recorded on CDs. 6512 6983336 might be the model number for the MP3 capable changer.

[hugh]

Well, this idea is not really new

I don't know of any car stereo that comes with a SD micro slot. The nice thing about this is that you can but don't have to plug in an MP3 player/ FM transmitter or anything else to play digital music.

Is it revolutionary - no but it is evolutionary and very convenient

[Paolo]

I have a USB to SD Adaptor. I will load a shoot load of MP3z on my GF's SD card and see if it reads on her Sony explode deck

[I_Want_My_HDTV]

IMHO, USB connectors on car systems is long overdue. Plug in a flash drive or notebook hard drive with an MP3 playlist and it should play. It's no different from inserting a CD. No doubt the music companies have a lot to say about that though. I can't get so excited about SD card slots since they aren't as versatile. I almost got a media extender with FM transmitter, built in hard drive and car adapter kit. That would have been up to 1GB of MP3s.

[Dog Byte]

SD slots were available a couple of years ago but never caught on (memory was too expensive) and were replaced with USB ports. But all of those still had a CD player. I like the idea of a high capacity SD slot. Load up a card, hit shuffle and you're good to go for days.

My 2004 BMW comes with a stock stereo unit, including a "Business CD" player with no MP3 capability or audio jacks.

If the deck supports a CD changer then there's probably a plugin module that supports audio-in or an iPod. Just to annoy people, some car makers use a custom form factor for the radio so that you can't replace the radio.

[Biggworm]

I recently purchased a Sony head unit with line in and USB port. I had a 2GB USB key which I filled with MP3's. Everything works great. The "load time" jumping between albums is quicker than any CD changer I have owned. The fact that the head unit supports ID3 tags, AAC and WMA files is a bonus.

Just for fun I put a 10GB hard drive from an old laptop I had in an 2.5" external drive case, plugged it in and voila, I had roughly 130 full CD's ripped at 192kps at my fingertips.

[WayneH]

How about a 1 TB USB drive plugged into a USB headunit. Now that's alot of music!

[hugh]

Just an FYI that using hard drives in an automobile is probably not the best idea since spinning heads and bumps in the road could lead to the hard drive crashing.