How much would a DAC improve iPhone to car stereo lossless streaming playback? (1 Viewer)

[JohnRice]

John,

Is there any menu structure that you can search for songs or play by a playlist?

All that is done with iTunes and without it, it seems like you are just scrolling through files of music.

What do you recommend as far as direct copying to a drive and playback organization is concerned?

Ron, as long as you maintain the same file structure on your drive (Artist>Album>Songs) then YES. It also needs to be in the meta data of the files. The first time you insert the drive the car usually indexes it, which can take several minutes. In my car, after that it's maybe 30 seconds after each time I start the car for it to check it again. I usually just play back on shuffle, but I can also use the voice command to play back a certain artist or album, or even song.

 

[JohnRice]

Possible correction...

The file structure on the drive might not matter. I suspect it does, but I've never checked. Meta data is certainly important.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Possible correction...

The file structure on the drive might not matter. I suspect it does, but I've never checked. Meta data is certainly important.

John,

Do you have Windows or a Mac?

Do you simply copy the iTunes Music folder to the drive and that does it?

I would guess any Meta Data is included in such a copy.

Thanks, as always, for your help

 

[JohnRice]

John,

Do you have Windows or a Mac?

Do you simply copy the iTunes Music folder to the drive and that does it?

I would guess any Meta Data is included in such a copy.

Thanks, as always, for your help

I am 100% Mac, and as long as your car can play ALAC, then you should be able to copy over, intact, any non-DRM music, using the same file structure as iTunes and have it work perfectly. iTunes does add full meta data. In my case, I take the ALAC or FLAC files and convert them to 320kb/s mp3 using XLossless Decoder and put those files in the car.

 

[JohnRice]

I need to add emphasis on should. IOW, it works in my Jeep. I did the same thing with someone's Ford and it refuses to play anything. Of course, Ford and Lincoln are the same company.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

I need to add emphasis on should. IOW, it works in my Jeep. I did the same thing with someone's Ford and it refuses to play anything. Of course, Ford and Lincoln are the same company.

Yeah, I am not optimistic on this end. Thank you once again.

 

[JohnRice]

Yeah, I am not optimistic on this end. Thank you once again.

Ron, I never figured out why it doesn't work in the Ford. I've done it with multiple Jeeps as well as Oppo BR players with no problem.

 

[dpippel]

The way music stored on thumb drives is handled is almost entirely dependent on the software in your head unit. Most present it in a very basic way - a tree structure based on artist/album or something similar. If you're used to a slick interface like iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, etc., it can be very frustrating to use.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

The way music stored on thumb drives is handled is almost entirely dependent on the software in your head unit. Most present it in a very basic way - a tree structure based on artist/album or something similar. If you're used to a slick interface like iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, etc., it can be very frustrating to use.

That's my fear, Doug. I have over 8,000 songs divided into Playlists that I need some sort of menu structure for.

Doesn't look like a straight copy to a drive will preserve that structure. I will say that using EXPORT FOR ITUNES on a Mac did preserve the iTunes structure and all my Playlists, but of course, won't copy over the DRM files.

 

[dpippel]

Playlist support might be an issue as well, since I don't believe there's any industry standard. But, I may be wrong there.

 

[JohnRice]

Almost zero chance it will support your playlists.

FWIW, I have 10,000 tracks on my car drive.

 

[GeorgeHolland]

I've put aftermarket sound systems in my cars and after making that investment, wanted to feed the highest quality signal possible. The 2009 BMW 335i Coupe has a few connection options, USB, AUX and a snap-in iPhone 3 or 4 adapter. I use the OEM head unit to maintain all the other BMW integrated features along with an external DSP. I don't stream and have my CD library saved as ALAC and FLAC. When parked and playing back my library my perception was playback of ALAC files from an iPhone 11 Pro Max connected to an OPPO HA-2SE Portable Headphone Amplifier and DAC with the Oppo connected from its analog out to my cars AUX IN sounded the best. The OPPO connection takes the pure digital signal, bypasses the iPhone DAC and uses the OPPO DAC. The other options still sounded great and once starting the car, any difference in sound quality once driving was nil. I have an old iPhone 3 in the snap-in adapter dedicated as an iPod to play back ALAC files I use most of the time and a USB drive for FLAC file playback the rest of the time.. I think the snap in adapter utilizes the iPhone DAC.

The 2016 BMW X6 is a more significant upgrade and includes the HELIX DSP Ultra that has an option to install the HEC HD-Audio USB-Interface. It wasn't released when I was having my system installed and I use a USB drive to play back my Library and playlists saved as FLAC. I use MediaHuman Audio converter to convert my ALAC files to FLAC. It allows me to save my iTunes playlists and supports cover art.
The HD-AUDIO USB-INTERFACE extends HELIX devices with a High Resolution Audio USB input and converts a PC or smartphone into a HD-Audio player.
The direct digital signal transmission (without additional AD-DA conversion) from the music source to the DSP with up to 192 kHz / 32 Bit allows lossless audio processing and thus assures perfect sound quality.

Unlike BMW, I was able to change out my Head Unit in my 2000 Series 100 Land Cruiser. It supports Apple Play and High Resolution Playback. I plug my iPhone in to one of the USB ports for playback.

 

[Wayne_j]

I highly doubt you would notice a difference in DACs in a moving car.

 

[JohnRice]

Did you try anything, Ron?

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Did you try anything, Ron?

Hi John!

No, from all the advice I have received in this thread it seems like there's nothing I can really do.

I'm pretty happy, overall, with the sound. Just always looking for ways to make it that much better.

Thanks, everyone, for the help.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I need to add emphasis on should. IOW, it works in my Jeep. I did the same thing with someone's Ford and it refuses to play anything. Of course, Ford and Lincoln are the same company.

My parents used to own a Ford Escape (cannot remember the year) that had no issues playing MP3 files from a thumb drive.

Ron, if you have a USB memory stick laying around, why not just copy some music onto it and give it a try?

As for file structure, you shouldn't need to maintain the same structure as on your PC. I don't, and am able to see lists based on artist, album, etc. The head unit will read and organize based on the meta data stored within the music files. How quickly that happens will be dependent on the unit. My old 2011 GMC Terrain was very slow at this, and every so often it would lock up, forcing me to pull the thumb drive out, and it would start indexing all over again. With our newer GM vehicles (2018 Acadia and 2019 Buick Encore) the process is very quick and bug-free.

 

[JohnRice]

My parents used to own a Ford Escape (cannot remember the year) that had no issues playing MP3 files from a thumb drive.

Ron, if you have a USB memory stick laying around, why not just copy some music onto it and give it a try?

As for file structure, you shouldn't need to maintain the same structure as on your PC. I don't, and am able to see lists based on artist, album, etc. The head unit will read and organize based on the meta data stored within the music files. How quickly that happens will be dependent on the unit. My old 2011 GMC Terrain was very slow at this, and every so often it would lock up, forcing me to pull the thumb drive out, and it would start indexing all over again. With our newer GM vehicles (2018 Acadia and 2019 Buick Encore) the process is very quick and bug-free.

It occurred to me the file structure might not matter. I commented on that somewhere along the line. However, using a logical structure (Artist>Album>Song) makes it infinitely easier to know what's on the drive.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

It occurred to me the file structure might not matter. I commented on that somewhere along the line. However, using a logical structure (Artist>Album>Song) makes it infinitely easier to know what's on the drive.

Definitely. While I do not use the exact file / folder structure from the library on my PC, I do have a structure on the thumb drives in our vehicles to make it easier to know what's on there. My comment was more for informing that the file structure has nothing to do with the vehicle's music indexing function.