cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/30700991
I still have an old ipod. So old it has no wireless ability. I want to use it in my car which doesn't have a cassette or cd player. It plugs into the car's usb port but the car radio "doesn't see it". Any tips on how to get it to work?
Are you sure your car doesn't have an aux in? Most cast do. Otherwise, maybe a USB to aux converter might work but I doubt it. So I'd go with a Bluetooth or FM transmitter like others adviced. If your car has Bluetooth, I'd go for that one as FM can have interference. Or just play music from your phone. No iTunes hassle and more storage.
Amazingly my 2024 german made car does not have an AUX
Why is it so hard for car makers to equip every car with basic needs like enough cup holders, USB and enough power plugs, Bluetooth, AND A FREAKING AUX PLUG *major facepalm
Edit: my BMW had one under the arm rest by the way. It's also possible to have one in the glove box compartment.
Okay, yes, this is older technology & cars don't have infinite, universal backwards compatibility. Cars have Bluetooth & they think that just fixes everything....well...not quite.
Maybe there are other fixes & other workarounds, but you need to employ old(er) technology solutions to fix this old(er) technology problem. You need a (QUALITY) FM transmitter that will plug into your aux, blast the signal as an FM radio station, and you tune your radio to that station & listen. Notice I said QUALITY...most of them are kinda crap & you have to deal with static. I have no specific brand, model suggestions. Good luck.
A better but more expensive solution: upgrade your car's head unit. Stock head units are shit, anyway. 🙂 Get yourself a nice head unit with 3.5mm aux connection & aux in that iPod, if your budget allows. THEN, you'll have the best sound quality and also Bluetooth connection, etc.
I wish you well, music makes the driving experience, I hope you get EVERYTHING you need. 🙏
It's strange that most radio head units you can buy look like they were designed by high school students in 2010 with an infinite RGB and plastichrome budget.
You can use 3.5mm jack to bluetooth adapter.
These work well. I have to power mine through the cigarette lighter, but newer cars should have USB power as standard.
Or even 3.5mm to FM adapter like this https://avinusa.com/fm-transmitter-mini-aux-adapter-with-built-in-3-5mm-jack.html
That's really annoying for everyone else though.
Low power. Only picks up your cars receiver, and potentially neighboring vehicles temporarily if they are receiving at the same frequency.
Yeah If you use the same frequency as an existing station.
They pack them in as tight as they can, so doing that fucks up two stations instead....
"probably won't remember"?
Man. Fuck this kid. I'm not that old....
Just started using my 2006 SanDisk equivelant of this, I feel attacked lol
Everyone in these comments are idiots? Or bots? Usb to aux outputs, Bluetooth to aux outputs guys it's a freaking iPod the one thing it has is aux output. The problem is getting it into the radio.
Op, does your radio have aux in? That's the easiest but it's so simple I think you would have done it already.
If you don't sometimes you can buy an adapter that plugs into the back of your radio, heck eBay might net you an actual iPod 30 pin cable specific to your radio.
If your radio has Bluetooth, you can get an aux Bluetooth transmitter not reciver like people linked here, to transmit from the headphone jack to your radio.
Last resort is a fm transmitter with either aux or a 30 pin.
I was selling smartphones and smartphone accessories when they were just emerging, ending PDA era, and we had FM transmitters - it is powered from car, you plug in your device through aux, and the transmitter sends out the sound in FM, so you can catch it on your effin radio (the frequency were either fixed or selectable). This was the future!
How old is your car? Ipod support is odd like post 2015.
We used FM transmitters for those guys back in the day. Plug it in the headphone port and tune the stations.
They aren't great especially if you live in a big city, but out of all the options this would get you the truest classic iPod experience.
It was always fun to be driving down the highway and suddenly picking up somebody's stream, then annoying when you realize you’re in traffic with them and now they’ve hijacked the station you were listening to
Lol. Some of these devices gives you have a choice of different frequencies. Mine had 4.
Even cheap ones now allow you to go to any FM frequency.
The one I had connected to the antenna port on the back of the head unit. Still FM just no longer wireless. I think I had the choice of 5 or 6 stations to broadcast to.
I don't think it will work in USB. Afaik on PC it can only work with iTunes, so good luck installing that in your car. If it's "that" old though, it should have the one interface that is so perfect it has barely changed in one century.
(The audio jack...)
There are 3.5mm (headphones) to Bluetooth adapters. If you car are Bluetooth u can use this.. fairly inexpensive. And if you have FM radio in your car there is 3.5mm to FM adapters..basically you have a mini radio station with short range but enough for your car to pick it up
An iPod nano can't play over USB, you need to use the aux port
This is unfortunately the only real answer. “Install an aux port in your car, or get a different player that will play via USB” isn’t a good answer to hear, but it’s the correct one. Maybe use one of those FM transmitters instead. Reception will entirely depend on where you are, (and the FCC severely limits how powerful a non-licensed radio broadcast can be,) but at least it would get music to your car. Or if your car has Bluetooth, you can get one that takes the audio in via aux and outputs to Bluetooth.
But if you don’t have an aux port, I’m guessing you don’t have Bluetooth either.
I still have one. No these ones specifically don't have wireless capabilities. Later ones do, though.
Male to male aux, if your car has aux input. Maybe aux to fm (like this), so you can connect ipod to the transmitter, then set the car's radio to the same frequency.
The USB port in your car radio might only support a specific file format for the drive (like EXT, FAT32, NTSF) that the iPod doesn't use (IIRC, the iPod used Fat32 or Fat16?)
Or it doesn't see directories and would work with a plain USB stick loaded with .MP3s loosely added to it. You could get a iPod to do this, but it wouldn't work as an iPod anymore; it would be an external hard drive.
Edit: NVM I just realized it's a nano. You can't use the USB to play anything from a nano.
Does the radio have a 3.5mm AUX jack? If so, just use that.
NTFS*
The more usual thing are aux to USB adapters but they can only do USB to aux, nit the reverse. What you need is aux to USB converter, they can do both ways.
This article is good, autotranslate if not german.
Can you just get an aux cable and plug that in?
It is likely the car USB port is looking through directories for MP3 files, and thats not now those iPods present themselves when hooked up via USB. You might be able to find an audio-to-bluetooth adapter, but it is likely you will not be able to control the device through the car's interface, so you would have to press play manually.
(Side note: older cars with USB might have a very low-level relationship with the USB sticks, where they read files in the order they were written to the device, without regard to what folders you put them in. There are utilities that can reorder the files' physical position on the stick so that albums play in order)
I use a Bluetooth to aux for my phone, which is only slightly annoying at times, but I blame the apps. I can play, play, pause, skip forward with my Bluetooth receiver, and OP will miss out on that, except they can PROBABLY use the dial blindly for just that.
There are AUX cables that have a transmit and recive switch. You can use this to transmit the output of your iPod through AUX to a built in bluetooth receiver in your car or other device.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/UGREEN-Bluetooth-Transmitter-Headphone-Connection/dp/B0D12MFCBG
Just make sure what you choose has the transmitter function as most cheaper ones only have the receiver function (for use in a car stereo for example).
I've had one of those (battery died, unfortunately) and if you'd look at its files, you'd notice that they are organized in a different structure than what an MP3 player might expect.
iPod_Control\Music's sudirectories might contain some songs, but the filenames are hashes (corresponding to the entry in the iPod db). The metadata and the contents are perfectly fine, and you can play the file yourself via a different player (you can probably test it in your computer).
I suggest you just connect the iPod through the 3.5mm output audio jack or find a 3.5mm audio output to Bluetooth transmitter adapter.
EDIT:
WTF. I triple posted. My bad. I deleted the two others, also corrected some minor typos and mistakes.
Aux to aux in your car stereo not available?
Seperate from the FM transmitters that other people have mentioned, you can install an FM modulator into your car. This is a box that goes behind your stereo, feeds power off the stereo power supply, and connects directly to the antenna wire to supply the frequency modulated sound signal directly to the antenna without traveling through the air. Similar to an FM transmitter, it has a headphone wire that plugs into the headphone outlet of your ipod for the audio signal. It can bypass the interference problem that FM transmitters run into, but the one I installed back in the day actually picked up engine revving noise from my alternator, so maybe it needed better wire shielding. Obviously this requires taking out your stereo and doing some wiring work so you need some tinkering skills or have it installed by a pro.
The reason the USB plug on your ipod doesn't work is that earlier audio devices like the original ipod didn't have a way to transmit audio digitally over USB, it was only used for charging and file transfer.
We should start with, what car do you have? Then we can figure out if it has an AUX port.
Also if this Nano has an original battery, you might want to replace it before it becomes bloated.
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