I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

On 8/19/2020 3:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.


I put most of my music on the computer and then transfer what I want to
a USB stick. Otherwise I'm listening to SiriusXM.

On 8/19/20 2:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

Have you tried Tunein? Maybe I'm just used to the ads but it
doesn't seem too bad. They have a commercial free version but I haven't
tried it.

On 08/19/2020 03:56 PM, Dean Hoffman wrote:
On 8/19/20 2:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play.
They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll
go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

Have you tried Tunein? Maybe I'm just used to the ads but it
doesn't seem too bad. They have a commercial free version but I haven't
tried it.

I tried Spotify briefly but unless you pay them you get a lot of ads.
After getting the same razor ad three times in a row I deleted the app.
Jango might not have as much music available but it's ad free (so far).

In alt.home.repair, on Wed, 19 Aug 2020 17:39:38 -0400, Ed Pawlowski
wrote:

On 8/19/2020 3:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.


I put most of my music on the computer and then transfer what I want to
a USB stick. Otherwise I'm listening to SiriusXM.

I only listen to music 20% of the time, but before I took a 3-month trip
to countries where none of the radio talk stations were in English, I
used RadioMaximus and 181 FM - Oldies (one of a dozen 181 FM web-radio
stations, and I recorded every song for 36 hours. Then deleted the
ones I don't like and copied the rest to a flashdrive which I use in the
rentacar, or computer.

Two interesting things:

1) The first time, they got copied to the flash drive in the wrong
order. This might not matter, but the first 4 seconds of every song is
part of the previous song's file. Playing them in the wrong order mixed
this up more. Turns out, they wee copied in the order they were
displayed on the File Manager. Since I usually put the most recent ones
at the top, that's how they were copied. I redid that.

2) For various reasons, I had 3 different rentacars on one trip, and the
first two played the songs in alphabetical order, even though they
weren't stored that way. There were 100's of titles, but apparently
enough RAM and software in the car radio to sort the songs. Since the
first part of each song title was the artist, often hir first name, all
the songs by Aretha Franklin were played together, some of them more
than once in a row, because that's what alphabetizing does.,

On Wed, 19 Aug 2020 16:56:58 -0500, Dean Hoffman
wrote:

On 8/19/20 2:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

Have you tried Tunein? Maybe I'm just used to the ads but it
doesn't seem too bad. They have a commercial free version but I haven't
tried it.

I haven't listened to any broadcast music in my car in 20 years. I
play my own MP3s from a thumb drive and a disk drive before that.

On Wed, 19 Aug 2020 21:59:37 -0400, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Wed, 19 Aug 2020 17:39:38 -0400, Ed Pawlowski
wrote:

On 8/19/2020 3:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.


I put most of my music on the computer and then transfer what I want to
a USB stick. Otherwise I'm listening to SiriusXM.

I only listen to music 20% of the time, but before I took a 3-month trip
to countries where none of the radio talk stations were in English, I
used RadioMaximus and 181 FM - Oldies (one of a dozen 181 FM web-radio
stations, and I recorded every song for 36 hours. Then deleted the
ones I don't like and copied the rest to a flashdrive which I use in the
rentacar, or computer.

Two interesting things:

1) The first time, they got copied to the flash drive in the wrong
order. This might not matter, but the first 4 seconds of every song is
part of the previous song's file. Playing them in the wrong order mixed
this up more. Turns out, they wee copied in the order they were
displayed on the File Manager. Since I usually put the most recent ones
at the top, that's how they were copied. I redid that.

2) For various reasons, I had 3 different rentacars on one trip, and the
first two played the songs in alphabetical order, even though they
weren't stored that way. There were 100's of titles, but apparently
enough RAM and software in the car radio to sort the songs. Since the
first part of each song title was the artist, often hir first name, all
the songs by Aretha Franklin were played together, some of them more
than once in a row, because that's what alphabetizing does.,

That is usually because of whether they are indexing on the file name
or the ID3 meta file. You can also load genre in the ID3 file and most
players will filter by that. There might also be album title, date
(file date or recording date) and a bunch of other stuff. If you right
click the song title in Winamp you can see and edit the ID3 files.

On 08/19/2020 08:43 PM, wrote:
On Wed, 19 Aug 2020 16:56:58 -0500, Dean Hoffman
wrote:

On 8/19/20 2:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

Have you tried Tunein? Maybe I'm just used to the ads but it
doesn't seem too bad. They have a commercial free version but I haven't
tried it.

I haven't listened to any broadcast music in my car in 20 years. I
play my own MP3s from a thumb drive and a disk drive before that.


One of the plus points of the car I bought this spring is there's a
direct USB port. The last one required a MP3 player plugged into the aux.

On Wednesday, August 19, 2020 at 10:43:24 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Wed, 19 Aug 2020 16:56:58 -0500, Dean Hoffman
wrote:

On 8/19/20 2:22 PM, bruce bowser wrote:
I can already see where this is going with online continuous play. They are going to interrupt it every 3 minutes with commercials. I'll go back to the 1980's casette tapes before this.

Have you tried Tunein? Maybe I'm just used to the ads but it
doesn't seem too bad. They have a commercial free version but I haven't
tried it.
I haven't listened to any broadcast music in my car in 20 years. I
play my own MP3s from a thumb drive and a disk drive before that.

I'd use a thumb drive, it's just that I like continuous play and somehow, I think an ad will appear on there during the recording. With an old 1996 boom box tape deck, you know no site provider can slip ads in.

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce bowser
wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

As soon as you commit to MP3, the media doesn't matter. It will work
on just about anything. If your CD player is smart enough it will play
MP3s from a CD and you can get about 150 on one disk. This is not new
technology. The player in my wife's 2008 Lincoln plays MP3s from disk
but it also has a USB that supports 16g thumb drives. That is over 10
days worth of continuous music. After 250 hours you might be ready to
hear the same song again.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Previous car had a CD changer. It was a 2000 Toyota and the changer
worked until about 2014 (though it jammed 3 times. Once I freed it up
by pressing a lot of buttons and twice I had to take it out of the car
and fiddle with it. The 4th time, in 2014 I had to rip the guts out to
retrieve my CDs.

This car has a screen with a map and GPS and behind it is one slot to
play a CD and another slot that holds a CD with the map on it. For a
couple years I t hought the map was inadequate because it's from 2005,
and I wanted to connect the screen to my phone. That can't be done, but
the map in the car is pretty good after all.

They sold newer map CDs on ebay. but only 3 or 4 and only up to 2008
when I guesss they were driven out of business by google maps, and the
CDs they sold were 30 or 40 dollars. Worth it if I had no CD at all,
but not just to get a map that's 2 or 3 years newer.

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it. You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Still that's enough for me to get all of my collection on 31 CDs.
I typically play the same CD 2 or 3 times before I get bored and switch
to the next CD. I'm really happy with this solution. I really detest
radio and it's commercials.

I wrote some software to pick random tracks and spread them over
all 31 CDs so I don't have to listen to the same artist day after day.

My car is getting a little old now. I'm able to keep a full backup
of all my music on 1 USB stick but the car won't play from USB, only
that Apple thing.

--
Dan Espen

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it.

If that was a way of encouraging me to try it, a) you are very tactful.
(I mean it.) b) I did try it. IIRC the owners manual etc. said
nothing about audio CDs or MP3's or the difference . Surely MP3 existed
in 2005? But I guess the car radio people hadn't gotten around to it
yet. They were probably gloating about using a gps map in the radio
(and it does work very well to show where I am and what direction I'm
going.)

You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Interesting.

Still that's enough for me to get all of my collection on 31 CDs.
I typically play the same CD 2 or 3 times before I get bored and switch
to the next CD. I'm really happy with this solution. I really detest
radio and it's commercials.

I have about 20 CD's I got at a Goodwill store. That was all they had
from a set of about 35 that was made for sale to GI's in Germany during
the 70's (with songs from the 50's, 60's and a little 70's). Most are
original, but a few are reproductions. Some reproductions sound exactly
like the group that made the song famous, but a few are inferior.

But since I no longer have the changer, I only play one of them and it's
not even a good one.

I wrote some software to pick random tracks and spread them over
all 31 CDs so I don't have to listen to the same artist day after day.

My car is getting a little old now. I'm able to keep a full backup
of all my music on 1 USB stick but the car won't play from USB, only
that Apple thing.

You know for under $15 there are things that plug into the cigarette
lighter that transmit to the radio. They have USB and probably AUX
inputs and maybe even SD card input, and have switches to play the next
song, the previous song, to adjust the frequency to any unused freq. in
your area. There are dozens of models, some with flexible stalks,
others very short. Some have a little screen that shows the name of the
song that is playing. They also have bluetooth and work with the cell
phone. It's incedible how much they pack into a little thing for so
little money. Maybe by now some are $20. If you're interested, I'll
tell you which ones I like

Most have two USB jacks, one of which is only good for charging your
phone and one which takes a flashdrive and is input to the radio.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio. That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it.

If that was a way of encouraging me to try it, a) you are very tactful.
(I mean it.) b) I did try it. IIRC the owners manual etc. said
nothing about audio CDs or MP3's or the difference . Surely MP3 existed
in 2005? But I guess the car radio people hadn't gotten around to it
yet. They were probably gloating about using a gps map in the radio
(and it does work very well to show where I am and what direction I'm
going.)

Tact is a virtue. I was guessing you'd look into it a bit.
I have the OEM radio in a 2006 Scion Xb.

Of course you can always have a new radio installed.

You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Interesting.

Still that's enough for me to get all of my collection on 31 CDs.
I typically play the same CD 2 or 3 times before I get bored and switch
to the next CD. I'm really happy with this solution. I really detest
radio and it's commercials.

I have about 20 CD's I got at a Goodwill store. That was all they had
from a set of about 35 that was made for sale to GI's in Germany during
the 70's (with songs from the 50's, 60's and a little 70's). Most are
original, but a few are reproductions. Some reproductions sound exactly
like the group that made the song famous, but a few are inferior.

But since I no longer have the changer, I only play one of them and it's
not even a good one.

I had 300 45s, 500+ LPs, and a number of CDs.
I can get obsessed in multi-year projects so I ripped them all
to my hard disk track by track. I don't regret the time spent
as I now have multiple ways of accessing my entire music collection
and full backup.

I wrote some software to pick random tracks and spread them over
all 31 CDs so I don't have to listen to the same artist day after day.

My car is getting a little old now. I'm able to keep a full backup
of all my music on 1 USB stick but the car won't play from USB, only
that Apple thing.

You know for under $15 there are things that plug into the cigarette
lighter that transmit to the radio.

Nope, didn't know that.

They have USB and probably AUX
inputs and maybe even SD card input, and have switches to play the next
song, the previous song, to adjust the frequency to any unused freq. in
your area. There are dozens of models, some with flexible stalks,
others very short. Some have a little screen that shows the name of the
song that is playing. They also have bluetooth and work with the cell
phone. It's incedible how much they pack into a little thing for so
little money. Maybe by now some are $20. If you're interested, I'll
tell you which ones I like

Most have two USB jacks, one of which is only good for charging your
phone and one which takes a flashdrive and is input to the radio.

Thanks for the offer.

My CD scheme works well enough for my current car. Right now I'm not spending
much time in the car so I'm not hot to upgrade right now.

A USB player that supports FLAC would probably be the best way for me to
go since that's the format my backups use. Random play would be
a necessity.

I've got most of my house and back yard covered with WIFI.
I tried bluetooth, but even with class 1 bluetooth I wasn't satisfied.

Getting away from radio stations with their obnoxious advertising was a very
good thing. I'm glad I spent all that time moving my entire collection
to my hard disk which is the root of the whole system.

--
Dan Espen

Jim Joyce writes:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio. That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

Back of the radio?

I just did some searches for my 2006 Scion Xb.
I don't see any indication that there is something
on the back of the radio for USB.

I know I can connect a player to the AUX port.
I really like the CD controls on the steering wheel which I don't
imagine would work with AUX.

I just looked for IPOD to USB, didn't look good.

If I could get an easy way to plug in a USB stick, I'd go for it.
Otherwise my data CD solution is good enough.

I could afford a newer car but I love the bizarre look of the early Xb
and I think I'm going to stick with it until I see something I like
more.

I'm 74 now and in great health, I'm thinking the Scion might outlast
me. I only have 50K on it, and lots of people have gotten 300K out of
them.

2020 - 2006 = 14 years.
300K / 50K - 1/6 of it's lifetime.

At this rate, I'd have to live to age 144.

--
Dan Espen

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Previous car had a CD changer. It was a 2000 Toyota and the changer
worked until about 2014 (though it jammed 3 times. Once I freed it up
by pressing a lot of buttons and twice I had to take it out of the car
and fiddle with it. The 4th time, in 2014 I had to rip the guts out to
retrieve my CDs.

This car has a screen with a map and GPS and behind it is one slot to
play a CD and another slot that holds a CD with the map on it. For a
couple years I t hought the map was inadequate because it's from 2005,
and I wanted to connect the screen to my phone. That can't be done, but
the map in the car is pretty good after all.

Your dash unit has GPS Nav and no USB port? Must have been a strange
crux of technology there.

I bought new radios for my 97 Honda and 2000 Ford truck that both play
MP3s and the one in the Honda will also sync with a phone if that is
where you want to get your music from. They are both 2009-10
technology. Prior to that I had PCs in my vehicles. I stopped when
Socket 7 boards that still worked were getting rare and I wasn't
willing to replace all of the capacitors. That does seem to be the
best for a car MP3 playing PC. The 133-166 Pentium seems to tolerate
the 140+ degrees you get in a car in the summer when it is parked in
the sun. They still run.
Faster CPUs have trouble and you really don't need more than a P133 to
play MP3s. You can even go slower with a tweek to the player software
(MPXPLAY) That is a DOS application and DOS boots faster than my
commercial players, any of them, including the one in the Lincoln. It
also lets you select songs from a keypad so you don't need to take
your eyes off the road. It defaults to random.
I still run it in the house, It will run on W/7 and I assume W/10.
That is what I run from my 3W1 Seeburg

http://gfretwell.com/ftp/judybar.jpg

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it. You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Try loading the songs in a subdirectory. That is probably a limit on
the number of files you can put in the root.

You are also not getting 700 MP3s on a 700MB disk unless they are
painfully compressed, like mono 64kb or something. Typically they are
a meg a minute.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:58:54 -0400, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it.

If that was a way of encouraging me to try it, a) you are very tactful.
(I mean it.) b) I did try it. IIRC the owners manual etc. said
nothing about audio CDs or MP3's or the difference . Surely MP3 existed
in 2005? But I guess the car radio people hadn't gotten around to it
yet. They were probably gloating about using a gps map in the radio
(and it does work very well to show where I am and what direction I'm
going.)


MP3s were starting to grab hold in 98 or so (at least that was when I
became aware) but you are in the gap in 2005, That could be before
they started putting MP3 capability in radio units. My oldest is 2008.
If you can find a Blaupunkt Toronto 410 on Ebay, I can recommend that
one. Crutchfield usually has deals on new players tho. Finding a
clearance on an old model is usually the biggest bang for the buck.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 18:21:09 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

You know for under $15 there are things that plug into the cigarette
lighter that transmit to the radio.

Nope, didn't know that.

I have a couple I can send you but they are pretty flaky. If you are
in an area where there is a pretty wide band without any other FM
stations they seem to be OK. In an urban area with a crowded dial, not
so much. I tried all sorts of stuff before I got a real player. My
original setup used a dummy tape cassette playing from line out of the
PC. My Honda had an "Aux In" so it was easy.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 19:39:02 -0400,
wrote:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 18:21:09 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

You know for under $15 there are things that plug into the cigarette
lighter that transmit to the radio.

Nope, didn't know that.

I have a couple I can send you but they are pretty flaky. If you are
in an area where there is a pretty wide band without any other FM
stations they seem to be OK. In an urban area with a crowded dial, not
so much.

In Baltimore, 90.5 is vacant. I think 90.3 and 90.7 are too, or at
least only have some small noises. . 90.1 is C-Span Radio, that most
car radios but only a few home radios can receive.

Also the range of those cigarette lighter things goes one or two**
notches above and below the FM band and my radios go that high and low,
even though I dont' think there are any FM stations that do.

**TWo notches on the gizmo, which goes up and down 0.1 mHz at a time.
That's one notch on the radio that goes 0.2 mHz at a time.

For one reason or another, for me the gizmo worked fine.

I tried all sorts of stuff before I got a real player. My
original setup used a dummy tape cassette playing from line out of the
PC. My Honda had an "Aux In" so it was easy.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 18:21:09 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it.

If that was a way of encouraging me to try it, a) you are very tactful.
(I mean it.) b) I did try it. IIRC the owners manual etc. said
nothing about audio CDs or MP3's or the difference . Surely MP3 existed
in 2005? But I guess the car radio people hadn't gotten around to it
yet. They were probably gloating about using a gps map in the radio
(and it does work very well to show where I am and what direction I'm
going.)

Tact is a virtue. I was guessing you'd look into it a bit.
I have the OEM radio in a 2006 Scion Xb.

Of course you can always have a new radio installed.

They sell devices under $20 that will plug into the back of many car
radios and have a USB input and an AUX input. One was listed for my
car, and I think if the car had been made later in 2005, it would have
worked. It didn't, but I took the radio out to find that out for
sure. (Crutchfield paid return postage and promptly returned my money)

In doing so, I was as gentle as could be, but still one place in the
vinyl dash, it crumbled. Less than a cubic mm. but enough that I don't
want to try it again or hve a pro try either.

The dash has 10 cracks, most 2 inches long. No cracks have gaps but I
expect things to get worse, maybe a lot worse, before I get rid of the
car around 2024.

I was also concerned that the steering wheel controls might not work
right, even though crutchfield sells a dedicated kit.

It's a tan dash too. Don't black dashes crumble earlier, and do red
dashes fade like the red street lines in a map I had that totally --
totally -- disappeared?

You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Interesting.

Still that's enough for me to get all of my collection on 31 CDs.
I typically play the same CD 2 or 3 times before I get bored and switch
to the next CD. I'm really happy with this solution. I really detest
radio and it's commercials.

I have about 20 CD's I got at a Goodwill store. That was all they had
from a set of about 35 that was made for sale to GI's in Germany during
the 70's (with songs from the 50's, 60's and a little 70's). Most are
original, but a few are reproductions. Some reproductions sound exactly
like the group that made the song famous, but a few are inferior.

But since I no longer have the changer, I only play one of them and it's
not even a good one.

I had 300 45s, 500+ LPs, and a number of CDs.
I can get obsessed in multi-year projects so I ripped them all
to my hard disk track by track. I don't regret the time spent
as I now have multiple ways of accessing my entire music collection
and full backup.

Sounds good.

I wrote some software to pick random tracks and spread them over
all 31 CDs so I don't have to listen to the same artist day after day.

My car is getting a little old now. I'm able to keep a full backup
of all my music on 1 USB stick but the car won't play from USB, only
that Apple thing.

You know for under $15 there are things that plug into the cigarette
lighter that transmit to the radio.

Nope, didn't know that.

They have USB and probably AUX
inputs and maybe even SD card input, and have switches to play the next
song, the previous song, to adjust the frequency to any unused freq. in
your area. There are dozens of models, some with flexible stalks,
others very short. Some have a little screen that shows the name of the
song that is playing. They also have bluetooth and work with the cell
phone. It's incedible how much they pack into a little thing for so
little money. Maybe by now some are $20. If you're interested, I'll
tell you which ones I like

Most have two USB jacks, one of which is only good for charging your
phone and one which takes a flashdrive and is input to the radio.

Thanks for the offer.

My CD scheme works well enough for my current car. Right now I'm not spending
much time in the car so I'm not hot to upgrade right now.

A USB player that supports FLAC would probably be the best way for me to

Is that Roberta FLAC?

go since that's the format my backups use. Random play would be
a necessity.

I've got most of my house and back yard covered with WIFI.
I tried bluetooth, but even with class 1 bluetooth I wasn't satisfied.

Wifi reaches my house and probably all of the yard, at least where a
radio might be, but I don't have any wifi radios. I have a bluetooth
radio that is about 40 feet from the computer and that is too far (so I
ran a wire that works fine)

But I dont' want to run wires to the bathroom and the kitchen and the
basement, so someone on sci.electronics.repair, I think it was,
recommended an FM transmitter.

I got the little one, $10 or 15 and it wasn't enough (even though he
thought it woudl be. ) so I got a 30 or 40 dolllar one and it reaches
the whole house and any FM radio will receive it. 90.5 but it will xmit
on any FM frequency. It's the strongest station on the dial when I'm
playing something. I'm in a townhouse and I wonder if my next door
n'bor get it, has come across it, and I wonder if she wonders why
sometimes it s there and usually it's not. But it's a vacant frequency.
I have a button on the radio for it so I check frequennty.

Getting away from radio stations with their obnoxious advertising was a very
good thing. I'm glad I spent all that time moving my entire collection
to my hard disk which is the root of the whole system.

Great.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:07:24 -0500, Jim Joyce
wrote:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio.

Exactly. I bought one** from Crutchfield, under $20, easy to install,
into the CD changer port, but it didn't work. I tried everything. I
think there was a one letter difference on the radio it would work with.

**It had USB and AUX and I bought extensions and a plate so I could
mount it in the little box in the middle. I still have those things.

That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

Worked in a 2002!!. :-( There is still a difference in radios
possible. Mine, 2005 Solara (like a Camry), might be the first one
with a GPS map.

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 18:21:09 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:37:58 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:
....
They have USB and probably AUX
inputs and maybe even SD card input, and have switches to play the next
song, the previous song, to adjust the frequency to any unused freq. in
your area. There are dozens of models, some with flexible stalks,
others very short. Some have a little screen that shows the name of the
song that is playing. They also have bluetooth and work with the cell
phone. It's incedible how much they pack into a little thing for so
little money. Maybe by now some are $20. If you're interested, I'll
tell you which ones I like

Most have two USB jacks, one of which is only good for charging your
phone and one which takes a flashdrive and is input to the radio.

Thanks for the offer.

My CD scheme works well enough for my current car. Right now I'm not spending
much time in the car so I'm not hot to upgrade right now.

A USB player that supports FLAC would probably be the best way for me to

Is that Roberta FLAC?

FLAC is the other completely lossless audio format.
If differs from WAV which is used on audio CDs in that it's compressed
and therefore smaller than WAV.

Most other audio formats introduce loss, if you convert back and forth
a few times eventually the audio will be a mess.

go since that's the format my backups use. Random play would be
a necessity.

I've got most of my house and back yard covered with WIFI.
I tried bluetooth, but even with class 1 bluetooth I wasn't satisfied.

Wifi reaches my house and probably all of the yard, at least where a
radio might be, but I don't have any wifi radios. I have a bluetooth
radio that is about 40 feet from the computer and that is too far (so I
ran a wire that works fine)

Bluetooth comes in class 1 and class 2.
Class 2 is really short distances. Class 1 wasn't enough to reliably
go through one wall into my backyard. WIFI does.
I have one WIFI repeater in the house.

--
Dan Espen

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 19:16:45 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

Jim Joyce writes:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio. That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

Back of the radio?

I just did some searches for my 2006 Scion Xb.
I don't see any indication that there is something
on the back of the radio for USB.

He's talkng about a CD changer port. Rectangular with 6, 8, or 10 or
so pins. See if you can find a CD changer that would work with the
radio and if there is one, there should be a port too.

I know I can connect a player to the AUX port.
I really like the CD controls on the steering wheel which I don't
imagine would work with AUX.

No, they woudln't work with AUX but if y ou have a changer port, they'd
probably work with a changer that plugged into it. But not with an
AUX/USB port that plugged into it. .

They'd still work with whatever was in the radio itself.

I just looked for IPOD to USB, didn't look good.

If I could get an easy way to plug in a USB stick, I'd go for it.
Otherwise my data CD solution is good enough.

I could afford a newer car but I love the bizarre look of the early Xb
and I think I'm going to stick with it until I see something I like
more.

I'm 74 now and in great health, I'm thinking the Scion might outlast
me. I only have 50K on it, and lots of people have gotten 300K out of
them.

2020 - 2006 = 14 years.
300K / 50K - 1/6 of it's lifetime.

At this rate, I'd have to live to age 144.

You should definitely do that.

I bought a car with 130,000 miles on it (for $4000**) but I don't drive
much either, especially not with the virus. Still, it's a 2005 and I
expect all my cars to last forever but tthey all wear out at 7 years
(one lasted 8.) I think I bought it 3 years ago so I only have another
4. so in 2024, I'll buy a car made in 2012 to 2017 and it will have the
fancy fadio I want. That's the plan.

** I only had 3 other choices and this was the best Solara I could
find. The seller lives less than a mile away but woudn't tell me where.
He met me in a parking lot and wouldn't even tell me his name. I had a
lot of doubts about that but I want ed the car and the money changed
hands only after the guy at the tag and title outlet said the car was
now registered to me. The seller lied*** to me too about how long
he'd owned it, but at least he actually owned it. ***I know because
the Carfax for the owner before him included a whole summer or more when
he claimed his daughter was driving it to school. But I don't rely on
what the seller says anyhow. I don't even ask quesitons because I dont'
want to make a liar out of the seller and I don't want to be mad when I
find out he was lying. I'm not mad this time because I like the car.

The two times I've sold a car, I said nothing or almost nothing about
its condition, and still the buyer of the first car was mad at me.

This was about 1981 and I was selling a 1967 Pontia Catalina
convertible. He said it was for his 15 year old son to fix up and be
ready when he was old enough to drive. Two or 3 weeks after he bought
it I found a spare oil pan (why I had a spare oil pan I cannnot now
imagine) and a couple other things, maybe an oil pan gasket, in a
closet , and I called him to see if he wanted it. For free of course.

He was mad at me. He accused me of lying to him. He said the car
overheated. It had never overheated for me. Not only that, that's just
the kind of repair a 15-year old can make and can learn on. I don't
think there ever was a son. He was planning on flipping it.

And oh yeah, the car only cost him $150. I figured any car that runs
is worth $100 and 50 extra for being a convertible. I still can't
believe the guy was mad at me. What a child. He never did want the
extra parts.


I coudln't find more than one set of keys and fob for the second car,
when he was here, but 3 weeks later, i found 3 more sets. I called him
literally a dozen times and he never answered. He had answered before
he came here to look at the car. I never had his address but I think
he moved.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 19:22:24 -0400,
wrote:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Previous car had a CD changer. It was a 2000 Toyota and the changer
worked until about 2014 (though it jammed 3 times. Once I freed it up
by pressing a lot of buttons and twice I had to take it out of the car
and fiddle with it. The 4th time, in 2014 I had to rip the guts out to
retrieve my CDs.

This car has a screen with a map and GPS and behind it is one slot to
play a CD and another slot that holds a CD with the map on it. For a
couple years I t hought the map was inadequate because it's from 2005,
and I wanted to connect the screen to my phone. That can't be done, but
the map in the car is pretty good after all.

The map has details for some cities, but not all. It has Baltimore, DC,
and I'm sure it has Philly and NYC. I haven't checked what is missing.


Your dash unit has GPS Nav and no USB port?

Right.

Must have been a strange crux of technology there.

I think for a radio made later that year, I could have plugged a USB
port into the changer port.

I bought new radios for my 97 Honda and 2000 Ford truck that both play
MP3s and the one in the Honda will also sync with a phone if that is
where you want to get your music from. They are both 2009-10
technology. Prior to that I had PCs in my vehicles. I stopped when
Socket 7 boards that still worked were getting rare and I wasn't
willing to replace all of the capacitors. That does seem to be the
best for a car MP3 playing PC. The 133-166 Pentium seems to tolerate
the 140+ degrees you get in a car in the summer when it is parked in
the sun. They still run.
Faster CPUs have trouble and you really don't need more than a P133 to
play MP3s. You can even go slower with a tweek to the player software
(MPXPLAY) That is a DOS application and DOS boots faster than my
commercial players, any of them, including the one in the Lincoln. It
also lets you select songs from a keypad so you don't need to take
your eyes off the road. It defaults to random.
I still run it in the house, It will run on W/7 and I assume W/10.
That is what I run from my 3W1 Seeburg

http://gfretwell.com/ftp/judybar.jpg

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 19:16:45 -0400, Dan Espen wrote:

Jim Joyce writes:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio. That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

Back of the radio?

I just did some searches for my 2006 Scion Xb.
I don't see any indication that there is something
on the back of the radio for USB.

I know I can connect a player to the AUX port.
I really like the CD controls on the steering wheel which I don't
imagine would work with AUX.

I just looked for IPOD to USB, didn't look good.

If I could get an easy way to plug in a USB stick, I'd go for it.
Otherwise my data CD solution is good enough.

I could afford a newer car but I love the bizarre look of the early Xb
and I think I'm going to stick with it until I see something I like
more.

I'm 74 now and in great health, I'm thinking the Scion might outlast
me. I only have 50K on it, and lots of people have gotten 300K out of
them.

2020 - 2006 = 14 years.
300K / 50K - 1/6 of it's lifetime.

At this rate, I'd have to live to age 144.

I used something like this item on a 2002 Highlander.
https://www.amazon.com/Interface-Yom...dp/B0169MV538/

It plugged into the CD changer port on the back of the radio. You can see
the connector and the port (on the back of the radio) in the photos at the
link above. The one I used had the USB port and the Aux port on a small
bracket that I attached to the bottom edge of the dash. The steering wheel
controls worked with it because the radio thought it was a CD changer.

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden. It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:56:28 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 19:16:45 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

Jim Joyce writes:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 17:05:34 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least. I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s etc.
and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

Is your current car still a Toyota? One of the nice things about most
factory Toyota radios is that USB adapters are widely available, easy to
install, and not very expensive. Some of them plug into the CD changer port
on the back of the radio. That's the other nice thing about many Toyota
factory radios. They tend to have a CD changer port. When I added a USB
adapter to a 2002 Highlander it took only about an hour.

Back of the radio?

I just did some searches for my 2006 Scion Xb.
I don't see any indication that there is something
on the back of the radio for USB.

He's talkng about a CD changer port. Rectangular with 6, 8, or 10 or
so pins. See if you can find a CD changer that would work with the
radio and if there is one, there should be a port too.

I know I can connect a player to the AUX port.
I really like the CD controls on the steering wheel which I don't
imagine would work with AUX.

No, they woudln't work with AUX but if y ou have a changer port, they'd
probably work with a changer that plugged into it. But not with an
AUX/USB port that plugged into it. .

With the kind of adapter that I'm talking about, the steering wheel
controls work with USB thumb drives. I can't remember if they also worked
with devices plugged into the Aux port.

snip

Jim Joyce writes:

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden. It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

Ah, USB charger. Don't need one of those, that's what the cigarette
lighter is for.

I'd like to play music off a USB stick since I can get my entire music
collection on just one of them, but my Data CD MP3s work well enough.
I can fit 31 thin case CDs in my center console and door pockets, but
I don't need to carry all 31 of them at one time. Even when I was
driving to work every day it took me over a week to get tired of one
CD and switch to the next.

It's like when I had small tropical fish in a 6 ft long 60 gallon tank.
The fish would swim to one end of the tank, turn around and forget they
had been there already when they got to the other end. It was all new
to them.

--
Dan Espen

On 21/8/20 7:37 am, Dan Espen wrote:
micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it. You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Have you tried putting the files into folders limited to 255 or less? I
had that issue with mine and solved it with multiple folders.

Still that's enough for me to get all of my collection on 31 CDs.
I typically play the same CD 2 or 3 times before I get bored and switch
to the next CD. I'm really happy with this solution. I really detest
radio and it's commercials.

I wrote some software to pick random tracks and spread them over
all 31 CDs so I don't have to listen to the same artist day after day.

My car is getting a little old now. I'm able to keep a full backup
of all my music on 1 USB stick but the car won't play from USB, only
that Apple thing.



--

Xeno


Nothing astonishes Noddy so much as common sense and plain dealing.
(with apologies to Ralph Waldo Emerson)

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 22:36:26 -0400, Dan Espen wrote:

Jim Joyce writes:

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden. It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

Ah, USB charger. Don't need one of those, that's what the cigarette
lighter is for.

What? No, not a charger. I was talking about taking advantage of the fact
that many Toyota radios have a CD changer (not charger) port on the back of
the radio. You can see it in the Amazon photo I linked earlier. Scion was
part of Toyota, so I figured there was a chance that your radio also has a
CD changer port, but perhaps not.

I'd like to play music off a USB stick since I can get my entire music
collection on just one of them, but my Data CD MP3s work well enough.
I can fit 31 thin case CDs in my center console and door pockets, but
I don't need to carry all 31 of them at one time. Even when I was
driving to work every day it took me over a week to get tired of one
CD and switch to the next.

Right, I was also talking about being able to play music from a USB stick.

It's like when I had small tropical fish in a 6 ft long 60 gallon tank.
The fish would swim to one end of the tank, turn around and forget they
had been there already when they got to the other end. It was all new
to them.

Sounds like a simple, perhaps happy, life.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:05:27 -0500, Jim Joyce
wrote:

I used something like this item on a 2002 Highlander.
https://www.amazon.com/Interface-Yom...dp/B0169MV538/

See, this is my problem:

Not Compatible with Factory Navigation System, which I have
1998-2002,Camry
1998-2003,Solara and I have a 2005 Solara

A Solara is much like a Camry, but I guess they used different radios
since the compatible Camry ended a year earlier.

They might have another version that does work but I looked 3 years ago.
I'll look again.... So far, they are all for Hondas.

It plugged into the CD changer port on the back of the radio. You can see
the connector and the port (on the back of the radio) in the photos at the
link above. The one I used had the USB port and the Aux port on a small
bracket that I attached to the bottom edge of the dash. The steering wheel
controls worked with it because the radio thought it was a CD changer.

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden.

Not necessarily. I had the port.

It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

It's still a possibility I guess. The dash is no worse than 2 years
ago, and while I had the radio out, I could alsso rewire the clock,
trip computer, and thermometer so that they were always lit up. Now
they are not lit up in the day time and most of the time I can't see
what they say. I have the wiring manual and that would only take a
little wire and two diodes.

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:47:06 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


Is that Roberta FLAC?

FLAC is the other completely lossless audio format.
If differs from WAV which is used on audio CDs in that it's compressed
and therefore smaller than WAV.

Most other audio formats introduce loss, if you convert back and forth
a few times eventually the audio will be a mes

That brings up another question. Other than youtube videos and some
news on the PC, just about everything I watch I record off the air on a
Philips DVDR. I use the lowest quality SuperLongPlaying, because I
don't care about the picture quality and it's always good enough, and I
can get more programs on the hard drive before it fills up.

But if I used a higher quality, would that make the sound better as well
as the picture? I only care about the sound.

On Law & Order and occasionally other stuff, I have a hard time
understanding because of the music, but surely the original was
understandable.. On some shows I can understand clearly, but every so
often a whole syllable is missing. I'll play it 3 times and it's
definitely missing. It's not that my hearing is getting bad. It's
too late to record that exact thing at higher quality, but in general,
if the picture is recorded at higher quality, will the sound be also
recorded at higher quality???


Because I can put in a bigger hard drive and have room for just as many
shows but at higher quality, 2 or 3 times the equivalent of feet per
minute.

On Fri, 21 Aug 2020 00:40:00 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:05:27 -0500, Jim Joyce
wrote:

I used something like this item on a 2002 Highlander.
https://www.amazon.com/Interface-Yom...dp/B0169MV538/

See, this is my problem:

Not Compatible with Factory Navigation System, which I have
1998-2002,Camry
1998-2003,Solara and I have a 2005 Solara

A Solara is much like a Camry, but I guess they used different radios
since the compatible Camry ended a year earlier.

They might have another version that does work but I looked 3 years ago.
I'll look again.... So far, they are all for Hondas.

I think you probably hit the nail on the head. With the factory Nav system
you probably can't do the USB adapter mod.



It plugged into the CD changer port on the back of the radio. You can see
the connector and the port (on the back of the radio) in the photos at the
link above. The one I used had the USB port and the Aux port on a small
bracket that I attached to the bottom edge of the dash. The steering wheel
controls worked with it because the radio thought it was a CD changer.

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden.

Not necessarily. I had the port.

It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

It's still a possibility I guess. The dash is no worse than 2 years
ago, and while I had the radio out, I could alsso rewire the clock,
trip computer, and thermometer so that they were always lit up. Now
they are not lit up in the day time and most of the time I can't see
what they say. I have the wiring manual and that would only take a
little wire and two diodes.

Xeno writes:

On 21/8/20 7:37 am, Dan Espen wrote:
micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 05:10:24 -0700 (PDT), bruce
bowser wrote:

The thing is, I never really bothered or let alone perfected recording
with much CD burning or thumb drive use strictly for audio, at least.
I have three thumb drives and they're all practically empty.

Unefortunately for me, my car radio plays only audio CDs, not MP3s
etc. and you can't get many songs on an audio CD.

I never knew my car radio/CD player handled DATA CDs with MP3s until I
tried it. You can typically get 700 MP3 tracks on a data CD.

I tried it but eventually found out the radio has an 8 bit processor so
song count overflows at 255, so I can only play 255 tracks on each CD.

Have you tried putting the files into folders limited to 255 or less?
I had that issue with mine and solved it with multiple folders.

Yes, I started out with the files in folders.
The folders counted too toward the limit of 255.
Interesting, I guess it all depends on who wrote the software for the radio.

So, I adjusted the software I wrote to randomly spread the collection
over the CDs to change the filename from just trackname to
trackname-artist-album. The longer filenames don't cause a problem.
The actual track/artist/album I put in the EXIF data in the file
so that the radio can display all that information.
The radio can display filename, track name, artist name, or album.

--
Dan Espen

Jim Joyce writes:

On Thu, 20 Aug 2020 22:36:26 -0400, Dan Espen wrote:

Jim Joyce writes:

If your radio has a standard Toyota CD changer port, you're probably
golden. It's a little more extreme, but you could also replace the whole
radio unit. Even basic models come with USB these days and swapping a radio
is easy. Check Crutchfield.com for info, not necessarily for buying.

Ah, USB charger. Don't need one of those, that's what the cigarette
lighter is for.

What? No, not a charger. I was talking about taking advantage of the fact
that many Toyota radios have a CD changer (not charger) port on the back of
the radio. You can see it in the Amazon photo I linked earlier. Scion was
part of Toyota, so I figured there was a chance that your radio also has a
CD changer port, but perhaps not.

Ah, I think someone else may have mentioned charging.
My radio has an embedded CD player but no changer feature.
I'll do some more searches and maybe even read the car manual to make
sure I"m getting this right.

I'd like to play music off a USB stick since I can get my entire music
collection on just one of them, but my Data CD MP3s work well enough.
I can fit 31 thin case CDs in my center console and door pockets, but
I don't need to carry all 31 of them at one time. Even when I was
driving to work every day it took me over a week to get tired of one
CD and switch to the next.

Right, I was also talking about being able to play music from a USB stick.

It's like when I had small tropical fish in a 6 ft long 60 gallon tank.
The fish would swim to one end of the tank, turn around and forget they
had been there already when they got to the other end. It was all new
to them.

Sounds like a simple, perhaps happy, life.

The fish never complained.

They really did look like they were exploring around the tank.
There aren't a lot of brain cells in the smaller ones.
They get a little smarter when you get to Cichlids.

I had that tank for over 20 years and specialized in creating
a view. I had all kinds of aquatic plants and very colorful
fish. I even had a species of snail that would clean the glass
but not overrun the tank.

I got the money to pay for the tank when a movie company paid me
to let them shoot scenes from the movie "7 Ups" in my house.

--
Dan Espen

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:47:06 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


Is that Roberta FLAC?

FLAC is the other completely lossless audio format.
If differs from WAV which is used on audio CDs in that it's compressed
and therefore smaller than WAV.

Most other audio formats introduce loss, if you convert back and forth
a few times eventually the audio will be a mes

That brings up another question. Other than youtube videos and some
news on the PC, just about everything I watch I record off the air on a
Philips DVDR. I use the lowest quality SuperLongPlaying, because I
don't care about the picture quality and it's always good enough, and I
can get more programs on the hard drive before it fills up.

But if I used a higher quality, would that make the sound better as well
as the picture? I only care about the sound.

On Law & Order and occasionally other stuff, I have a hard time
understanding because of the music, but surely the original was
understandable.. On some shows I can understand clearly, but every so
often a whole syllable is missing. I'll play it 3 times and it's
definitely missing. It's not that my hearing is getting bad. It's
too late to record that exact thing at higher quality, but in general,
if the picture is recorded at higher quality, will the sound be also
recorded at higher quality???

Because I can put in a bigger hard drive and have room for just as many
shows but at higher quality, 2 or 3 times the equivalent of feet per
minute.

I'm far from an expert but my understanding is that audio and video
are recorded as 2 independent things. They're in one file but the
encoding is separate. Note that the video might be 60 frames per second
but the audio might be 44khz.

My hearing IS bad. I don't hear high frequencies well in one ear.
I have the hardest time hearing movie audio even with hearing aids in.
Women that speak softly in crowded rooms is another challenge.
I've been trying to pay attention to what I can't hear because the
hearing aids can be adjusted to compensate. Hopefully my next visit
will result in improvements.

For my audio I wanted the master copy to be 100% lossless so that
if I had to convert to some other format like MP3 I wouldn't be
in a situation of doing WAV-MP3-WAV-OGG and getting a mess.
I'm not worried about space. I started with gigabyte drives but
now I'm using Terrabyte SSDs. Lots and lots of space.

--
Dan Espen

In alt.home.repair, on Fri, 21 Aug 2020 03:35:42 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

micky writes:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:47:06 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


Is that Roberta FLAC?

FLAC is the other completely lossless audio format.
If differs from WAV which is used on audio CDs in that it's compressed
and therefore smaller than WAV.

Most other audio formats introduce loss, if you convert back and forth
a few times eventually the audio will be a mes

That brings up another question. Other than youtube videos and some
news on the PC, just about everything I watch I record off the air on a
Philips DVDR. I use the lowest quality SuperLongPlaying, because I
don't care about the picture quality and it's always good enough, and I
can get more programs on the hard drive before it fills up.

But if I used a higher quality, would that make the sound better as well
as the picture? I only care about the sound.

On Law & Order and occasionally other stuff, I have a hard time
understanding because of the music, but surely the original was
understandable.. On some shows I can understand clearly, but every so
often a whole syllable is missing. I'll play it 3 times and it's
definitely missing. It's not that my hearing is getting bad. It's
too late to record that exact thing at higher quality, but in general,
if the picture is recorded at higher quality, will the sound be also
recorded at higher quality???

Because I can put in a bigger hard drive and have room for just as many
shows but at higher quality, 2 or 3 times the equivalent of feet per
minute.

I'm far from an expert but my understanding is that audio and video
are recorded as 2 independent things. They're in one file but the
encoding is separate. Note that the video might be 60 frames per second
but the audio might be 44khz.

I will continue to check, but it doesn't sound good for me. There is no
setting for sound quality.

I did try for a short while to record in high quality and didn't notice
an improvement in sound, but that might have been before the noise in my
ear got louder.

But to change the HDD means not ever watching some of what's on the HDD
now (mostly Gunsmoke with Festus, and I hate Festus.) and burning some
of what I havent' watched to DVDs (Right now that's just 1 hour of Law &
Order, but each weekday I record 2 more hours. Now that I've waited 10
or 20 years, Law & Order episodes are really good again. And I don't
remember them.

My hearing IS bad. I don't hear high frequencies well in one ear.
I have the hardest time hearing movie audio even with hearing aids in.

I looked into hearing aids last winter.

Women that speak softly in crowded rooms is another challenge.
I've been trying to pay attention to what I can't hear because the
hearing aids can be adjusted to compensate.

She told me about getting them adjusted after wearing them for a while.
..
Hopefully my next visit
will result in improvements.

But what really got me started is that I heard on the radio about one
particular brand which had a new? method for eliminating monopitch
tinnitus, and I thought I had that. The noise sounds like water running
in a pipe, and she called that a whoosh and said it's not monotone. So
there's no new advance for me.

Then on the way home from the exam, that very day, NPR talked about Bose
HearPhones. They were 100 dollars off until new years day, which made
them 300 or 400, I forget, and I bought a pair. You would never find
them helpful because your hearing aids are so much better. So far,
I've only found them helpful at lectures, because I can make the sound
louder. And now because of the virus there are no more lectures for a
while. (they also have bluetooth and can work with cellphones like the
horse collar earbuds.) Maybe if my hearing were worse and I only had
500, they would be more valuable to me. And there is another brand about
the same price, made in Israel iirc, that has more features (like replay
the last 5 seconds!) that I didn't know about at the time, even though
they had been for sale for 2 years.

I've had a noise in one ear since I was 20 years old, or maybe since I
was 10. I didn't really notice it until I was 50+ and I went to Mammoth
Cave and they had a little thing where they asked everyone to be quiet
so we could all hear what quiet sounded like And that's when I really
noticed the sound in my left ear.

But it still didn't bother me until about 8 years ago when it suddenly
got 2 or 3 times as loud. Now it varies from barely hear it, the old
volume, and the new louder volume, about 1/3 of the tmie each.

Then shortly after I saw the audiologist last winter, I tripped on
pavement, hit my knee hard, and my forehead just a little. A tiny bit
of blood, no headache or dizziness, but I think the noise in my ear
switched to the right side. (Unless it already was in the right side
but I was sure at the time it was the left. I wish I could remember the
name of the ENT I saw 12 years ago.) This would correspond to what
they say, that the tinnitus noise isn't in your ear, it's in your
brain. And it would also mean t he one summer job I had with very loud
noise (and I can't remember if I wore ear plugs or not (I thought I did)
was not responsible for physical damage to my ear.

For my audio I wanted the master copy to be 100% lossless so that

I can certainly see that.

if I had to convert to some other format like MP3 I wouldn't be
in a situation of doing WAV-MP3-WAV-OGG and getting a mess.
I'm not worried about space. I started with gigabyte drives but
now I'm using Terrabyte SSDs. Lots and lots of space.

Wow. Amazing.

The DVDR came with a 160GB drive, which was pretty big in 2007, but I
found a comment online that I can use a 500GB drive. Maybe I can even
use bigger but 12 years ago the commenter probably hadn't tried that.

One last thing, she had me fill out a form, of course, to help decide
what I need, but the last page was only about how annoying the noise
was, phrased in 10 different ways, which I was to rate from 1 to 10 and
one was supposed to add up the 10 values and if the total was over 40,
60, I don't remember, that was bad. It was clear to me that 2 or 3 or
more people nationwide had tried to hurt or kill themselves because of
the noise and the audiologists were obliged to ask these questions
before they let a patient go home. (Once you use the word patient, you
have heightened responsibility.) .

Did you have to fill out a form like that?

You and I should be happy, I guess, that we dont' have that bad a
problem.

In alt.home.repair, on Fri, 21 Aug 2020 00:59:47 -0500, Jim Joyce
wrote:

On Fri, 21 Aug 2020 00:40:00 -0400, micky wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Thu, 20 Aug 2020 20:05:27 -0500, Jim Joyce
wrote:

I used something like this item on a 2002 Highlander.
https://www.amazon.com/Interface-Yom...dp/B0169MV538/

See, this is my problem:

Not Compatible with Factory Navigation System, which I have
1998-2002,Camry
1998-2003,Solara and I have a 2005 Solara

A Solara is much like a Camry, but I guess they used different radios
since the compatible Camry ended a year earlier.

They might have another version that does work but I looked 3 years ago.
I'll look again.... So far, they are all for Hondas.

I think you probably hit the nail on the head. With the factory Nav system
you probably can't do the USB adapter mod.

I really like the map and the GPS, but I will never use the navigation.
For one thing, I can't understand the instructions! And I wonder why
that interferes with the USB//AUX add-on.