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Music Media Wireless Networking Hardware Technology

In Dash Car MP3 Player with 802.11? 36

Posted by Cliff from the on-the-shelf-yet dept.
An anonymous reader asks: "I'm looking for a car MP3 player, either with a tuner and CD player built in, or with a line-out to connect to the existing car stereo. The Omnifi DMP1 looks good, but you need to use their Microsoft Windows software to upload to it. When you take the harddrive module out it plugs into a USB port on a PC and can be used as a USB mass storage device, but none of the files you copy to it will be put into the database, so they won't play. It's also got an optional 802.11b adapter (plugs into a USB port), but it only works with their software. No SMB, let alone SSH, NFS, or FTP server is running." While this is an itch many of the more enterprising among us can scratch on their own, are there dash units currently available that aren't tied to any particular PC platform?
"I looked around some more and found the empeg/riocar, but it was discontinued some time ago.

Yes, I know you can build one yourself. I built a navigation system for my car (which I took out again after my MS degree presentation because it was a PITA to use), and a PVR for my house (which I had a mishap upgrading when the source of TV guide data changed, and I haven't bothered fixing yet). This time I want something that works out of the box, but with a little more freedom for transferring files than I've found so far.

If I don't find a new product with all of what I want, I will either look for a used Empeg/Riocar, which there is a large development community for, and I'd try to add 802.11 and SMB to, or get an Omnifi DMP1 and attempt to hack it's database so I can add music without the WinXP software. Then if that goes well, see about getting an SMB or SSH server running on it (yes, it runs Linux)."
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In Dash Car MP3 Player with 802.11? More

In Dash Car MP3 Player with 802.11?

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  • i just got a tape player connector to cd kit (a tape with a line jack out of it) and hooked it into my zaurus. my zaurus has 802.11 already so you just ftp into and transfer in whatever you want onto a 1 GB sd card. an added extra is that you can transfer in movies for your passenger to watch also...
    • Something else to check out instead of using the tape connector kit, Best Buy has a box that broadcasts your device's audio output to any FM station, so it's 1 less wire to worry about. And it has a built in power converter so you can use it to power your device also.

  • MP3 CD (Score:3, Interesting)

    by webgit ( 805155 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @08:04AM (#10372586)
    A friend of mine has stereo in his car that you can just insert a CD with a collection of MP3's on it and it will play them just like a normal CD. Of course, it does also play normal CD's and lets you listen to the radio.

    • This is what my car stereo does. It was an upgrade from the factory standard package, but I managed to get it for free when I bought the car.

    • Re:MP3 CD (Score:3, Informative)

      by hopemafia ( 155867 )
      And as a bonus, these units are pretty cheap.... I got mine for under $200 installed, with the 3-year warranty, and that was a year ago so prices have probably dropped. My unit probably wouldn't be good enough for an audiophile...but then an audiophile wouldn't be playing mp3s on my cheapo stock speakers.

      One CD holds about 8 hours of mp3s (aka ~500miles)...so unless you're driving really long days you won't even need to switch disks.

  • OGG on CD... any small OGG players? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by tod_miller ( 792541 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @08:12AM (#10372620) Journal
    I think you are fretting with WiFi and copying things. A bit of a non-story - either use CDA / CD-MP3 (I am sure you can buy MP3 player for car).

    For added geek value, have a CD/SD/Memstick/pigeon carrier input to an ogg player. Less fuss more music.

    Geek value points: avian carrier IP dataram transmission [faqs.org]

    OGG audio [xiph.org]

  • awesome player (Score:1, Redundant)

    by alatesystems ( 51331 )
    If you can find one of these [empeg.com], get one. It comes out of your car and plugs in as a mass storage device(not 802.11b). They were linux based IIRC and sonicblue bought them if I'm not mistaken and they stopped making them and made "Rio Car" which is also not anywhere to be found new.

    This [ebay.com] looks awesome too though.

    Chris
  • Take an audio system with a line in. Put some WiFi enabled wireless doodah (TM) in there.

    Place PC / Laptop in boot (babelfish: trunk) and stick another WiFi doodah (TM) [i think thompson make those doodahs (TM)]

    Viola. Now you need a PDA running linux, ripping OGG streams, and using SCP to xfer them to the lappy in the back.

    *thinks* maybe the PDA can play your OGG direct to your system, using the headphone jack.... *.,.*

  • Hmmmm.... (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    "I built a navigation system for my car (which I took out again after my MS degree presentation because it was a PITA to use), and a PVR for my house (which I had a mishap upgrading when the source of TV guide data changed, and I haven't bothered fixing yet). This time I want something that works out of the box, but with a little more freedom for transferring files than I've found so far."

    Roughly translated:

    "All the homebrew stuff I've done has turned out to be crap and I've wasted a good portion of m

  • an easy solution. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by 4nd3r5 ( 732488 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @09:02AM (#10373094) Journal
    Buy a pda with wifi and GPS.
    Buy a 1 gb memory card.
    Hook the lineout[pda] to linein [radio].
    Buy a nice PDA mount for your dash board

    now you have a navigation system, and a wifi enabled mp3 system

    Now move to a nice neighbouthood, so it won't get stolen...
  • The first car MP3 player, http://www.phatnoise.com [phatnoise.com], is still the best. You replace you trunk-mounted CD unit with it, and it translates the key-presses from the stereo faceplate. It's very slick. It runs a little embedded linux (well, not embedded, it's actually on the drive cartridge) and you can mount the linux filesystem and hack at it to your heart's delight. I haven't looked at the forums in over a year, but last time I checked someone was hacking in a wireless device. Is it *really* such a pain in the

  • DIY (Score:1)

    by k3pler ( 30317 )
    Sometimes you just have to roll your own.
    It's that or accept a subset of the features you want.

    Shameless site plug: http://carputer.org/ [carputer.org]
    Car computer information site
  • I know, but I'm not telling 'cuz I'd like to see what you add to the developer's community. Just kidding, of course ;-)

  • Not a Chance (Score:2, Insightful)

    by sweede ( 563231 )
    Unless you write it yourself.
    why?

    Sure, you can find plenty of head units that support Mp3 Audio, my Alpine does that just fine (had i waited another two weeks i could of gotten one that supports DVD's and place 4 gigs of mp3's on a dvd instead :| )

    You can find in dash head units that play Mp3s and have wireless LAN built in.

    you can even find whole in car control centers that do everything you could possibly imagine in your car! http://www.drivesoft.net/ [drivesoft.net]

    However none of these systems will work with l

  • A DVD-R costs 81 cents and holds 72 hours of music.

    Aiwa has the CDC-MP3 head unit [$220 installed] which plays CDRs full of mp3s for 9 hrs per disc; Someone needs to come up with (or mod) a model that plays DVD-Rs full of MP3s.

    No uploading. Disposable discs. Cheap media. 72 hrs of music PER DISC... I think you'd be fine.

  • Alpine head unit + iPod (Score:5, Interesting)

    by pauljlucas ( 529435 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @11:06AM (#10374500) Homepage Journal
    No 802.11, but this [crutchfield.com] allows you to connect an iPod to an Alpine head unit. (This is the generic version of the iPod/BMW [apple.com] thing.) I'll be getting one of these as soon as it's released. (I also highly recommend Crutchfield as an on-line vendor. I've bought from them several times. They also include extra detailed installation instructions and parts for your car.)

    On Cliff's moderation: I posted your exact same question about a year ago and it got rejected.

  • I saw a car 'computer' on one of those car make over shows - it's called drivesoft. http://www.drivesoft.net/

    The bad:
    Very expensive
    Runs windows embedded

    The good:
    Runs windows embedded.
    It's pretty standard and modular.
    You aren't locked into proprietary hardware (not 100% sure about this)

    Their system dosents seem to have any BS proprietary hardware like omni-fi... this is what empeg should have been I think.

  • I guess I should elaborate. The reason for wanting 802.11 access is not just for users to manually transfer files. It's so that the car's music library syncs to your home music library automatically, and you never have to manually put music in your car. IE: schedule an rsync on your home server to be performed at 3:00am (or some other time your car is likely to be parked in your garage), connecting to an SMB share or SSH server running on your car, via the 802.11 link. I'd prefer to use SSH for it, but
    • Umm So it has to be fully powered up and running your battery down all the time?
      Seems a bit iffy to me. Now if you could have it auto synce when you get home that could be cool.
      What I would really like to see is to have an internet connection in your car. No not for reading email but for things like weather radar and for the "Passenger" to make hotel reservations.

      • I had a similar idea, I figured that you could have it do stuff like do an rsync when you start your engine...

        Although personally, I would like a car MP3 player which takes USB memory keys or compact flash and can play low bitrate MP3s like the various radio programmes out there on the 'net.

        Bump proof and no stupid disks. The hard or expensive part really is just the display and controls.

  • Forget the commercial pre-built products. They are non-upgradable and expensive. Build it yourself and you can have navigation system/mp3/dvd/video files/fm tuner for relatively cheap price.

    These are some of the more popular choices for parts i've seen from reading about other CarPc DIYselfers.

    touch screen lcd:
    http://www.digitalww.com/

    software (donation-ware):
    http://users.skynet.be/media-ca r /software.html

    MoBo (Via's "car" form factor):
    http://www.via.com.tw/en/initiatives/spe arhead/min i-itx/
    personal w

  • Go for the empeg (Score:4, Informative)

    by Drakino ( 10965 ) on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @01:15AM (#10381118) Journal
    Several owners of the empeg units do indeed have them hooked to an 802.11 access point in their car and upload music wirelessly. The one do it yourself part of this will be to make the ethernet dockable. To do so, pull the tab off a cable and shave a bit of the plastic off. Then just mount the connector firmly on the dock the empeg comes with.

    There are still used empegs being sold on the empeg boards at www.empegbbs.com . Feel free to stop on by and introduce yourself, the community is very much alive and active development from both Rio and the empeg community occurs. In fact, we now have lyrics displaying on our displays thanks to a third party developer.

    As far as the PhatBox, it's ok, but you loose a lot of control the empeg gives you. Kinda a shame that the empeg was the first car player on the market, and still nothing has gone beyond it in features or usability in 5 years now.

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