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I used the Bluetooth Audio in my new car for about two weeks. It was actually pretty reliable, and felt like the future. I'd get in, turn the car on, my phone

I used the Bluetooth Audio in my new car for about two weeks. It was actually pretty reliable, and felt like the future. I'd get in, turn the car on, my phone would pair itself and pick up where it left off, and I never once had to take it or my keys out of my pocket. Then I started to actually listen to my music. The audio over bluetooth was frequently out of tune. I'm a musician, so I can definitely hear this and it's infuriating. VLC on Windows had the same problem for years and everyone told me I was crazy, but the car was at least twice as bad. It sounded like an old cassette player, if anyone remembers those. Googling reveals this to be a common issue with many different varieties of bluetooth speaker. I can only imagine it's doing some sort of time stretching to "hide" latency in the packets but, well, it's not hiding it well enough for my ears. Trying to listen to anything melodic, especially piano pieces, was just awful. Fortunately, I discovered that my car also has a shockingly excellent USB Audio implementation, so I copied the Music from my phone onto a large USB drive and have been happy ever since. More wires for me please, the future isn't ready.

DiabloD3 10y ago
Your phone may already be able to do it on its own: get an OTG adapter for your phone (usually MicroUSB male to USB A female) and plug a USB cable in and use your phone directly.
- zeta0134 10y ago
  Alas, my phone is running a newer version of Android, and does the Media Protocol thing instead of doing Mass Storage. I usually don't expect to be able to access its files in a sane manner over USB; it's hit or miss. Instead, I use Syncthing, so my files are synced properly between the phone and my computer using my wireless network, no cables needed. I just copy the same folder to my USB drive periodically and don't need to mess with it beyond that. (In a pinch, I suppose I could use the OTG cable to update the USB drive using my phone.) I like being able to have the drive plugged into the car at all times, as it's one less thing to fiddle with when getting in and out. If I'm going to plug a wire into my phone for my car, I'd much rather just use the standard AUX (3.5mm headphone jack) port that's built in, as it's simpler and more reliable. I still do this from time to time if I feel like using Youtube, Google Play, or another streaming based service, or if I need to hear something on my phone (like Navigation).
forgetsusername 10y ago
>The audio over bluetooth was frequently out of tune. I agree. I have a Ford, and the interface is as good as any I've experienced with respect to Bluetooth enabled vehicles. But there's a definite drop in "sound quality" compared to USB based devices or CDs. I only ever use it when we're bored of what we've brought and want to stream Google Play.
cptskippy 10y ago
There's an assortment of codecs that can be used by the Bluetooth A2DP stack, the protocol is extensible but the only required codec is SBC. Apple supports AAC and Samsung backs APTX so that doesn't help. You usually end up with the lowest common denominator. I've tried out a number of in-car bluetooth setups over the years and I've found that the quality varies pretty significantly between both auto makers and aftermarket units. Ford and Toyota are pretty solid where as Chrysler and Honda are pretty awful. As far as aftermarket solutions go, GROM is decent and USA SPEC is horrid steaming crap. Another unfortunate occurrence I encountered was that Android paired with certain systems (Honda) will prefer to stream audio over the HSP/HFP stacks instead of A2DP or will switch when a call is incoming and stick. This is tons of fun because HSP/HFP use very low quality codecs meant tuned for voice applications. Now that Bluetooth is high bandwidth, I would like to see them add a new audio streaming stack that just accepted PCM/FLAC/AAC/MP3/OGG in all their glory.
dpc_pw 10y ago
You need bluetooth with AptX audio codec support. Most phones have it, but most cars don't (because cars are lagging with technology). I'm using separate bluetooth dongle powered from the lighter socket and plugged into car RCA port and my music sounds good now.

DiabloD3 10y ago

Your phone may already be able to do it on its own: get an OTG adapter for your phone (usually MicroUSB male to USB A female) and plug a USB cable in and use your phone directly.

zeta0134 10y ago
Alas, my phone is running a newer version of Android, and does the Media Protocol thing instead of doing Mass Storage. I usually don't expect to be able to access its files in a sane manner over USB; it's hit or miss. Instead, I use Syncthing, so my files are synced properly between the phone and my computer using my wireless network, no cables needed. I just copy the same folder to my USB drive periodically and don't need to mess with it beyond that. (In a pinch, I suppose I could use the OTG cable to update the USB drive using my phone.) I like being able to have the drive plugged into the car at all times, as it's one less thing to fiddle with when getting in and out. If I'm going to plug a wire into my phone for my car, I'd much rather just use the standard AUX (3.5mm headphone jack) port that's built in, as it's simpler and more reliable. I still do this from time to time if I feel like using Youtube, Google Play, or another streaming based service, or if I need to hear something on my phone (like Navigation).

forgetsusername 10y ago

>The audio over bluetooth was frequently out of tune. I agree. I have a Ford, and the interface is as good as any I've experienced with respect to Bluetooth enabled vehicles. But there's a definite drop in "sound quality" compared to USB based devices or CDs. I only ever use it when we're bored of what we've brought and want to stream Google Play.

cptskippy 10y ago

There's an assortment of codecs that can be used by the Bluetooth A2DP stack, the protocol is extensible but the only required codec is SBC. Apple supports AAC and Samsung backs APTX so that doesn't help. You usually end up with the lowest common denominator. I've tried out a number of in-car bluetooth setups over the years and I've found that the quality varies pretty significantly between both auto makers and aftermarket units. Ford and Toyota are pretty solid where as Chrysler and Honda are pretty awful. As far as aftermarket solutions go, GROM is decent and USA SPEC is horrid steaming crap. Another unfortunate occurrence I encountered was that Android paired with certain systems (Honda) will prefer to stream audio over the HSP/HFP stacks instead of A2DP or will switch when a call is incoming and stick. This is tons of fun because HSP/HFP use very low quality codecs meant tuned for voice applications. Now that Bluetooth is high bandwidth, I would like to see them add a new audio streaming stack that just accepted PCM/FLAC/AAC/MP3/OGG in all their glory.

dpc_pw 10y ago

You need bluetooth with AptX audio codec support. Most phones have it, but most cars don't (because cars are lagging with technology). I'm using separate bluetooth dongle powered from the lighter socket and plugged into car RCA port and my music sounds good now.