Hi all,

I have a 2015 with Connected XL. I always used bluetooth, but now that I have an android phone, I have put all my music that was on my iPhone onto an iPod classic.

When I plug it into the USB port, it shows up after about 30 seconds as a device, then when I click on the device, it starts playing a song, and disconnects within 5 seconds. Then it says "Not connected" on the screen.

It says the device is supported, but I am wondering why it would do this. Do you still need to use the Y cable? I thought you could just plug in devices with only USB now.

Any help would be appreciated before I start buying new cables to test that.

 

I've had trouble with lightning cables that look perfectly fine. Sometimes spinning the plug 180' helps, but they eventually stop working altogether.

You can try rebooting the iPod.

 

This iPod actually uses the 30 pin connecter (older wide one). But it is a 6th gen classic 80GB and it says it is supported. I tried rebooting the iPod and no luck. Now it won't even show up when I plug it in. It charges on the ipod, but I do not get the screen on the iPod showing it is connected to MINI, or anything on the Mini's screen.

I tried a new cable and it did not help. Then I tried a lightning iPod nano 7th gen and the same thing happened.

Could this be a bad USB port?

 

Guessing since the classic is using a spinning HD, it is drawing too much power for the car, and the car is is shutting off you iPod classic...it might be the battery drawing too much or the HD, with way, it is what it is...try a Bluetooth transmitter plugged into the headset jack to the car radio...about $12 for a simple fix, or put a cable into the aux in if your car has one.
The same thing happens with unpowered USB drive adaptors when plugged into a laptop or desktop... Solution is to run them with the optimal power plug, or through a powered USB hub...
Not sure what the fix would be for the car....just the above ideas to bypass it...
Car USB ports typically meet the requirements of the computer USB spec...that is why they charge phones so slow...they typically only supply only 1/2 amp of power...

 

Thanks for the input- That seems weird that it would pull too much since it says it is a supported device.

I have now tried 3 iPods (touch 4th gen, nano 7th gen, classic 6th gen), with three different cables, and it keeps doing the same thing.

Connects, starts playing, then disconnects and says "Not Connected"


There's no way all three iPods would not work. It is a simple USB interface!!

 

A $3 cable with a aux Jack or a $12 Bluetooth on Amazon is a workaround....pretty simple...
Unfortunately "supported" if often only one software version....and things get updated and deprecated.... In my experience it if does not work, and a decent cluge is available, it often works better than trying to force a fix.

 

Yeah- I mean the problem is that I would need to select the songs on the iPod which is distracting. I'd rather select through the HUD.

I am going to bring it in to Mini and see what they say. Just wanted to see if this was a common problem..

 

Not sure this related to your specific problem, but I went through 3 or 4 lightning cables until I found one that the MINI liked. Before that, I had "on-off-on-off-on-off" sporadic connectivity issues, and I, too, suspected a bad USB port, but it WAS the cable. All the cables I tried seemed okay, and were okay elsewhere. All were Apple MFI-certified, but ultimately, only a genuine Apple cable did the trick.

 

You know- I don't know if my cables are genuine apple. They look like genuine apple, but i bought my ipods on ebay, and they are probably knock off cables. I guess I need to try to purchase a new cable and see if that does it..

 

My suggestion...
Sign up for apples "match" service for a month....it will swap out your older protected files for unprotected ones, usually at a higher bitratete for higher quality....
Then just put them on a SD card, or even a USB, or on your current phone....leaving the Apple "eco-system" can be a pain....wish they made it easier to mix and match....but they make it so you need to be "all in" or not....

 

Would it not be easier to put all your songs on a USB drive and use that instead?

I have 12k songs on a small 64GB drive that I just leave plugged into my USB port. The MINI will let me select artist/album/song/etc. and I'm good to go.

Something like this:
It's also less of a theft risk, not having an iPod in the car!

The only reason I can think of for why you would need an iPod is if you have older DRM music which, like ZippyNH suggests, can be replaced with higher quality DRM free copies using Apple's Match service (which I used to convert a few hundred songs a few years ago).

 

Hello, do you have the albums in folders and MP3? or apple format.

 

You may want to try cleaning the dock connector.

I have an iPod Video [5th gen Classic] where the dock connector is too loose to keep connected in the car. I've only tried it once, I think. I'll have another try this weekend.

 

A mix of MP3 (in various bitrates), AAC/M4A (unprotected is key), and even a odd WMA or two. For people with the XL headunit, FLAC is also supported, though with this system, you'd probably be hard pressed to hear the difference. What is not supported is any kind of DRMed music files (M4P, WMA protected) and any other lossless format besides FLAC (Apple Lossless, etc.)

Album art is supported, provided it is embedded in the file. iTunes does a pretty good job of adding it to ripped CDs and external files. Purchased DRM free music will already have it embedded.

 

The iPod Video wasn't brilliant, I did get it to work but I had a few problems.

It was low on charge and the battery is weak. When I plugged it in, it lost the rest of its charge and kept rebooting.

I charged it up for a couple of hours on my computer, then it worked, it even shows a nice MINI logo and it played an album I have hardly listened to which I like more now than a few years ago.

The dock connector is loose and even with the low mileage Apple cable it still disconnected if anything bumped the wire so I had to take it out of the cradle and lay it on the seat.

When I got home, the battery wasn't fully charged. I'm not sure if it was never fully charged or if that has to do with the loose dock or the weak battery, but I think it doesn't have enough current for iPod.

 

The MINI USB port should provide enough power for any iPod - check the connectors, make sure they look good, try a different cable if you can.

 

It was the cables. Bought one from the apple store and it worked right away. I had three apple look-alike cables that all did not work!

 

I have definitely noticed that MINIs are picky about what cable you use. Even certified cables can be hit or miss - Apple branded cables are the only ones that seem to have no problem connecting.

 

Only in the Apple world does a cable need to blessed by the ghost of Steve Jobbs....
Most cables are certified vtiva spec... Yes, cheap counterfeit cables exists everywhere, but it seems Apple folks are always dealing with non-certfied look-a-like cables that don't work.....
Why Apple never adopted USB spec, now faster than lighting, and the cold FireWire....
I see rays of hope with the usb-c on some newer items from Apple ...
But the cable revenue and licenceing fees must be pretty nice....seems I see tons of old radio with outdated Apple docs, usually 30 pin, in hotels everywhere.....