My MA swears the cars in the lot read CD track titles. We took the car in yesterday and they couldn't get ours to do it. We tried a dozen manufacturer CDs not burned CDs and nothing. My other car reads them find as well as the burned CDs.

Our car just reads CDs as track 1, track 2, etc.

 

No CD titles. It will display MP3 tags, though. I can't figure that out; my kids play-toy-quality cd player reads track info. Shame on MINI!

 

CD track titles are not included on CD audio discs so there is no way for the player to display them without getting them from another source such as an Internet database. Databases such as CDDB and FreeDB work by the player software generating a code based on track lengths and gap lengths and querying the database based on that code.

MP3 CDs will likely have ID3 tags with track and artist info as part of the MP3 files so the player will be able to show that info.

 

I think Sony CD has some kind of proprietary method of putting them into regular CDs calls CD Text. Not sure how popular is it though. My BMW CD player does not read CD info either, but my co-worker's Infinity G35 has a built in database. His audio system could also rip a CD into the memory card and play it from the card. Pretty cool!

 

They still make CDs? You know, you have an auxilary port, right?

 

I have in front of me a CD from Atlantic Records. The most recent release from my current favorite prog-rock band - Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet.

Inserted into my POS $100.00 Sony Explode CD/MP3 Player I get all the track tags. But not in the MINI. Geeze. :impatient

 

The WAV/PCM files do have AIFF information available, if it has been entered for the CD. I enter it on the CD's I burn and it will display on the home player. But it will not show up in either the Mini or the Lexus.

MP3,..pfffffft.

 

Paul, you're comparing a $100 radio to a $20,000 vehicle. I'm sure that POS $100 Sony Explode cost more than the factory MINI radio and has had more R&D put into it.

Just thought it was weird you were comparing a radio to a whole car

ps.. Keyword is 'Cost', not what they Charge

 

No, I'm not comparing a MINI to a Car Stereo so I respectfully disagree. I'm comparing a car radio provided by an OEM to a budget-level car radio retailed for the aftermarket. I just find it unusual that given the level of technology inherent to the MINI that the CD player's design is lacking this feature. How many discrete processors are in a MINI? Quite a few, I think. It just appears to be a glaring oversight when viewed in the context of the whole vehicle.

I understand that all things can't be perfect to everyone and I really don't have a problem with the fact that I can't see the CD track info, It just seems unusual to me. Nothing more than that.

 

I'm not sure "unusual" is the right word??? Between many cars not dsiplaying track info (cd text) and ALL cars not giving us preamp outputs to work with, I'd use the word RETARDED!!!

 

LOL!

 

All our CDs work in all the other cars as far as reading track titles/artist/album from the cheapest stereo on up. Its really a shame Mini would put the cheapest possible innards into a unit you can't replace....

 

It does not work in my Lexus.

No big deal to me. In the units that can display it, it only shows like the first 10 or 15 letters of the title. Looks a bit stupid to me.

 

I have two or three CDs where all the track names as well as the title of the CD are displayed. I, however, have the R56 HiFi Upgrade.

My past experience with Sony's CD Text has been poor to say the least. 8 years ago, I bought a Sony CD Text capable head unit for my previous car, bought Sony CD-R Burner for my computer and used Sony CDs and burned mix CDs. The CD Text never worked in my car's head unit, but always worked in my friend's Magnavox shelf stero unit.

 

I have the HiFi in my Cooper as well and it does not show any titles from the CD. Is it an option to configure? That would explain it for me.

 

Skuzz,
I read somewhere on here recently, you have to put the CD display in a particular mode to get the text to show up.... I htink it was in the Nav / audio section....

 

Ok, so it does not default on. Ergo, I will never see it. Hehe. It appears I am a Mini programming idiot.

 

Did I miss the solution?

 

I bet it won't show titles for a CD. Mine does show albums and titles for mp3 CDs by default (some I have 15 albums on) but it only shows the first 10-15 letters no matter what (no scroll).

 

No. I beleive the "skuz" man was referring to his inability to program anything in his new mini. See a few other threads flying around where he can't get the programming options to come up. Either he is right, or his software is fubar'd. ;-)

 

I burned an MP3 cd, which holds alot more music than one regular cd. The MINI displays the directores and each track title. It's very, very cool, like having a cd changer for free! I am going to make several MP3 cds to keep in the car all the time for those days when the Zune is busy somewhere else...

 

Yeah, I still prefer my Zune to CDs. A little off topic (and probably will start another zune vs ipod flame war, but what the heck...)... Z3BUM, I velcroed a Zune dock over the passenger side cup holder. With piano black interior and chrome highlights, and the dock slightly angled towards me, it looks really good. Everyone (even a few die-hard ipod fans) like it and some have actually thought it was part of the center console.

I'm also following this thread
https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...d.php?t=103787

where someone thinks they may have figured out how to tap into the TV module. So maybe, we can use video output from the Zune directly to the Nav Screen like in this article.

http://www.zunerama.com/articles_017...18_zune2_story

That would be SO sweet. All the track titles and album art you want.