Car radio supporting Ogg?, Why still don't exist? Options

[Alexxander]

I have looked everywhere on the Internet (I think). I looked on major search engines, forums and on trademark sites and couldn't find any car radio which supports ogg or flac. Well, I did, just one, Kenwood Music Keg based on Phatnoise box. It's based on cartridges but I am actually looking for a car radio supporting CD's with Ogg, or even better: supporting DVD with Ogg. Neither did I find car radios with integrated DVD supporting mp3. It should be much cheaper to produce than Phatnoise based ones.

It should be simple and cheap to implement since there are several portable players supporting ogg out there. Why still don't exist CD- or DVD-car radios supporting Ogg? Any ideas about why or upcoming models?

Please correct me if I missed existent models.

Thx in advance

[hangman]

Well if it does exist (haven't seen such a thing either) I would buy one. So there ya go Pioneer, Kenwood, Sony, Alpine, etc. you already have two customers lined up, although if you send me a free one I reckon I still got some more room for stickers on my car.

Guess the problem is that the average consumer wouldn't even know what to do with it.

[Teqnilogik]

My guess is because the average consumer doesn't even know what MP3 is, or just has a basic understanding. Ogg Vorbis is way out there to the average consumer. Most have never even heard of the format. I guess manufacturers don't feel dedicating resources to Ogg Vorbis development in their product is justified since the majority of their customers aren't even aware of the format.

I would like to see more formats implemented in players rather than just MP3 and WMA in the future. My hope is that AAC catches on as well.

[kotrtim]

Oh Please don't give up
Keep checking this topic

I still can remember there's a member here who owns a Ogg Vorbis Car radio which has HDD....

It can only support max bitrate at 192kbps??????

JUST WAIT FOR HIS/HER POST

[Otto42]

Generally, car stereo and other hardware manufacturers will support whatever format the chipsets they're using support. They're buying a single chip for the decoder and sticking it in there. If it'll do MP3 and WMA, then their product will do MP3 and WMA. These aren't generic processor solutions, usually.

If you want hardware support for OGG, then get chip manufacturers to produce OGG capable decoders at low prices.

I'd be absolutely thrilled if there existed a hardware decoder that could decode MP3, WMA, AAC, M4A, OGG, MPC, FLAC, SHN, APE, etc, etc. A one chip solution that could decode anything would be the holy grail, IMO.

[Alexxander]

Generally, car stereo and other hardware manufacturers will support whatever format the chipsets they're using support. They're buying a single chip for the decoder and sticking it in there. If it'll do MP3 and WMA, then their product will do MP3 and WMA. These aren't generic processor solutions, usually.

If you want hardware support for OGG, then get chip manufacturers to produce OGG capable decoders at low prices.

What about those portable players which suppport mp3 and ogg? It's very reasonable to suppose they work with one decode chip (for less power consumption). Anyone knows for sure?

[rjamorim]

Oh Please don't give up
Keep checking this topic

I still can remember there's a member here who owns a Ogg Vorbis Car radio which has HDD....

It can only support max bitrate at 192kbps??????

JUST WAIT FOR HIS/HER POST

Meh, that's the PhatBox.

And said member is probably ScorLibran.

The max bitrate is actually lower than 192kbps, IIRC. That's why it isn't really an usable solution - at least, one can't claim "vorbis compliancy".

This post has been edited by rjamorim: Dec 12 2004, 00:44

[slippyC]

I would much prefer upgradability/expandibility and some cost increase than be stuck with a chip that only supports a couple of codecs(decoding is built into chip, instead of processing some external algo from some flashable source or the chip itself could contain rewritable memory). Something along the lines of the I-river players. I admit I don't know alot about Hardware on this level, but another thing is you wouldn't have to worry much about power consumption.

Maybe the size has something to do with it, but that still gets back to the upgradability of the I-River players and their size.

Why nothing like this for mobil audio yet?

It may all be part of product cycles, but that is only a guess.

This post has been edited by slippyC: Dec 12 2004, 02:25

[indybrett]

Be not troubled...

It is in the works, and I will be one of the first to buy one.

http://www.mp3newswire.net/stories/2004/irivercar.html

It says MP3, but I expect it will support Vorbis too. My H140 does.

This post has been edited by indybrett: Dec 12 2004, 03:12

[Calufraxis]

I would upgrade car radio immediately if I could find one that would play flac/ogg off a dvd, but I don't see that for years...

As far as expandability and such, that's why I purchased a car CD player with aux line in on the front. So I have mp3 on CD, plus if I want, I take my Karma and play Flac or Ogg on trips.

Admittedly, this isn't a perfect solution, or even all that convienient but it does allow me to be in control of my music. It also allows me to use laptop (all formats), and even my pocketpc. I just keep the cable in the visor so any device works. It will also support satellite radio if I can ever get beyond how it sounds.

If you like to build your own, then there is always www.cajun.nu

And just for info, I saw a lowend car radio at CircuitChity for only $70 with an aux line in. So it really isn't that expensive of a solution.

Good Listening,
Cal

[Lucem]

Wouldn't be better if someone come with an in-dash adapter for IRivers H or Jetaudio M3 players ?.
Something that you can just plug in and detach?
That seems to be the perfect solution, since your songs library is always in one place and there is no wasted resources for other device.
That could also work for a others players like IPod, and Creative Video players, this could be accesories best seller, and would be cheap to manufacture.

[jakamoko]

This might be of interest:

Yakumo Car Radio

It's an in-dash cd player/sd card reader/usb reading radio that can play ogg (this is only specified in the pdf manual available from that page. No DVD capability, but it's a step in the right direction, and cheap too - Amazon (UK) is selling it for £70

[Nero]

In my old car I had an 80GB Kenwood Music Keg, and it would play WMA, MP3, WAV, Vorbis, AAC and my format of choice: FLAC.

At the time, it couldn't play Vorbis over about 192kbps because of buffer underrun issues, but they've since upgraded the decoder and firmware (with some of my help testing prototype code), and now it can decode up to 320 (is that -q 9?), according to my experience.

But the PhatNoise forum (the company that produces both the PhatBox and Music Keg) is defunct now. I think the company is still around, though.

It's the only option I know of that offers Vorbis playback in a car audio system. I agree that it'd be great to have one that's CD or DVD based, or even a HD in the head unit (as some companies do, like Sony, but with Vorbis decoding). The PhatBox/Keg was a Linux-based system with a removable cartridge that was usually installed in the trunk.

Consider, though, that there are three ways you can have a portable player work with your car's head unit, and therefore be limited only by what the portable player can decode. (1) Mini-jack to head unit, if the head has such a port. (2) Some setups allow wiring the portable's output into the AUX input of the head, but it involves pulling the head and doing some wiring by hand. Same result as (1), but with more installation work. (3) Use of an FM modulator. There are some available for the iPod, as well as for some other portables (and possibly one that is Vorbis-friendly).

[rompel]

Also worth mentioning is the Empeg/RioCar. The alpha versions of the player software support Vorbis and FLAC.

Of course it was discontinued 4 years ago today but still has an active user base (with a whole bunch of 3rd-party add-ons) and used units frequently show up on eBay.

[de Mon]

You can buy VW Golf next year . Since next year every VW Golf is equiped with Ogg Vorbis playback capable car audio. You can check for this on www.vorbis.com.

[Mr_Rabid_Teddybe...]

For selfbuilding projects there's Cajun, as Calufraxis mentioned, which is Linux based. In addition you have various links from this page to projects using MPXPlay on (Free- or MS) DOS.

[VEG]

Ural ConceRt CDD plays Ogg Vorbis.

http://www.cdd.ru/forum/showthread.php?t=299
http://www.cdd.ru/repository/video/UralCDD.mpg

This post has been edited by VEG: Jan 4 2006, 01:13

[suhrim]

Neither did I find car radios with integrated DVD supporting mp3.

I found this one that supports mp3 from DVD.

[Thoifl]

Some companies are really strange.

In Germany a big discounter (Aldi) sold an Car Radio with MP3-Support for 70€.
The quality is quite ok. The strange thing is: in ads and in the manual you only could read about mp3 Support, none other codecs. But in fact, it supports Ogg Vorbis perfectly, with Tags, seeking, gapples play, all the stuff. But they didn't tell even one sinlge word. No idea why...

[Triza]

Some companies are really strange.

In Germany a big discounter (Aldi) sold an Car Radio with MP3-Support for 70€.
The quality is quite ok. The strange thing is: in ads and in the manual you only could read about mp3 Support, none other codecs. But in fact, it supports Ogg Vorbis perfectly, with Tags, seeking, gapples play, all the stuff. But they didn't tell even one sinlge word. No idea why...

What is the manufacturer and the model number? I am interested finding this.

Triza

[Hanky]

The brand name is most probably Tevion. You can find a picture of it here or here

The last review tells us it is mostly identical to the Micromaxx MM 80455.

This post has been edited by Hanky: Jan 7 2006, 21:29

[Triza]

Thanks Hanky

[Thoifl]

The brand name is most probably Tevion.  You can find a picture of it here or here

Yeah, you're right, that's it!

[zilexa]

Some companies are really strange.

In Germany a big discounter (Aldi) sold an Car Radio with MP3-Support for 70€.
The quality is quite ok. The strange thing is: in ads and in the manual you only could read about mp3 Support, none other codecs. But in fact, it supports Ogg Vorbis perfectly, with Tags, seeking, gapples play, all the stuff. But they didn't tell even one sinlge word. No idea why...

This is true! it's a very low price and you get a car radio that not only supports OGG VORBIS but also has a SD cardreader and USB slot.
In the Netherlands, these radio's (about 3 or 4 different brands, varies in no USB/SD or only SD etc) are also being sold by Kijkshop.
Please check kijkshop.nl to check if this company is also in your country.

[HotshotGG]

This is true! it's a very low price and you get a car radio that not only supports OGG VORBIS but also has a SD cardreader and USB slot.
In the Netherlands, these radio's (about 3 or 4 different brands, varies in no USB/SD or only SD etc) are also being sold by Kijkshop.
Please check kijkshop.nl to check if this company is also in your country.

This is interesting, it's something we don't see quite often car radio support for multiple audio codecs, etc. The last Car Radio system that I knew of that supported Vorbis and FLAC was Kenwood Music System or maybe it was just Vorbis.

This post has been edited by HotshotGG: Jan 15 2006, 22:29