SD Card port on radio

[vdubJettaTDI_2010]

SD Card

I just got an 8GB SDHC card last week to use in the car. I got one for 14.99 from sears.com. It worked great for the thanksgiving road trip. I decided not to get a bigger SD card because the manual says that the system can only play a maximum number of total songs (I can't remember the number) that I calculated to be about 8GB worth of songs at 256kbs.
Oh and a little trick I realized if you keep your music in folders and want to be able to play all the music in all the folders on shuffle - put at least a single song on the SD card in no folder. If you select the shuffle option while that song is playing, it will play all the songs in all subfolders.

This was great information. I looked in my Premium 8 manual and didn't find the limitation on going from SD to SDHC. So, I'll go for an SDHC and covert over some files. The price point is so good nowadays, if you lose a small card like these, no worries.
take care and drive safe.

 

[vdubJettaTDI_2010]

I thought SDHC was considered:

8GB
16GB
32GB



So if he has an 8GB..that would mean yes.

SDHC ( HC for High Capacity ). A new standard that allows these devices to hold greater sizes, like you mentioned. Greater than 4gigs.
Which is amazing.

 

[740GLE]

You're right about reformatting-- and then I had to delete those pesky resource forks (that I posted about above). I just didn't know they would slow down the unit, who was trying to read them. Instead of using terminal, I chose an excellent shareware program (BlueHarvest), which scrubs the resource forks directly from within system prefs.
NOW I can enjoy my sweet ride!

I was able to delete those forks and other junk files, i def notice it was faster navigating through folders

 

[AusTexRocker]

Well it looks like it has been mentioned that even if the head unit accepts a 32gb SDHC card, there is still a limited number of files displayed. I sure wish I had read this thread first before buying a 32gb card (and new card reader to transfer files). I have several thousand files at my fingertips and can only access about half. Not good! I am much more interested in this format than Sirius. If there is a workaround or fix, I sure would like to know about it.

 

[mojo]

Does the MDI connection have the same limitations as the SD card slot, meaning does a USB drive, iPod, or portable hard drive connected via MDI have a limited # of folders/songs? I'd assume not since that would make most iPods useless. I'm supposed to get my new Golf TDI this week (if we can clear out the snow in the DC area) and will likely opt for a USB/mini-usb adapter. Hoping to hook up a portable hard drive.

 

[AusTexRocker]

This may be of interest to some. True enough, the head unit will not read the full 32 gb on a SDHC card. However, I plugged my card reader into the aux usb port and now have access to the full card! All folders and files show up on the touch screen display. Im sure glad this 32 gb card was not a waste.

 

[mojo]

Thanks, AusTexRocker -- I'm sure a lot that have these high capacity cards will be happy to know it's not wasted. I saw this deal on FatWallet for cheap thumb drives that may be worthwhile: http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/hot-deals/988556/ I will probably still try a portable hard drive so I can have all my music with me, but a high capacity flash drive would be nice for quicker file access and no moving parts.

 

[Red Lion]

Now that might make the USB port worth thinking about.

 

[jayb79]

I have the MDI in the console with the ipod interface, i do not have an ipod can i get a usb adaptor for it? Were do i get it?

Did a little seaching and found my own answer.
http://www.vwdiscountparts.com/part...tegoryID=155007&subcat1=155129&subcat2=155131

 

[S_Sanders]

Shop for SD cards on eBay, they are much cheaper there. I bought a 16Gb SDHC for under $30.00 (I don't recall the exact price).

It might be helpful for you to know that SDHC is also known as SD 2.0.

I have an Android cell phone with an 8Gb mini SD card. When connected to the mini-USB adapter, it "mounts" like an external hard drive and music files stored there are available on the head unit. (I have the non-Nav model.)

I have always avoided the iPods because I figured the Apple software would cause compatibility problems with other devices. Apple makes good stuff, but unfortunately they don't work and play well with others! :-(

 

[mojo]

I opted for the USB cable since I wasn't going to use an iPod. With this I can use thumb drives directly, SD cards with a card reader attached, or can buy a small adapter to make it USB mini for a portable hard drive. So if you get either the USB or USB mini cable from VW, you can buy a cheap adapter to have both options: http://www.tca-inc.net/usbmatousbbf.html

 

[mysql]

I'm using 8 gig SD cards.. fat32 formatted. Non navi.

That's about 1,600 songs (if your songs average 5 megs each). I figure you can have a half dozen 8 or 16 gig cards and swap as needed.


The sound via SD is MUCH better than Sirius radio. I wonder if they're compression the audio stream to 64k or something. It's terrible.

 

[Elides]

I have the premium 8 and max file on whatever size SD card is 512. I think It's a good option to use a USB drive on the MDI. It's concealed, you can leave it there and you can put as many songs that will fit on your drive since there's no limit on this input.

I agree, Sirius compression is not acceptable to my ears. It should at least be 128k. I will definitely not subscribe when my 3 month trial is over. Totally Useless.

 

[ksing44]

Too bad there is a "SAT" button on the radio. When subscription runs out the button will be a total waste. I don't like the idea of having a new car with a dummy button.

 

[ARDailey]

How do I determine firmware version?

Short of tearing the dash apart....how do I determine the exact model / firmware of the RNS-510 in my '10 JSW?

 

[ziffdine]

Anyone know if playlists work with SD cards?

 

[denass]

Anyone know if playlists work with SD cards?

The manual says any playlists in PLS, M3U and WPL formats.

 

[slvr32]

I'm not sure if there's an official/FAQ thread with these SD card details, but I just put a 32GB SDHC (micro-SDHC in an SDHC adapter) card into the slot on the RNS-315 on a 2012 Golf TDI, and it seems to work great.

Also, I have my mp3s organized in a way that shouldn't be an issue with any of the path/folder depth/files per directory, etc... limits, e.g.

mp3 --> artist --> album --> track.mp3

even the 'mix all' is very fast, with 5,948 mp3s in the ~ 30.9GB of usable FAT32-formatted space on the card.

 

[mojo]

Does it actually mix all 5948 tracks?? The manual indicates it's limited to ~2000 files. In using a usb hard drive via the MDI, I found that the MIX function simply mixed the first 2000 files, ignoring all beyond my "B" artist folders. Can you verify that files from the top and bottom folders are being included? I'm also using an SD card but haven't bothered using anything beyond an 8gb card since I get close to the track limit that way. Thanks!

 

[SoCal Will]

SD cards

I put 12 GB of music on a 16GB SD card and the radio only recognizes a little over half of the folders (organized by artist - stops at New Order). There is some kind of limit (see the post by "Polipino"). I would recommend going no higher than an 8GB card. I am going to try to identify what that song limit is. I see 2000 mentioned by "mojo". That is probably about right. The SD card is definitely the way to go. Why put wear and tear on an iPod or your iPhone? The sound quality is great! I also have some file formats that are not recognized, but all of them are .mp3. Odd. Are there different types of .mp3 files? I don't have any problems with VBR files.

2010 JSW TDI

 

[SoCal Will]

I am still seeing an echo copy of every file with an underbar "_" before the file name. So it scrolls through all those ghosted out files until it gets to the real .mp3 files then it starts playing. The problem is that I think it's counting those files. I have 1720 mp3's but it's only showing me about 60 of the 80 folders. It's a 16GB SD card with 6 GB free. I think if I can get to those echo files (whatever they are? album artwork maybe?) it will open up the entire folder. HELP???

 

[jtelford]

Will, did you use a Mac to make or copy the mp3 files? If so, then those files are part of the macintosh file system. They are actually ._filename. They can be deleted without issue, though you might need to plug your SD card into a windows box to see them.

 

[rfortson]

I love the SD slot. I've wanted something like that for a long time, and it just makes a lot of sense. I have a 16GB card loaded with WMAs and MP3s. All the albums play fine, and the audio quality is nice. My only problem (haven't delved into it too deeply) is that I can't get it to mix all the tracks. It will only mix within an album. I also haven't tried any playlists. Still, I'm glad it's there.

 

[mojo]

My only problem (haven't delved into it too deeply) is that I can't get it to mix all the tracks. It will only mix within an album.

The MIX feature only works for the folder that is active and any of its subfolders. If you want to mix everything, put a single file in the root directory. Play that song, then hit MIX. Because all of your folders are then considered subfolders, it will play songs from them, too.

The issue I ran into is that because of the 2000 file limit, the MIX feature never made it past by "B" artist folders. So I now have all of my music on a hard drive via the MDI and use that to listen to a specific artist. For the SD card, I just selected 2000 songs, unorganized, and use the MIX feature exclusively on it.

 

[rfortson]

The MIX feature only works for the folder that is active and any of its subfolders. If you want to mix everything, put a single file in the root directory. Play that song, then hit MIX. Because all of your folders are then considered subfolders, it will play songs from them, too.

The issue I ran into is that because of the 2000 file limit, the MIX feature never made it past by "B" artist folders. So I now have all of my music on a hard drive via the MDI and use that to listen to a specific artist. For the SD card, I just selected 2000 songs, unorganized, and use the MIX feature exclusively on it.

Sweet! Thanks for the tip. I figured there was something easy like that.

I was considering a HD for music, but I take so few actual "road trips" that I'd never get through 10% of my music. As it is, the 16GB card will cover me for many hours before repeating. Still, there's something comforting about having all your music available whenever you want.

 

[SoCal Will]

@JTelford... brilliant! I brought the card to work, Windows PC's, and it worked. I was able to delete all those ._ files.

THANK YOU!

I even used Terminal on the Mac to show hidden files and it did, just not those. I guess there are hidden hidden files.

I'm loving this forum...

 

[kenargo]

The issue I ran into is that because of the 2000 file limit

For the 2012, according to the 2012 manual the per-folder limit is 6000 now, 15000 total between all folders. I've have as many as 5500 and no issue so there are apparent differences between the models.

Just an FYI for people with newer cars.

 

[mojo]

That's good to know about the model differences. Since this is obviously a software difference, it would be nice if VW would offer a update for the rest of us!

 

[robhagopian]

For the 2012, according to the 2012 manual the per-folder limit is 6000 now, 15000 total between all folders. I've have as many as 5500 and no issue so there are apparent differences between the models.

Just an FYI for people with newer cars.

The 2012 RNS-315 also seems to have removed the 32GB card size limit. It recognized a 64GB fine once I reformatted with FAT32. (128GB on order now since my phone also supports 64GB.)

 

[smosh]

I put 12 GB of music on a 16GB SD card and the radio only recognizes a little over half of the folders (organized by artist - stops at New Order). ....
2010 JSW TDI

Thumbs up on New Order!!!