Connecting an audio input jack to back of radio?

[acensor]

It's my understanding that all automotive radios do have an auxilary aduio input .. That if the auto manufacturer didn't run it out to a 3.5mm standard stereo audio input jack on the dash that it's still there somewhere in back of the radio.
Is so, if I could get to it without a nightmare or breaking anything, it should be not hard to wire a input jack to it and install the jack on the dash (as IMO MiEV should've done standard in the first place).

The reason I'm interested in this it would seem to be a superior way to get my wife's iPad audio into our MiEV SE's nice audio system, compared to --as I've been dialoging about elsewhere in this group -- either the FM transmitter route (subject to poor quality and static) or installing a USB port (problem with that is the MiEV's one-line LCD and quirky controls for navigating into the MP3's and finding and playing what you want).

(Yeah, bluetooth might've been the nicest way to interface, but that's not an option now.)

So the questions I have here are:
# How hard is it to get to the back and side of the MiEV SE's radio?
Slam dunk? Nightmare of broken plastic tabs and skinned fingers and "never got it to seat back in right?" Or somewhere inbetween. Thought I saw once some directions/pictures on doing that here, but the search feature in our forum doesn't work that well and I can't re-find that.
# Does anyone have specific knowledge/confirmation that the SE radio does have a audio input on the side or back buried behind the dash.

Anyone?

Alex

 

[Don]

Honestly . . . . the factory USB jack *is* the 'simple way' . . . . I don't think you'll regret buying it - Especially since you can get one for $125 and install it yourself. I paid $175 to have it come with the car and I don't regret one penny of that . . . . we use it every day, every mile that we drive. All our favorite tracks on a $5 flash drive that's only removed from the car when we add new tracks

I'm not sure where that thread on installing it is, but it's not hard to do - Likely one of the guys who has done it will be along shortly to point out how they did it, but the radio just pops out of the dash so much simpler than in most any other car, that adding the jack is only a 15 minute 'project'

So far as I know, the only auxiliary input on this radio is the plug for the factory USB jack

Don

 

[acensor]

Honestly . . . . the factory USB jack *is* the 'simple way' . . . . I don't think you'll regret buying it - ...... the radio just pops out of the dash so much simpler than in most any other car, that adding the jack is only a 15 minute 'project'

So far as I know, the only auxiliary input on this radio is the plug for the factory USB jack
Don

Hi Don!

I have no problem spending $125 (outrageous though it may be) on a USB jack, and even an hour or two putting it in. My concern is once it's in, per other threads here, and my experience trying to navigate a collection of MP3's on a CD,
--- see http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1470&start=10 ---
that the audio system's clunky ability to navigate and select music out of the iPad's MP3 files is going to be a real high bar for my wife to get over.

Are you saying that's not a big deal or annoyingly clunky?

Alex

 

[Don]

Alex,

I'm not versed at all on the iPod (or iPad) operation with the car - I've never owned an 'i' anything in my life

But - If you could live using a $5 or $10 flash drive to hold your tunes, THAT IS easy enough to navigate with the radio's buttons. You can get a couple thousand songs on a 4Gb drive arranged in files and folders. I like the fact that I'm not leaving anything valuable in the car when I lock and leave it, plus I prefer using my laptop to add and delete songs so that I only listen to what I want to hear

. . . . or, you could use the FM modulator technique

From what I've read here, the jack on the back of the radio is unique and it seems only the Mitsu part will fit it - Not sure how you could adapt that to 'auxiliary' ports . . . . and wouldn't that still leave you dealing with the radio's navigation buttons? My uneducated 'guess' is the problems others report is likely due to both the radio and the iPod are trying to do the 'navigating' at the same time :? Whereas, the flash drive is completely dumb and just sits there holding your songs, so it's not confusing the radio

At any rate, my months of experience with the USB port and the flash drive have all been positive - 3 or 4 friends who regularly ride in the car have already hit me up for a copy of my drive
Don

 

[acensor]

Alex,

At any rate, my months of experience with the USB port and the flash drive have all been positive - 3 or 4 friends who regularly ride in the car have already hit me up for a copy of my drive
Don

Thanks Don,

Will try the FM technique, and if that don't work will go for the USB drive.

One question: When you have your song collection in your USB drive do you have it arranged in subfolders or albums or just one long list of MP3s?

Alex

 

[Vike]

Will try the FM technique, and if that don't work will go for the USB drive.

One question: When you have your song collection in your USB drive do you have it arranged in subfolders or albums or just one long list of MP3s?
Alex

The FM transmitter and USB provide different functionality. Like Don, I use a thumbdrive plugged into the USB port almost exclusively - but I do keep an FM transmitter in the glovebox just in case.

You're right, the radio's interface is horrible, but it's fairly functional once you learn it. I do organize all the music on my USB drive into artist/album folders, just as I do on other players, and that would DEFINITELY be preferred for the i-MiEV. The radio supports scrolling through folders and songs as separate functions, so having things organized into album folders allows you to scroll through your albums instead of all the songs (which is what you'd have to do if you dumped everything into one directory). That said, I don't usually bother with any of that - the radio has a RANDOM function that I usually select, and it just plays everything on the drive in random order. If I'm not in the mood for a particular selection, it's quite easy to skip to the next one. Figuring out how to do all this can be tedious, but you can study the owner's manual for instructions on how to navigate an MP3 CD - the procedure's identical for a USB drive.

While I find this works well for my purposes, there are two major drawbacks, which are addressed by the FM transmitter. First, using the USB forces you to use the annoying i-MiEV radio controls - you give up the intuitive (or at least familiar) iPod control interface. Second, and perhaps more troublesome, non-MSC (mass storage control, i.e., emulating a disk drive) devices don't work unless they're iPods. This matters if you use a subscription service like Rhapsody or Audible and store downloads on your smart phone, Android player, etc. In MSC mode, those will not be playable by the i-MiEV's radio (I believe iTunes tracks, though sometimes copy-protected, should work because of the special iPod interface). If you want to be able to listen to such material, you'll need to connect the FM transmitter to the headphone jack of the player. Once the car's radio is set to a matching frequency free of interference (potentially tricky in areas with lots of radio stations), you then control playback with the portable device just as if you were wearing headphones. This is best for around town use, since changing areas usually means changing radio frequencies - but heck, that's a pretty good fit for a car that doesn't do road trips.

While the FM transmitter does allow you to access anything on the player, it does mean you need to juggle the device instead of using the in-dash controls. As one potential workaround for smartphones and other devices with Bluetooth headphone support, some of the more advanced FM xmitters have Bluetooth interfaces and some basic playback controls that might be easier to handle while driving than the portable device itself.

 

[Don]

Alex,

I started out like Vike, with different folders for different artists. If you rip an entire CD and store it in a folder by artist's name, then you'll find yourself manually skipping though the songs you don't really care for, to get to the next one you like

So, later on, I began compiling a folder on my laptop hard drive of 'Car Music' where I picked all my favorite songs and just dumped them into one folder. The songs wind up stored in an alpha-numeric order which gives you a pretty eclectic mix - All of the songs which were labeled track #1 on the albums they came from are put in a sort of alphabetic order, followed by the songs which were track #2 and so on. This means you seldom hear two songs by the same artist back to back. I find this works even when I download a single MP3 from Amazon - That song fits into the order based on what track # is was in the album it originally came on

Anyway, I currently am using a flash drive with ~325 songs on it (all in one folder) and I add a few more from time to time, whenever I find something 'worthy' of being added to my collection . Currently, I'd guess there are about 15 or 18 different artists in my collection. As I mentioned earlier, this drive has become a popular request from friends who also have USB equipped audio systems in their cars (and boats too)

This won't be the perfect arrangement for everyone - You may be in the mood to listen to only one artist when you take a drive, so you'd need separate folders for that . . . . but there is so much room on a 4 or 8Gb flash drive that you can have both if you like - Separate folders for your favorite artists and then another folder for your favorite 'mix'. This means spending some time on the computer arranging things, but once you get it 'right' you have a $5 easily copied flash drive which will do most of what you could do using an iPod and you have the benefit of not tying up your iPod and not having to worry about leaving it in the car

I haven't tried the radio's 'random' feature Vike mentioned - So long as your various folders were all edited to contain only the songs you really liked, this would give you a really random mix of all your favorites too

This is the first car we've ever had new enough to have a USB equipped radio, but I know I'll never buy another one which doesn't have this feature - After using it in the car for a few months, I went out and bought a new system for my boat so I can use the same music drives there that I use in the car

Don

 

[nsps]

Nothing would make me happier than a straight-up audio line-in jack. The audio interface is my least favorite thing about the car. (Love the sound quality, hate the "premium" package's inept engineering and interface design.)

 

[aarond12]

Nothing would make me happier...

Nothing? :lol:

If you hate the radio so much, get the SE radio cover plate and put a double-DIN radio in place of the old radio. Seriously. Then you can have line in, iPod control with a touch screen, or whatever you want.

 

[Vike]

If you hate the radio so much, get the SE radio cover plate and put a double-DIN radio in place of the old radio. Seriously. Then you can have line in, iPod control with a touch screen, or whatever you want.

But I'd say do it soon, given the grim prospects for this little EV pioneer. Actually, just to leave the option open down the road (because yes, it's much prettier than any alternative I can think of), I'd thought of getting one of these and putting it on the shelf. I haven't tried ordering it from my Mitsubishi dealer's parts desk, but I shudder to think of the cost. Has anyone priced this, and from what source(s)?

 

[Don]

$120 from the dealer - $87.50 aftermarket

http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=509&hilit=stereo+upgrade

Don

 

[Vike]

$120 from the dealer - $87.50 aftermarket

http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=509&hilit=stereo+upgrade

Thanks Don. Alas, if you're referring to http://www.ricartparts.com/, I'd checked there a while back when reading the thread you reference here, but they no longer listed parts for the i-MiEV (and still don't) - which is just the sort of thing I'm concerned about. $120 from dealer isn't too bad, though, so might be worth having at hand. Perhaps I delude myself into thinking I'll have my i-MiEV for a while (although at this juncture it's hard to imagine it would be worth selling), but if I do, this part would make for a much better looking radio upgrade "one of these days." The temptation to have aux in or even (heavens!) Bluetooth for my Android may prove too much to resist.

 

[Don]

I too noticed they don't list the iMiEV there - I went looking to see what an alloy wheel would cost

Possibly, the same dash panel is used on some other Mitsubishi car? At any rate, it appears he bought it there, so maybe we can get a part number ans see if they still carry that panel

Don

 

[siai47]

I hate to go through this again but I am still looking for a AUX jack for the I-MiEV radio. I know there is nothing on the standard radio but is there something on the Nav radio. I ask this question for two reasons. Just before I started to disassemble the dash on my "donor" I-MiEV and turned on the Nav radio system. During bootup it showed a picture of a RCA connector and a couple of other connections on one of the screens. There is no screen that allows you select a AUX input so it must not have one----except for the unused jack on the back of the radio. When I was pulling out the connectors, I found one socket not in use. It is a 4 pin mini DIN plug. This is exactly the style of plug used in many Foreign vehicles for a input from a stereo source. You can easily find a mini DIN to 3.5 mm stereo jack for sale on a number of web sites. Does anyone out there have any insight on this? Is this Nav unit used in any other Mitsubishi vehicles? Is there a setup program in the radio where this can be activated? My car didn't come with any owers manuals. Inquiring minds want to know. :idea: