I am looking for a solution to get a CD player connected to the car speakers by USB or bluetooth through our new 2023 Niro. I get that there are better solutions, but this is my wife's car and she really wants the CD solution. I haven't seen any good solutions. Does anyone have any ideas that work?
CD Player
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baileysteve1964
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Some cars still come with CD players:
9 New Cars with CD Players (2023 Models) (cartradeinsider.com)
But it's not the norm anymore. Also not available as factory option anymore: eight-track, CB radio and illuminated ashtrays.
9 New Cars with CD Players (2023 Models) (cartradeinsider.com)
But it's not the norm anymore. Also not available as factory option anymore: eight-track, CB radio and illuminated ashtrays.
I think those arguing with NoThanks must never buy music any more - or at least, no music more unusual than Taylor Swift!
My music tastes are unusual, and to me, much more interesting than anything likely to be found on Sirius, or iTunes, or streaming services: medieval music, "pure drop" Celtic trad, eastern European folk, classical, Appalachian, klezmer. I have hundreds of CDs, some by local musicians. So if I go to a concert an hour away and support the musicians by buying their CD, why should I not be able to play it on the drive home? This doesn't matter to Taylor Swift fans, but I'm a musician. I take music seriously.
I've ripped most of my CDs to my computer's hard drive, a very time consuming project; and I've got a subset of those on a USB stick that I use in the car. But at this point I've probably got 30 more that I've bought since that massive ripping project that still need ripped, which I'll do eventually. I now listen to them only at home, when I'm doing other things and can't really get into the music; but I'd get much more joy out of playing them during my mindless driving time.
And I've tried three different portable CDs, two from Amazon, one given as a Christmas gift and "guaranteed to work in a car." None would do the Bluetooth connection. Even a 1/8" Aux input would solve this - and how much space would that take? How much would it have added to the cost of the car?
If anyone has found a portable CD drive that really works in my Kia, I'd love to hear about it.
My music tastes are unusual, and to me, much more interesting than anything likely to be found on Sirius, or iTunes, or streaming services: medieval music, "pure drop" Celtic trad, eastern European folk, classical, Appalachian, klezmer. I have hundreds of CDs, some by local musicians. So if I go to a concert an hour away and support the musicians by buying their CD, why should I not be able to play it on the drive home? This doesn't matter to Taylor Swift fans, but I'm a musician. I take music seriously.
I've ripped most of my CDs to my computer's hard drive, a very time consuming project; and I've got a subset of those on a USB stick that I use in the car. But at this point I've probably got 30 more that I've bought since that massive ripping project that still need ripped, which I'll do eventually. I now listen to them only at home, when I'm doing other things and can't really get into the music; but I'd get much more joy out of playing them during my mindless driving time.
And I've tried three different portable CDs, two from Amazon, one given as a Christmas gift and "guaranteed to work in a car." None would do the Bluetooth connection. Even a 1/8" Aux input would solve this - and how much space would that take? How much would it have added to the cost of the car?
If anyone has found a portable CD drive that really works in my Kia, I'd love to hear about it.
I don't believe anyone is saying you don't have a valid point. But from the manufacturer's point of view you have unfortunately fallen into a small minority of owners and the majority no longer care about CD players. The Aux input was something that was around for a while, but it too seems to be going away. If you look back, you will see the same thing happened with cassette players, then 8 track before that. They even tried record players back in the 50s, but that didn't last long for technical reasons.
Musically, I'm in a similar place, with classical, folk, and contemporary music from all over the world in Arabic, Hebrew, Ladino, Turkish, Persian, English, French, Gaelic, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Macedonian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Norwegian, and Finnish, Tamashek, and I don't know how many other languages from Asia and Africa.
The "too much time required" argument is a red herring. As soon as I get a new CD, I rip it, a task that, once started, requires no intervention on my part, so my net labor cost is less than a minute per CD. As I acquire more music, it gets copied to a USB flash drive, again, a task that requires a few seconds of my time to initiate. Digitizing from LPs is the only conversion that required a significant amount of time, mainly to go over each track with a sound editor to remove pops and clicks. Excluding LPs, over the past 20 years, perhaps an hour of my time has been required to digitize hundreds of CDs; the incremental cost for ripping a new CD is negligible.
@SDeemer you nailed it! Ripping CDs individually takes very little time. I can't imagine that if one needed to have a CD alternative to enjoy their music in their new (or old) Niro that one would need to have their entire library immediately available on USB flash drives. Ripping CDs is so much easier than copying analog music from LPs (or 45s) to cassette tape. It would seem if folks actually took their time and started to rip their CDs to digital format incrementally they would realize that it is easy to keep adding music to their USB drives (or phones) and that they don't need to have their entire music library converted before enjoying their music. Granted MP3 or AAC may not have the same tonal qualities as CDs or FLAC or ALAC (can the latter two be played on Niros?), in the acoustic environment of a vehicle traveling on a typical highway or freeway, I seriously doubt anyone could hear the difference between the different formats.
It is a snap to make back up copies of one's music USB sticks and you don't need to find a place to put them, unlike outboard CD players. Not sure about other folks' Niros, mine isn't blessed with a large amount of storage for things in the front part of the cabin.
It is a snap to make back up copies of one's music USB sticks and you don't need to find a place to put them, unlike outboard CD players. Not sure about other folks' Niros, mine isn't blessed with a large amount of storage for things in the front part of the cabin.
All of the type of music you mentioned is readily available on Sirius. Many PBS type stations also broadcast alternative type music. Wouldn't most any car audio store be able to assist you?
Here is one of many alternatives shown on You Tube.
USB CD Player for Cars and Trucks - Intelligent CarPlay CD Player (youtube.com)
CDs make the best sense for people who love long-play records, as the artists intended, and own them. Yes, it's great that I can load a thumb drive with 15 hours of music, but to do so and have songs from lps together in proper order, I have to manually edit file names. It's a pain in the ass.
iPhone is a pain in the ass, due to recent "upgrades" that send you on a snipe hunting trip to delete songs from the device itself when you want to change out.
And for those in this thread throwing insults around at those of us who want the CD option: it's not our fault you didn't come of age at a time when there was a great range of audio gear that even working class teenagers could afford, when lps cost $6-$9. Just as it's not your fault we didn't come of age when a $1500 computer with s--t speakers became a must-have.
This external CD player suggests that it provides a browsable user interface for music stored on CDs with compatible vehicles. while the Niro isn’t explicitly listed, the 2023 Sportage is. Since the Sportage uses a similar (if not the same) infotainment unit, the CD player might work.
If CDs are important, it may be worth a shot.
https://a.co/d/5Obyjvm
(This is an Amazon link btw)
If CDs are important, it may be worth a shot.
https://a.co/d/5Obyjvm
(This is an Amazon link btw)
Thanks. I hope this hopes the CD people. An alternative way to link to an Amazon product is by its product number: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08C9BGSMK
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I couldn’t find a YouTube review of the exact brand mentioned above but there are a few showing similar looking players. Once you plug it in, you click on the USB option in your car’s display and it should show the list of tracks from the CD.
Here’s one:
Here’s one:
Books on CD from library. Ripping them brakes copyright, plus its a pain for a one time use.
Books on Libby and Hoopla app from library. No physical CD or ripping required.
Try a different library. I got virtual cards from Dallas, Houston and Denver.
Coincidentally, a friend recently told me his sister bought that same unit for her car and it worked well. I bought it, plugged it in, and except for some minor skipping for the first couple minutes when it was cold, it seems to work very well. After I removed the rubber pad inside the Kia's wireless charging nook, I was able to force the player into that nook. I'm considering this problem solved.
I don't want to try a different wife!!! She doesn't do apps and its her car.
The unit I bought goes through the FM so its trivial and the player doubles for non-car duties. I don't have to go through the bother of ripping a bunch of CD's and for long trips when out of radio range its ideal. Satellite radio has both a cost and wheat and chaff problem (too many choices).
If you don't own the CD to rip there are several web sites which will download tracks from Spotify for free in high quality MP3 format. You just cut and paste the Spotify web link for the track into the conversion web site and download the mp3 audio file.
For home use I now stream uncompressed high quality tracks using Amazon Music Unlimited (£11 per month) which is generally supplied at a higher data rate and bit rate than CD quality.
For home use I now stream uncompressed high quality tracks using Amazon Music Unlimited (£11 per month) which is generally supplied at a higher data rate and bit rate than CD quality.
Audiophile here, when MP3's first dropped and you downloaded a poor quality track there's tons of noise and other sounds over a Lossless or FLAC quality track.
Back in the day i preferred CD's over MP3 due to the random luck of getting a bad track.
its similar to the sound difference between playing music over android auto (quieter playback) over the cars bluetooth (louder and slightly more dynamic)
I turn 70 in Dec and I prefer NOT having a CD player... when I had one , I hardly ever used it.... and have moved on.
If you wanted one, why not just buy a vehicle that came with one?
Most do not, and I'm ok with that... 8)
THose that still do (and many will not in the next few years), buy one of those. 8)
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