How do you listen to your music? (Bluetooth vs USB vs Smartphone Integration)
 

Hi all,

First off, I want to thank everyone on the forum for the fantastic contributions and all the knowledge / wisdom you share. I took delivery of my new X5d last week, and made use of much sage advice gleaned from this forum. Cheers!

Now, my previous ride was an '06 E90, and it's been a hoot to play with the new Nav system. It's amazing how much better it is - in every way imaginable. The best is that there are now so many options for listening to your digital music.... but none seems "ideal". So, I wanted to poll the community and also get your feedback on how you all are doing it.

Here are the options that I see (I think this is all of them ;))

- Download music to the car's HD
- Pros:
- It's always accessible
- No external cables / devices to deal with (except on load)
- Search works well
- Cons:
- 12gb isn't always enough (my library is 80gb+)
- No album art cover
- It's a bit of a hassle to load music
- risk of your music going 'stale'
- yet another digital library to manage

- Connect your device via USB
- Pros:
- simple
- devices charges
- one library to manage
- music is fresher
- album cover art
- Cons:
- a bit of a hassle (not much though)
- In my case (iPhone) connecting the device via USB makes the system forget that it was also paired via Bluetooth and 'forgets' it (only the audio portion) and this is a hassle

- Connect via Bluetooth audio
- Pros:
- When it works, it's like magic
- Once paired - fantastically simple and efficient
- Cons:
- Bluetooth is finnicky
- No song info at all
- Let alone album art

- Connect via Smartphone integration
[Will have to update post when I buy a cradle]
- What are your thoughts? Any value at all to this mechanism?


So, all in all, it seems that we are more than covered, but there is no ideal solution. In my ideal world, Bluetooth would transfer song info and art cover and allow for more controls from the iDrive - and I'd be set. Everything else is 'extra'.

Would love your thoughts, tips and opinions!

Cheers!

My X5 shows my blackberry as a audio bluetooth device but won't play it.

How do ppl stream pandaora over bluetooth ? (Don't tell me to use the Aux port, what's the use of bluetooth then)

My wife just leaves her ipod connected under arm rest...i loaded my cd's to the HDD for when i drive it.

I just have an iPod for the X5 and a separate phone for bluetooth. It works great. I leave it in the car at all times except about every other week that I grab it to update the songs. I have an iPod Nano for each car and a Touch for personal music and pictures. I've done this since putting an iPod adapter into an '06 650i. I don't have the new interface and cover art but song/playlist selection work as good as could be.
I want a Verizon iPhone but decided to wait for the next gen. I'll likely keep the iPod Touch in the car for music.

What richard said^

Best to just have an ipod for the car. I also have an iphone but it is too much of a pain in the butt to unplug it every time I get out of the car. Haven't tried blutooth streaming but it seems unnecessary and without advantage.

:iagree:

I have a 64gb usb stick in the console that holds as much music as I want. My X5 is also one month prior to the new combox, so I bought a blackberry bluetooth stereo gateway, which I can pair my phone to and it outputs audio to the aux connection in the center console.

I haven't put any audio on the internal drive, it doesn't make sense when I have it all on my usb stick anyway. I use bluetooth through the blackberry device for pandora, podcasts, whatever. Between that, usb, xm, fm, hd radio, etc., I think I have more music entertainment options than I can reasonably take advantage of on one commute :-)

how did u set up pandora for blakberry. I see my blackberry as a bluetooth device but can't stream

I'm old school.. burned a bunch of MP3s onto a cdr.

I work at home full time - so I don't even own an mp3 player other than my smartphone, which doesn't count.

BTW, I have the old idrive... if I wanted to do it via USB, is that possible? Did I need the smartphone integration option, upgraded audio option, or what? I think all I see is an AUX jack in the center console. So is iPod my only other alternative?

- Connect your device via USB
- Pros:
- simple
- devices charges
- one library to manage
- music is fresher
- album cover art"

Is it possible to get album artwork via USB. I thought this required the cradle etc?