Database Users

quick question about the TP2 and car stereos.

most car stereos today have a USB in for connecting an IPod, Zune, whatever.
do these work with the TP2?

crazy talk said:
most car stereos today have a USB in for connecting an IPod, Zune, whatever.
do these work with the TP2?
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Click to collapse
Probably yes (haven't tried it myself), but when you connect your TP2 to an USB-host (which the car stereo is), the TP2 asks you which mode you want (Active Sync, Disk Drive or Internet Sharing). If you select Disk Drive, the microSD card shows up as a diskdrive in windows (or your car stereo...)

Yup, what andrehj says.
All devices that show up as Mass Storage will definately work on car stereo's. Worked on mine. But I never use it. Because mine has Bluetooth 2.0 A2DP support (stereo streaming). It works flawlessly.
No wires for me. Except the charger itself. xD

Simultaneous program access?
I can confirm that the TP2 works in drive mode as an input for a car stereo. However it appears the phone restricts access to the storage card in this mode and programs cannot access it, which means things like TomTom cannot access maps.
Does anyone know a way around this? Is it a WinMo restriction or something else?

Please specify "drive mode"?
I've used mine playing music through A2DP in combination with Tomtom Navigator 7 + Benelux maps.
The only downside I experienced was that the Tomtom voice was much louder than the music I played. Thus when adjusting the music volume to a much louder level, that Tomtom woman scares the heck outta me. Like when needed to take a turn, it's more like "GO LEFT!!!!!! W$E%T#@$%[email protected](#%|(!# ". In between the music.
No problem with tomtom reading the maps though.

'Drive mode' via USB
Thanks Crix84. By 'drive mode' I meant the Disk Drive mode that you can select when connecting via USB. I expect accessing via the BT profile is quite different which is why things work for your setup.
That TT girl would be scary at high volume!

Ohhh okay now I understand. You mean't the mass storage function I was talking about in a previous post of mine.
Well for what I've found and experienced. That mode makes the phone really function like a USB stick aka Mass Storage Device. At that moment only the MicroSD card is blocked from access within the phone. For what I know, the driver used for Mass Storage (any windows system or other) is a standardized universal driver. Wich means it must be as illogic to access the card both from within the phone and the computer/car-radio through USB at the same time. Like using 1 usb stick on 2 pc's by using a usb splitter. Device in use means in use.
Active Sync in the other hand uses a different kind of USB connection. It accesses the phone itself, through that, the card. Mass Storage is a direct function to the microsd card. Kind of a bypass. For compatibility issues. When you just want to put something on your card without the hassle of installing drivers (on old pc's) etc. Wich would really mean that the maps on the card for Tomtom are inaccessible. That would really be indeed a problem. The only solution for that is either use the phone as I do. Bluetooth A2DP not available? Then the car-audio system should change the access mode to the phone. Maybe an active sync like solution/connection. Problem is most manufacturers do that. Thinking of only using a USB stick on the radio. Mine does that too. Only mass storage devices are accepted through my radio's usb.

Audio input over USB?

Specifically, HTC Fuze as USB computer speaker - possible?
It may be too complicated a hack, but I would like to use the speakerphone of my HTC Fuze (Raphael) as a cheap USB speaker for my computer, for when my 100 watt stereo speakers would be too loud and when I don't feel like wearing headphones.
Just a kinda funny but fairly unnecessary usage scenario. So, how to do it, and is it even possible?

pretty sure that pda's can performe the tast of an usbSoundcard
but when connected to activesync the pda would have the same network
as the pc and as so being able to map a shared network drive and play music from it

Rudegar said:
...able to map a shared network drive and play music from it
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Click to collapse
Thanks, but I need it to output games and application sounds, not mp3s.
Not sure if it would need a WinMo driver, an xp driver, or what. Maybe record computer's sound in realtime and play file from disk, also in realtime? Some sort of streaming? Just throwing out ideas. I have no idea how to make it work.

you would need a dummy sound driver on the pc and then a "server" app on the pc feeding a socket which the client driver on the pda would play
but you could never get it to do it real time
even if you used 2 pc's rather then a pda in the client end
and the pda would slow it down even more
but you could do it over bluetooth if the bluetooth device in your pc supported audiogateway then the pda would work as a soundcard for the pc

Rudegar said:
but you could do it over bluetooth if the bluetooth device in your pc supported audiogateway then the pda would work as a soundcard for the pc
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Click to collapse
Thanks Rudegar! Too bad about USB, but that sounds even better. Knew I should have gotten a fancy bluetooth adapter for my computer instead of a wifi one!

they are pretty cheap just make sure you get one with a good newer broadcom bluetooth stack software

A couple of annoyances - screen lock and charging

Hi all,apologies if this issues have been asked about before - I have locked but couldn't specifically find what I was looking for.
I use my HD2 in the car to play music, whilst doing this I want to use the USB port on my stereo to charge the HD2... however the USB mode on the HD2 kicks in and then disables my memory card from being used directly by the phone. Setting the USB mode to activesync makes no difference.
Having plugged the USB cable in it would be nice if the stereo recognised the USB card when I wanted it too so that tracks could be read directly by the stereo. Other USB storage devices I have work fine but setting the HD2 to USB - Disk mode makes no difference, the stereo does not read any tracks. Anyone had this issue too?
Whilst using the HD2 in the car, playing music (charging or not) I'd like to prevent the screen lock for activating, I'd be happy if the screen darkened but with one tap of the screen I would like it to be back to working brightness and active. Is there a tweak to allow this to happen and for the lock to be set manually, for example by pressing the poweroff button?
Thanks all
Dan

It just sounds like your music collection is not compatible with your stereo. When you plug in the USB cable and select "USB drive", yes, it will stop the phone from accessing the SD card, but if you want to play music via the stereo then who cares!
You can also set the backlight to stay on when connected to an external power source (settings, menu, all settings, system, power, backlight).
That should solve all your issues.
Don't forget, it's not just the file type that your stereo might be finniky about. It might not like the bitrate of the tracks either.
Hope this helps

Thanks John...
I'd rather use the HD2 to play the tracks to be honest, with coverflow it is much easier than the clunky button method on the stereo.
Will the back light option also disable the screen lock? Assuming I can't power the HD2 from Stereo (because I need to have the HD2 access the memory card). Then I will have to set the backlight to be on permanently and that will kill the battery Ideally I need to be able to create a profile based on certain circumstances.
The stereo also has a SD card reader so I will try the card from the HD2 in the stereo direct and see if it has any problems accessing the files.

[Q] Audio Through USB

I'm currently aching to be able to play my own music through my car speakers, weird place for this yes.. if it's the wrong section to post this please let me know.
But, I was wondering if it's at all possible to feed the phone's audio through the USB.
For example, I have a USB port on my stero in my car, and when I plug it in..i'm able to feed off my SD card to play the music thats on it. But.. I'd like to be able to play pandora as well..which I'm currently unable to do.
Was wondering if this is possible. If i've confused you feel free to ask more questions
XtaC318 said:
Since it isn't possible.. what about an app that allows me to control the music played? I can stream music from the sd, but its got to mount to read therefore I don't have access to the stock music app. Only way to control what's played is the buttons on the stero and its pain staking..
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Click to collapse

I don't believe this is possible. As far as I know, when you use the usb the deck itself is decoding the mp3's (or whatever music files you're using) directly. It doesn't support playing music through the usb, it just uses the usb to get the files. I hope that makes sense...

So is that why I ca never plat music on my xbox whenever I have a phone hookedup to charge? I thought my xbox just didn't play nice with phones
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

XtaC318 said:
I'm currently aching to be able to play my own music through my car speakers, weird place for this yes.. if it's the wrong section to post this please let me know.
But, I was wondering if it's at all possible to feed the phone's audio through the USB.
For example, I have a USB port on my stero in my car, and when I plug it in..i'm able to feed off my SD card to play the music thats on it. But.. I'd like to be able to play pandora as well..which I'm currently unable to do.
Was wondering if this is possible. If i've confused you feel free to ask more questions
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So your car stereo has a USB input but no auxiliary? If so, your best bet would probably be to get an FM transmitter. Like the poster above said, your car's stereo is merely mounting your phone as a mass storage device and reading the mp3 files off the SD card and decoding and playing them locally.

It sees it as you do on the computer, just a drive. The only way to get what you want is to use a source from the phone that plays audio. Head phone jack or Blue Tooth. Your stereo... if it has USB should also have an AUX input or BT. Havn't come across to many that have USB and not an AUX or BT. Its nice though... having Pandora in the car.
If you tell me the Model of the Stereo I can help you out. I have seen a BT to FM Mod. Those are kinda cool. If your in a pinch with a stock stereo.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

a454nova said:
It sees it as you do on the computer, just a drive. The only way to get what you want is to use a source from the phone that plays audio. Head phone jack or Blue Tooth. Your stereo... if it has USB should also have an AUX input or BT. Havn't come across to many that have USB and not an AUX or BT. Its nice though... having Pandora in the car.
If you tell me the Model of the Stereo I can help you out. I have seen a BT to FM Mod. Those are kinda cool. If your in a pinch with a stock stereo.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Makes sense. My stero does have an auxiliary port on it, but due to recent events I'm really short on cash lol, was wondering if there was a work around so I'm not limited to my sd for music.
Since it isn't possible.. what about an app that allows me to control the music played? I can stream music from the sd, but its got to mount to read therefore I don't have access to the stock music app. Only way to control what's played is the buttons on the stero and its pain staking..

XtaC318 said:
Makes sense. My stero does have an auxiliary port on it, but due to recent events I'm really short on cash lol, was wondering if there was a work around so I'm not limited to my sd for music.
Since it isn't possible.. what about an app that allows me to control the music played? I can stream music from the sd, but its got to mount to read therefore I don't have access to the stock music app. Only way to control what's played is the buttons on the stero and its pain staking..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope... The phone isn't even connecting to your stereo. When you put it into USB mode so it can read the SD, it unmounted from the phone. Its as if you pulled the SD out and slid it into a card reader. When you pull the plug... It will remount to the phone. You'll notice it scanning for media at the top.
Now when you go BT... You can control it via the stereo or phone, using the Aux you can control it by the phone. "They" could make the phone controllable via USB like an Iphone but they would have to built that into the stereo like they do the Iphones/Ipods. Not likely to happen unless the Galaxy S takes off like IPOD did.

In theory, a rooted Epic with proper kernel support and hacked cable (since they don't exist commercially) can repurpose the data pins on its USB port for left and right analog audio thanks to the Fairchild FSA9480 USB switching chip inside the phone (the same chip enables the USB pins to be repurposed as a serial port with nonstandard voltage levels, enables the normally-unused fifth pin to be used as mic input, enables it to be used with a special "JIG" interface for JTAG reflashing without having to hand-solder anything to the microscopic internal pads, and apparently can also work its magic in conjunction with a chip by Silicon Imaging to use 5 pins to output a signal that can be transformed by a companion chip (embedded in the cable's connector shell) into valid HDCP-compliant HDMI. I'm pretty sure the 9480 can also repurpose the two data pins for external I2C, but don't quote me on it.
Check out the I9000 boards... they're about 2 months ahead of us. If you google for FSA9480, you can find a brief (but revealing) dialogue between a Samsung engineer and the Kernel.org folks regarding a kernel addition to support the chip. He had a few issues, because on one hand he's apparently not allowed to say much about how the chip works or what it does, but the kernel folks managed to wring much of it out of him one juicy detail at a time. If you check Fairchild's site, they don't even acknowledge that the chip EXISTS, but it's been photographed inside all the Galaxy S phones in various teardowns.
In English -- yes, the hardware exists today to connect your phone to a stereo's analog inputs via a cable that repurposes the USB port... but the official software to make it work from Samsung and Sprint doesn't exist, and the information needed to make it work ourselves on a rooted Epic with AOSP isn't quite available yet.
I'm personally quite happy about the uart, because that means we DO have an easy, low-ceremony way to do i/o between something like a gamepad built into a hardcase a-la-iphone-GameBone that doesn't require Bluetooth (note that if something IS using the USB port for UART purposes, the USB port is still active, but the phone sees it as having nothing connected because the signals from the D+ and D- pins are physically re-routed by the 9480 to the CPU's UART pins. Think of the 9480 as being like an old-fashioned telephone panel with cables that can be moved around to connect the USB port's 5 physical pins to different pins inside the phone.
I'm now pretty sure that this is why there are exactly 7 contacts on the microUSB connector inside the phone -- 5 are used to get the pre-HDMI signals out of the phone, and the other 2 (3, if you count the ground/anchor tabs and assume they carry a signal as well in addition to mechanically anchoring it in place) are used to supply +5v and ground, and possibly one wire for half-duplex signaling purposes.

Wow that was a lot of info... lol. I didn't know that about the usb tho. That's good to know. I was thinking of taking it apart to see.
But... I think he's wanting a UI via the USB like the way some players will do for the IPODs, not analog. To go throught all that when the Head Phone jack will do the same... I could only see that if it was broken or if you really really want only one cord to the phone.
; )
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

I've got an Alpine unit, I hook my USB up - turn on the TUNER. Mount the Drive and once the phone is done - swap back over to USB and i can get all my MP3S. sadly I get all of my ringtones too - odd when the radio is full blast and a track changes - none the less works well for me. Try it.

I purchased this Kensington LiquidAUX Bluetooth Car Kit for my phone a few days ago. It works perfectly on my sister's iPod touch (no AVRCP [silly apple]) and an old WinMo 6.1 phone.
I just got my Epic in the mail today so I'll be testing it out soon.

WTF. AVRCP (bluetooth remote control) is really buggy with this phone. I used the LiquidAUX with an old Omnia for a week with no problems. The Epic connects and plays audio just fine. I can also pause and play music but the forward and back buttons don't work. When I first pair the phone with the device everything is fine, but after disconnecting and reconnecting the remote control stops working. I got it to work after un-paring and re-pairing but it only worked once.
The Moment I had before this had really choppy audio.
EDIT: I had the phone opened up in DDMS and the phone is receiving signals from the remote. But it only reacts to them when the media player is on the screen. Weird.

[Q] How to connect to car audio system via USB?

I wanted to know how to connect via USB to my cars audio system.
I used this tutorial: http://www.mobiletechworld.com/2010/11/18/use-your-windows-phone-7-device-as-a-portable-usb-drive/
I can now store and retrieve picture files from the phone but I still cannot play music files on my cars audio system. It seems as if the phone turns off this feature when my cars head unit tries to communicate with it via USB.
I also cannot connect via bluetooth.
I have read that some folks have been successful in implementing this feat. I really dont want to use the headphone jack because I cannot control the phones audio via my head unit. I guess I am looking to set it up legacy style like my previous phones eg iphone, nexus one, milestone etc.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

The portable USB 'trick' doesn't make the device a USB Mass Storage device. It's a client-side registry modification that only makes the device viewable in windows explorer (legacy mode). It's still running its communications over the proprietary MTPz zune-sync protocol. This is why after running the registry modification, you can't just plug your WP7 into another computer and have it pop up, and also why it requires the Zune software to be installed, and to sync up first for it to work.
This is also why it won't/can't work with your USB capable audio system. It has absolutely no ability to do Zune protocol sync (as far as I'm aware, Kenwood made a head unit that could, but I don't know if it works with WP7. I'd doubt it), and despite the misreporting of various sites, your WP7 is not magically now a mass storage device.
Bluetooth may or may not work. I don't know about A2DP support on either your car's head unit, or WP7, and it may be specific to the device/manufacturer as to whether this is present (I have no idea). If bluetooth doesn't work, you're pretty much **** out of luck.
Headphone jack is your best (only) option. I can't recall if the supplied headphone cable has inline media controls. If so, you could probably macguyver that into a line-in cable for your stereo and use the media controls on that. Ghetto, but workable.

wow, that really sucks.. I am liking this phone less and less...