Music Storage: how do you store your music for best use your car?

[Fireballer 2,369]

Im planning on replacing the stereo in an older vehicle.  It doesnt get driven much, but I wanna take along my music when I do drive it.  Im probably gonna replace it with a unit that has no CD player.  I still have a bunch of great CDs, its just a pain to move them from house to car to truck, etc.   

So how to I store all my music for ease if use?  I was thinking jump drives?  But will modern stereos let you navigate through folders and albums you have on a jump drive?  I could use my phone, but thats a sh!t ton of space used up.  What are my best options?

[nzoner 936]

It's been a few years but personally I ripped all my cd's to my home computer then transferred what I wanted to an MP3.

[lickin_starfish 1,477]

I have music on a USB drive that I leave connected to the stereo. My particular model uses a cable that goes into the back of the head unit, which I ran behind the dash and down to an accessory tray. I can navigate through the folders and pick songs, shuffle songs in a folder, and shuffle all folders.

[Fireballer 2,369]

2 minutes ago, nzoner said:

It's been a few years but personally I ripped all my cd's to my home computer then transferred what I wanted to an MP3.

Yes that's the plan. But then how do I store them for best use in the car? I'm sure the stereo that I buy will have a USB port, but I'm not sure if storing them on jump drives will give me the versatility that I'm looking for. I would want to be able to scroll through all the folders and be able to find any given song and play it if I wanted to.

[Mike Honcho 4,009]

1 minute ago, nzoner said:

It's been a few years but personally I ripped all my cd's to my home computer then transferred what I wanted to an MP3.

This.  I put all the CD's next to the computer.  Whenever I used the computer, I would feed CD's into the drive and transfer them to itunes, google play...every cd I ever bought is on the cloud now.   I get into my car and can play anything I own through blue tooth.

[Fireballer 2,369]

Just now, lickin_starfish said:

. I can navigate through the folders and pick songs, shuffle songs in a folder, and shuffle all folders.

Okay thanks. This is kind of what I was looking for. In my wife's car if you use a USB drive, it just reads it as one big drive and you have to listen to each song as it plays through the music on the drive

[Fireballer 2,369]

1 minute ago, Mike Honcho said:

This.  I put all the CD's next to the computer.  Whenever I used the computer, I would feed CD's into the drive and transfer them to itunes, google play...every cd I ever bought is on the cloud now.   I get into my car and can play anything I own through blue tooth.

What cloud are you referring to?  So you're actually streaming music to your phone and then playing it on your stereo through Bluetooth? Correct?

[lickin_starfish 1,477]

I'm sure that each brand and model of head unit has different features. I suggest looking for YouTube reviews for any stereo that you are considering.

[nzoner 936]

2 minutes ago, Fireballer said:

Yes that's the plan. But then how do I store them for best use in the car? I'm sure the stereo that I buy will have a USB port, but I'm not sure if storing them on jump drives will give me the versatility that I'm looking for. I would want to be able to scroll through all the folders and be able to find any given song and play it if I wanted to.

I use my MP3 player,I have playlists I can use or just hit shuffle.

My Jeep on the other hand has a built in 28 G storage and I was able to rip cd's directly to it,which I love.

[lickin_starfish 1,477]

Many head units come with Bluetooth connectivity. You can use that to stream things like Spotify, etc.

[JustinCharge 2,397]

The problem I have with blue tooth is every once in a while, my phone auto-updates an app and then music starts cutting out.

[lickin_starfish 1,477]

Turn off automatic updates.

[Mike Honcho 4,009]

6 minutes ago, Fireballer said:

What cloud are you referring to?  So you're actually streaming music to your phone and then playing it on your stereo through Bluetooth? Correct?

Yes, put every CD i own into the computer and loaded them into iTunes(did this a few years ago).   iTunes then ask do I want to store my music in the cloud(there servers) for use anywhere...YES.   Eventually I switched to android and uploaded all those songs to the Google Play music and now where ever my phone goes, my music goes with me.   Since they are just MP3 audio files, streaming from phone doesn't burn through much data....easy peezy.  

[Fireballer 2,369]

5 minutes ago, Mike Honcho said:

 Eventually I switched to android and uploaded all those songs to the Google Play music and now where ever my phone goes, my music goes with me.   Since they are just MP3 audio files, streaming from phone doesn't burn through much data....easy peezy.  

Ok.  This kinda looks like what I wanna do.  50,000 song storage for free.  

[vuduchile 1,940]

I have an old iPhone 4 that contains all my music.  

I also put all my cds into iTunes a few years ago   

Thankfully, my truck also has a decent iphone interface so it makes finding and playing certain songs or playlists really easy.  

[jerryskids 5,169]

We have a bunch of CDs which we'll probably never put on the cloud, although Mike's Google Play suggestion is useful since we use Android.  I just use Spotify these days; can play from the cloud or local (I started using it for airplane trips so I downloaded a bunch of stuff. 

[Reality 2,710]

I saw a CD about 10 years ago. I think it had music on it.. Or, maybe it was pictures.

I use Amazon music, the free one with Prime. Buy whatever extra I might want, rarely need to.

 

[Fireballer 2,369]

1 hour ago, Reality said:

I use Amazon music, the free one with Prime. Buy whatever extra I might want, rarely need to.

 

 

I started digging into that today now I realize it comes with Prime.  Do you personally stick to making playlists and skip around from there?

[Drizzay 644]

Find one that plays FLAC and rip your CD's in that format.

[Reality 2,710]

12 minutes ago, Fireballer said:

I started digging into that today now I realize it comes with Prime.  Do you personally stick to making playlists and skip around from there?

A little bit of both, have my own playlists and use stations. You can thumbs up\down songs or artists you like\dislike with the stations like Pandora or whatever. I think it works well, BT in the house with my sound bar, in my truck and carry a speaker in my golf bag. You have your phone, you have your music. 

Putting music on a thumb drive is merely a stop-gap. Make the jump to a music service on your phone, you'll be much happier.

[Hawkeye21 1,848]

I just use my iPhone. Have some music transferred from CDs, some purchased on iTunes and the rest is streamed from online services.