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Topic: Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII (Read 34706 times) previous topic - next topic
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Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

For whoever might be interested: I have a brand new Volkswagen Golf VII (Golf 7) which has USB and SD slots. Conclusion of my tests:
  • WAV: supported
  • MP3: supported
  • MP4/AAC: supported
  • ALAC: not supported
  • FLAC: not supported
  • OGG: not supported
  • OPUS: not supported
No gapless playback on any of the supported formats.

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #1
Are the codecs supported for all storage types? My Skoda's Bolero (or RCD 510 as VW calls it) supports only MP3 and WMA via CD or SD card, the media-in interface in the glovebox supports MP4 and Ogg Vorbis for USB in addition.

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #2
this also depends on what stereo/Navi your car has, the Discovery Pro can read FLAC, the Discovery Media can't.

despite not having gapless playback, what really annoys me is the forced ~2 sec fade-in on the beginning of every song when playing from the SD-card.
haven't found a way to turn it off yet

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #3
this also depends on what stereo/Navi your car has, the Discovery Pro can read FLAC, the Discovery Media can't.

despite not having gapless playback, what really annoys me is the forced ~2 sec fade-in on the beginning of every song when playing from the SD-card.
haven't found a way to turn it off yet



Interesting that codec support isn't documented online on some VW/Audi web site, or is it?

IME the codec support of various music/AV players is sometimes well documented. For example what codecs does the Media Player in my $25/month Arris cable system front end/DVR support?

It is documented here: Arris Media Gateway Codec support specs

It is also remotely upgradable.  This media player browses and plays the computers I expose as media libraries on my LAN.

The counterpoint is the  poor reliability of the Arris hardware. If I play a lot of songs, it seems like it is just a matter of time until it locks up. An approximate 2 minute power cycle/boot is required to restore it. The media player has been otherwise reliable, but I'm on my third Media Gateway, and every replacement looses the media stored on it, and also the recording parameters.

The current hot button in the Codec world may be Opus. It seems like it may be the best thing since sliced bread but I know of very few real world players that support it.  No Audition Filter that I know of

it seems like there is Rockbox support for Opus.

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #4
it is documented in the digital manual, which you can get here: http://www.vw-bordbuch.de/de/welcome

unfortunately you need the vehicle identification number (vin) of your car for that

For Composition/Discovery Media it states:

– MP3-Files (.mp3) with bitrates of 32 to 320 kbit/s or VBR
– WMA-Files (.wma) up to 9.2 mono/stereo without DRM
– AAC-Files (.m4a, .m4b, .mp4, .aac).
– Playlists M3U, PLS, ASX and WPL.
– Playlists not larger than 20 kB and no more than 1000 items.
– File and Path names not longer than 256 characters


additionally, for cover images to work i discovered that it needs ID3v2.3 Tags with jpg images of max. 400x400 px and the image may not be larger than 200 KB.
It can be embedded or as jpg file in the directory

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #5
For a while some players would play ogg because it was in the chip they bought, but no mention on the feature list. (not the case on my Toyota Entune)
It would be nice to get an update with new codecs.  The dealer said an update to the maps for GPS was over a hundred bucks (!)  so I'd guess there's no free lunch on updates to the audio firmware either.

WIth the extra noise of snow tires I lose a lot of quiet passages, so I'm thinking of  just doing a run of dynamic compression and transcode to mp3 for the flash drive that goes in the car.

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #6
Some fixes are free during the warranty. Some older versions of the Bolero / RCD 510 did not support large SD cards for example (4 GB+) or had problems with many files so that navigating through folders would lock up the radio. These were fixed but if the car was outside warranty, you had to pay yourself.

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #7
My Golf 7 has Discovery Media (not Pro). I tried WAV, MP3, MP4/AAC, ALAC, FLAC, OGG and OPUS through both USB (behind gear shift) and SD (in glovebox) and the results were exactly the same. I have not tried WMA because I abandonned this format many years ago.

The behaviour between tracks is always the same. There's some kind of fast fade out and fast fade in with a pause/silence I estimate between 0,5 and 1 second (too much disturbing for gapless albums).

It's curious that Discovery Pro does support FLAC.

Edit: typo

 

Music codecs supported in Volkswagen Golf VII

Reply #8
Sorry to open an old thread.. but am wondering if anyone has found a fix for the lack of a gapless playback.

My 2004 B5 Passat with it's Phatbox (with 60 GB drive) is on its last legs and my main concerning getting a new VW is the sound system.

This recent press release indicates support for FLAC http://media.vw.com/release/1032/  but if play back is not gapless that would be ridiculous.

The decade old Phatbox supported gapless FLAC support.

I have also read some comments about car stereos that support USB drives/flash drives, etc... taking quite a time to start up initially.. I assume to read all the files. That too would be kinda pathetic unless the files have changed on the drive.

Thanks.