Video on SD card

LoveTheRain · May 22, 2015

2015 Sierra which I picked up this week... if I insert an SD card with audio and video, it can see all the files, can play audio but nothing happens when I try to play video. I was hoping the video player and codecs were part of the standard Infotainment system build. Has anyone been able get this to work, without the rear seat video player option? I expect it might be disabled as it poses a safety issue.

nadrojcote · May 22, 2015

Have you tried while in park? It may only support certain file types as well. I have never tried myself, but I know these trucks don't let you play video while driving. Your manual will tell you what file types are supported.

scott19677 · May 22, 2015

You can only play video 480 and under I believe. Or you may have to format your sd card differently. Im really the wrong person to be giving advise because Im an analog guy in a digital world. lol I just click around till something works. But there are a few in-depth posts on here. Try the search function and you should find what you are looking for.

WendysOrBust · May 22, 2015

Lol wait what? You can play video on the oe screen?

black00ta · May 22, 2015

From my understanding it needs to be in .mp4 format

szalkerous · May 24, 2015

Fascinating. I added a handful of different formats to an SD card and it didn't even see any of them.

MKV, AVI, MP4, all ignored by the system. Then again, I think they were all 720p/1080p video.

The manual is crap for any help, too. If anyone gets any definite answers, please post them.

Edited May 24, 2015 by szalkerous

chevydeth · May 25, 2015

I wonder if there is a way to "mod" to allow video playing while driving. My Kenwood unit I had in my past vehicle all I had to do is ground the "parking cable" wire and video worked while in gear.

Rock1500 · May 25, 2015

Fascinating. I added a handful of different formats to an SD card and it didn't even see any of them.

MKV, AVI, MP4, all ignored by the system. Then again, I think they were all 720p/1080p video.

The manual is crap for any help, too. If anyone gets any definite answers, please post them.

The manual is total crap. From what I heard it has to be under 480 resolution. Which is still crap.

crafferty · May 25, 2015

I wonder if there is a way to "mod" to allow video playing while driving. My Kenwood unit I had in my past vehicle all I had to do is ground the "parking cable" wire and video worked while in gear.

Yeah there is and the guys that can do it are charging $400-500 lol

szalkerous · May 25, 2015

The manual is total crap. From what I heard it has to be under 480 resolution. Which is still crap.

I'll try getting a 480p MP4. It would be nice while I'm sitting around in a parking lot to watch some standup comedy.

szalkerous · May 25, 2015

I wonder if there is a way to "mod" to allow video playing while driving. My Kenwood unit I had in my past vehicle all I had to do is ground the "parking cable" wire and video worked while in gear.

My Pioneer AVIC unit did, and I used that (technically illegal) feature 0% of the time I had it. Not out of fear of getting a ticket, but because I'm too busy watching the road. It's not worth the money anyone is charging unless they're giving you better features in addition to that.

chevydeth · May 25, 2015

Well, sometimes in rush hour traffic you need a distraction to ease your road rage aggression lol

SteveBBB · May 25, 2015

I have downloaded movies to a SD card and play when waiting for the wife . I downloaded them from YouTube in the mp4 format. The truck has to be in park for them to play. It seems most of the movies I have seen are captioned in what I think is Viet Namese, but the language is English. There are usually some recent releases available.

LoveTheRain · May 25, 2015

I'm a technology guy, I was just curious. I think the 480 tip is probably right, that screen is pretty basic. Not sure if I would use it, it's just a novelty.

I'm pretty impressed by the 'back end' capabilities of that unit. Plug in a couple USB drives and it computes voice tags so I can use voice commands for up to 100,000 songs. That's pretty impressive.

But the UI is pretty primitive, to your average smartphone user. I want to customize my home screen, with a background image, I don't want to see that same boring power on screen every day. It has internet access via OnStar, I want a weather forecast. The Sirius XM interface is very basic. The 'apps' should update like smartphone apps. I don't want to take it to a dealer. And it should run android apps...why not, android is essentially free so up the resolution and let people have their own apps and home screen.

I realize it has to be a highly secured system - it has control of your vehicle. But if architected properly entertainment apps could still be safely updated. Though we would see an entirely new class of hacks and recalls, as soon as the system was open to attack.

But smartphones set the bar, and as incredible as I find the systems in this vehicle compared to my previous 'dumb' 2007 Acadia, vehicles have some catchup to do. GM just announced 100 new vehicle system design jobs in this area in Oshawa, where I live. After doing 35 years are of IT architecture work, this would be a fun area to work in.

CounterMeasure · May 25, 2015

But smartphones set the bar, and as incredible as I find the systems in this vehicle compared to my previous 'dumb' 2007 Acadia, vehicles have some catchup to do. GM just announced 100 new vehicle system design jobs in this area in Oshawa, where I live. After doing 35 years are of IT architecture work, this would be a fun area to work in.

It would be, if it wasn't GM.

The system is actually running QNX under the covers, which is more than capable of providing a more cutting edge design. I've done a lot with it in years past. It seems GM isn't up for that, or isn't up for spending enough money to give the system enough horsepower to be able to do more. As a senior software engineer myself, it pains me to press a homescreen button and literally count the seconds before my input actually makes something happen.

While I am no fan of my wife's Charger (but that's what she wanted), her 3 year old uConnect system, while also having a fairly primitive UI, is way ahead of GM in terms of system performance and user experience. Its controls and actions make much more sense. And the fact they went with Garmin on the navigation side is way ahead of this god awful navigation system GM is providing. I watched GM's system try to add 110 miles to a 280 mile trip because it wanted me on an interstate. I knew better, and after the system continually tried to recalculate me to try to get me to that interstate, including going back 50 miles, I finally gave it the finger, gave the engineers that wrote it the finger, and canceled the route.