USB Flash Drive

[TrueBlue]

Anyone know if music (mp3,flarc, etc) will be usable if installed on a thumb drive? I plugged one into my usb port on my truck for the first time today and the USB selection on the Audio page just says No USB Device Detected, or somesuch.

I usually use my phone w/bluetooth to play tunes so this is my first time trying a usb stick. Manual doesn't go into this level of USB port use.

 

Thanks!

[tbarn]

Absolutely should work. 

[redwngr]

Some ports are only for charging.

It will work in the ones that are also data ports.

 

 

[TrueBlue]

So is it specific to certain trim levels? I would think that because my infotainment has the selection for USB for media input it should work on mine, which is a plain old 2023 LT. But it surely doesn't.

Edited November 18, 2024 by TrueBlue

[tbarn]

How many ports do you have and where are they located?

[TrueBlue]

Only these, unless there's more in the back. Never looked. But even if, these should be for power and data, if my trim level has data ports. Thanks.

 

 

[gemarsh]

On my '21, I had to format to fat32 to get it to work. Ntfs and exfat would not work.

[TrueBlue]

That just might be it. I'll see if I have a spare drive I can format and try. Thanks!

[TrueBlue]

That was it, thank you! Put in a correctly formatted card and it indexed the music and played correctly.

[redwngr]

11 hours ago, TrueBlue said:

So is it specific to certain trim levels? I would think that because my infotainment has the selection for USB for media input it should work on mine, which is a plain old 2023 LT. But it surely doesn't.

If it has ports for the rear passengers they are likely charge only.

Ports for driver are data (phone, usb) and charge.

[TrueBlue]

I seem to recall seeing ports there in the back, but I can't say with certainty. I rarely have people back there and so what's back there is just not important to me. And I don't drive the truck everyday, or even every week so I'm not entirely familiar with its layout. But I think you're right about the front ports.

I'm glad I got this to work. I ordered a small 128gb thumb drive this evening that will hold all of my music, which is a bit more than 64gb. I downloaded a program today that allows me to format a drive larger than 32gb in FAT32. The drive I tried in the truck today is also 128gb and formatted FAT32, but it's out of one of my MP3 players and I don't want to sacrifice it for the truck. I formatted it FAT32 some years back when my Windows version at the time would still run the Partiition Magic software that I have, which will format drives larger than 32gb in FAT32. My Windows 11 won't let that software run. And of course Windows will not format anything larger than 32gb in that partition type.

So, as soon as my new drive gets here and I get it set up I'll be able to just leave the drive in the truck and not use bluetooth with my phone for tunes.

I'm also curious to find out if the currently playing song will update properly on the dash panel with a usb stick. That stopped working from my phone after the recall OTA update I let them do. I figured out a work-around but it involves pushing the power button 3 times and then having to turn the infotainment screen off again afterwards. All just to find out what is currently playing if I don't already know.

Edited November 19, 2024 by TrueBlue

[redwngr]

Check out how many hours of mp3's can be stored per gigabyte.

 

Might not need huge capacity USB.

If library to be kept in truck is huge, might be better to have several small ones?

 

 

I'm still using 'freebee' usb's from years ago when businesses liked to give them out as promotions. 

If I was buying one I'd get the style that is like the small BT receivers for running a mouse on a computer. 

Less chance of physical damage when plugged into one of the trucks ports. 

Several brands have them.

 

example

[DubVBenz]

On 11/17/2024 at 6:09 PM, TrueBlue said:

Anyone know if music (mp3,flarc, etc) will be usable if installed on a thumb drive? I plugged one into my usb port on my truck for the first time today and the USB selection on the Audio page just says No USB Device Detected, or somesuch.

I usually use my phone w/bluetooth to play tunes so this is my first time trying a usb stick. Manual doesn't go into this level of USB port use.

 

Thanks!

 

Buy the fastest flash storage you can buy. I have about 15K mp3s on mine and the truck would struggle to index and read it using slower flash media. After upgrading it, it reads it more consistently now. Also, it's not smart enough to be able to read several subdirectories deep. So if you organize your music as Band>Album>Songs , it will not read 3 directories deep. Instead just do Band>Songs. I have FLAC and MP3s and it reads both I think.

Edited November 19, 2024 by DubVBenz

[Wayne Black]

I have found that some brands of usb flash drives just don't work.

Try another brand.

I currently have a Samsung 32 GB/200MB/s and it works just fine.

 

I will add that if you are a Mac user, this could also be causing a problem.

 

The Apple OS will install hidden dot files and my theory is these can cause the audio system to not see the usb drive when it starts indexing the drive.

I have used a program called "Eject for Windows" on my Macs for years to erase those not needed hidden files when ejecting an audio usb.

 

I just had this happen today when I installed some new music and by habit ejected the usb flash drive the normal Apple way.

Well, guess what?

The usb wasn't recognised until I brought it back in, reconnected it to the computer and ejected it using the "Eject for Windows" app erasing those hidden files.

Now my truck (2020 Silverado LTZ) sees the drive and it works as usual.

Go figure.

[TrueBlue]

Don't use MAC, strictly on Windows. My current library is 99% lossless, so it takes much more space than mp3 files do. The one I put in to test was a Samsung 128gb micro sd in a reader. My library is multiple levels deep and the truck indexed it fine, or appeared to, I didn't spend a whole lot of time playing with it. What I've ordered now is indeed one of the very small drives that looks like the transceiver for a mouse. I figured it would be less likely to be bumped, or seen from the outside. I will post up with exactly what happens after I get the drive set up, how I set it up directory-wise, and how the truck handles it. My phone works fine but the Tunes page on the infotainment doesn't show the album art or much about the song other than the name. The truck's music player seemed to get and show all of that from the metadata in the file and the folder from which the song was pulled.

Edited November 19, 2024 by TrueBlue