rodneyremington

I use ipods a lot and have a few, including an iphone. I'm just not sure if I want to give up (my perception, correct me if I'm wrong) the superior sound quality of a 6 CD changer for an ipod connection. I have an appointment in 2 days to do this. Currently I just burn CDs from itunes and load up the changer every few months. Does the ipod sound quality match the CD changer?

Ir's a 2005 with Logic7 and Sirius by the way.

JSpira

I'm confused. If you are burning CDs from iTunes, how could there be a difference in sound since you would be playing exactly the same track?

I haven't had a CD changer in a BMW since Model Year 2000. Didn't even think they made them anymore.

Gene

don't have logic 7, but sound quality via oem ipod adapter is like liestening to my ipod directly...idrive ipod menu's easy and fast to navigate also....


is the ipod and iphone adapter the same? or is there a specific cradle for the iphone?

kscarrol

Yes. Any small loss of quality is worth the increased capicity th iPod offers. For my untrained ears, the difference is mininal while the capacity offering of the iPod wins the argument easily. If the 6-disc changer played MP3s, maybe not...

rodneyremington

There is potentially a big difference. First the files themselves are different. On your ipod you are listening to an AAC audio file. On a CD it is converted to a file that can be read by CD players. In addition, the audio out of the ipod to your headphones is potentially a very different quality than the signal out to an ipod adapter into a head unit of a car. My question is to those that have compared the end result of those two audio sources.

eenBMW

You are absolutely right that there are different factors but you can rule out the first one. If you use a AAC, or MP3 for that matter, as a base to convert back to an CD audio file the sound won't get better. That is technically impossible. Probably even a little bit worse due to the (again) conversion.

I don't own my BMW yet but ordered it with the optional iPod connector. One thing that surprised me that you seem to have to connect both the USB connection and the 3,5 mm jack for sound. That might indicate that the D/A sound conversion is done in the iPod and that the USB is used only for power and controlling the device. Maybe one who knows for sure can chime in. I don't know how good the D/A system in the BMW CD player is but somewhere in the line that signal is converted into analogue and processed by the analogue amplifier as well, just like the signal from the iPod.

My guess is that it still will sound pretty good (no experience, just based on how it's converted). If you listen to classical music a lot you would probably be better of with an original CD to obtain the best quality to start with. Once something is lost in music conversion you will never get it back.

The comfort of using it the digital way (we have all our music on our iMac, our Apple TV and iPod Touch) is way more worth to me but I do discard downloads (oops ) that are of to low quality and go look for better ones (CD, iTunes store etc.)

Regards,

Guus

andy545

I chucked the cd changer out last year in place for the ipod interface. Cd changer can't play mp3's so from a standpoint of capacity it doesn't even start to compare. Quality is fine - no regrets.

JSpira

No one said that one is listening to AAC files on an iPod per se. There are several file type options. You also said you were burning the CDs from iTunes which would lead one to conclude they were the same files (MP3). Hence my comment.

Concerning the comparison between the audio via the headphone output versus the dock adapter, yes if you tried to use the audio from the headphone plug it would sound awful but no one is suggesting that is even possible so that quality isn?t an issue. Further, the iPod does not connect to a "head unit" at any time in the BMW.

But to answer your question, you should not hear any difference in quality that you would notice as long as you rip your tracks at a high enough bitrate.

bruce_miranda

Just to make it slightly easier, why don't you consider the Dension Gateway. You then don't need to choose between CD Change and iPod because you can have both and its gives you all the options of the iPOD connection that BMW offers.

Plus you get things like the USB stick reader ability and maybe in the future even be able to video your iPOD videos on your OEM screen.

bauska

I would suggest iPod connection. I personally got tired from changing CD's. If you sit in drivers seat with seat belt on - it is almost impossible to reach the changer anyway! If you are concerned with audio quality, you can get higher bit rate files or even use Apple Lossless format which is almost in CD quality.