CD player to USB - is there such a thing?

Forums › Transport (cars, bikes and boats) › CD player to USB - is there such a thing?

OnceBitten

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#317835 20-Nov-2024 10:29

Earlier this year we upgraded our car and now have a Mazda MX30

it doesn't come with a CD player unfortunately and that's the only downside

we can however plug our phones into the USB slot and play the music on our phone through car sound system, so that got me thinking

Can you buy a cable that has a headphone jack to USB?

my thought is to use our portable CD player - plug it into the USB and play CD's through the car sound system that way

Does anyone know if you can buy such a cable, or if this idea will actually work?

I've searched PB Tech and couldn't see any cable that fits the description

Does anyone know if this idea is possible?

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#3310866 20-Nov-2024 10:53

pretty common

https://www.pbtech.co.nz/product/SEVOEM9A052/35mm-Male-AUX-Audio-Jack-To-USB-20-Male-Charge-Cab

OnceBitten

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#3310868 20-Nov-2024 11:00

ok thanks for that - I couldn't see that one the other day while searching

I don't know if the car would recognise / pick up the portable CD player though... but that cable is only $7.05, so it's not going to break the bank

shk292

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#3310913 20-Nov-2024 12:29

There's no way a cable is going to work. The head unit is expecting a file system on the USB port, and you're trying to present it analogue audio.
Best solution would be to rip your music selection to MP3 and save to a USB stick for use in the car

scuwp

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#3310924 20-Nov-2024 12:54

My question is why on earth you would want to do this (aside from it probably won't work)?

It would be far easier to digitize your physical media into music files (very simple and quick to do), load those onto a USB drive or your phone to play them. Instant access to thousands of music tracks without the need to carry an entire library of disks. You probably don't even need the cable, assuming the car would have Bluetooth.

Lazy is such an ugly word, I prefer to call it selective participation

OnceBitten

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#3310927 20-Nov-2024 13:00

scuwp:

My question is why on earth you would want to do this (aside from it probably won't work)?

It would be far easier to digitize your physical media into music files (very simple and quick to do), load those onto a USB drive or your phone to play them. Instant access to thousands of music tracks without the need to carry an entire library of disks. You probably don't even need the cable, assuming the car would have Bluetooth.

the idea was to be able to play our CD's in the car

how does one digitise CD's without paying to download it on iTunes or similar?

I don't have CD / DVD slot on my Macbook

nitro

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#3310935 20-Nov-2024 13:26

OnceBitten:

the idea was to be able to play our CD's in the car

how does one digitise CD's without paying to download it on iTunes or similar?

I don't have CD / DVD slot on my Macbook

maybe buy/borrow an external cd/dvd drive... or someone's old laptop. kind of a do it once and be done with it. obviously there's the time factor involved as well, depending on how many discs you have.

also, not all portable cd players would be able to effectively handle skipping caused by bumps/rocking when driving. if mounted on ye olde gooseneck fixtures, it's far worse than it would be with a person holding it.

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Scott3

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#3310944 20-Nov-2024 13:38

Yeah, the USB to 3.5mm isn't going to work.

If your car has a 3.5mm in jack, you can use a 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable from a portable CD player. If not, you would need to use a Bluetooth sender.

But as others have suggested what you are trying to do is super strange. Much cleaner to ditch the optical disks all together.

OnceBitten:

scuwp:

My question is why on earth you would want to do this (aside from it probably won't work)?

It would be far easier to digitize your physical media into music files (very simple and quick to do), load those onto a USB drive or your phone to play them. Instant access to thousands of music tracks without the need to carry an entire library of disks. You probably don't even need the cable, assuming the car would have Bluetooth.

the idea was to be able to play our CD's in the car

how does one digitise CD's without paying to download it on iTunes or similar?

I don't have CD / DVD slot on my Macbook

There is a reason, car brands are dropping optical drives from their head units, and that is because very few people demand this feature any more.

In terms of ripping your CD's, The process is as follows:

Buy or borrow a USB Optical drive (they start at about $20 new, delivered to Auckland on trademe):

https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/marketplace/computers/components/cd-dvd-drives/dvd-writers/listing/5018524203

Buy a flash drive of your choosing (should be under $20)

Use your ripping software of your choice to turn the CD into Mp3 (or similar) files

Arrange the files on the flash drive and plug that into your car's USB port, and use the car head unit to play.

Repurpose the storage space in your glovebox to something else.

Note the interfaces of car auto's vairy in their ability to deal with a large library, if you have a large library, try with a small sample first.

richms

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#3310953 20-Nov-2024 14:02

OnceBitten:

the idea was to be able to play our CD's in the car

how does one digitise CD's without paying to download it on iTunes or similar?

I don't have CD / DVD slot on my Macbook

Spend $20 on a USB drive and then use one of the plethora of ripping softwares to copy them to your computer.

Encode at a quality that you find acceptable and the car will playback and stick them on a large USB stick. CDs and a portable player in a car died in the 00's

Richard rich.ms

OnceBitten

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#3310961 20-Nov-2024 14:11

Scott3:

In terms of ripping your CD's, The process is as follows:

Buy or borrow a USB Optical drive (they start at about $20 new, delivered to Auckland on trademe):

https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/marketplace/computers/components/cd-dvd-drives/dvd-writers/listing/5018524203

Buy a flash drive of your choosing (should be under $20)

Use your ripping software of your choice to turn the CD into Mp3 (or similar) files

Arrange the files on the flash drive and plug that into your car's USB port, and use the car head unit to play.

Repurpose the storage space in your glovebox to something else.

Note the interfaces of car auto's vairy in their ability to deal with a large library, if you have a large library, try with a small sample first.

thanks - will look for one of those CD / DVD drives

outdoorsnz

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#3310975 20-Nov-2024 14:56

Have you checked to see if the car has an auxiliary 3.5mm input?

OnceBitten

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#3310976 20-Nov-2024 14:59

outdoorsnz:

Have you checked to see if the car has an auxiliary 3.5mm input?

yes - the car has 2 x USB-A and that's all unfortunately

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tripper1000

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#3310990 20-Nov-2024 15:31

Your friends might be able to help. I have a few MP3 illiterate relatives (both old and young), and I have made up USB drives of their kind of music in under 20 minutes. (I guess that is the modern equivalent of a mix tape?).

Good old USB has also saved the day several times when camping and boating when spotify was useless due to a lack of cell coverage.

(edit: spelling) .

cddt

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#3310999 20-Nov-2024 15:45

OnceBitten:

how does one digitise CD's without paying to download it on iTunes or similar?

abcde

No, I'm not joking! It stands for A Better CD Encoder...

My referral links: BigPipe | Mercury

cddt

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#3311000 20-Nov-2024 15:46

I actually have the opposite problem - I would like to get my digital media to play through my car's CD player...

My referral links: BigPipe | Mercury

tchart

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#3311082 20-Nov-2024 18:08

shk292: There's no way a cable is going to work. The head unit is expecting a file system on the USB port, and you're trying to present it analogue audio.

FWIW many years ago I bought a USB dongle that accepts a Bluetooth connection eg from a phone and allows you to transmit the audio to the USB which appears to the host as a file system. It actually worked fine, very strange and magical. From memory it was a single file that somehow kept the music going.

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