How to work this USB jack?

So, how do you like your new car??? Post pictures and tell us more.

 

I love just being able to plug a thumb drive into the USB port, hit the USB tab on the NAV screen and hold down RAND for 5 seconds to play any random track on the drive, and it's like a radio. Very nice.

 

where is the usb jack or is it omitted on the nav package

thanks

tim

 

The USB jack is in the floor of the center storage console at the back, next to the auxiliary mini phone jack audio input (and both are under a cover next to the second 12-volt power outlet).

 

For those of us who don't know much about this sort of thing (and I did read the literature). How do you format your USB thumb drive in FAT32?

 

Just checked my Cruzer. I apparently formatted it as a FAT32 when uninstalling the U3.

 

Hmmm, have a 4GB PNY USB stick. Formatted it as FAT32, copied some MP3 files over to it (in music/[artist]/[album]/song folder structure). Tried several formats, last was 128bit constant. Also tried just putting them int he root of the USB stick (no folders). Nothing seems to work. It keeps saying there are no compatible files on the USB. Any other suggestions?

(Bluetooth streaming from my Droid works awesomely, by the way, not that that's relevant.)

 

P.S. My nav/audio/bluetooth manual does not reference the USB feature at all. The screens don't have the USB tab. Guess the manuals were printed before the feature was added. Is there some doc online or something?

EDIT: Never mind, found the addendum with all the other manuals/paperwork. Says it supports USB 2.0 FS (12MBPS) player devices formatted with Windfows FAT16 or FAT32 using Mass Storage Class.

That would be a normal USB stick, right, if it's formatted as FAT32?

 

Anyone able to get the USB stick to play MP3s? Anyone? Bueller?

 

I've got the opposite problem. There's an addendum to the manual on how to use the USB / iPod port, but there is no actual USB port next to the AUX input.

 

Open the armrest. The USB port is located under a flip up cap at the rear. What worked for me:

Remove U3 software from drive.
Reformat drive as FAT32 even though it is already FAT32.

Copy files & folders as you want.

My drive now works just like a CD.

 

You must have a < Aug 2009 Prius.... like mine. Does anyone know if the USB kit on the PriusChat store disables the Sat function, or if it simply adds another "tab" to the audio source options? I recall reading about a USB kit last year and that it did replace the Sat option... since I pay for XM, I don't want to do that

 

I just bought a pack of 3 SanDisk 4G USB thumb drives and it worked like a charm. Didn't format them or anything; just used straight out of the package and dragged songs off my Mac onto the drive. The dealer told me to insert the drive BEFORE turning on the car, so that's what I did.

That being said I'd much rather plug my iPod Touch (2nd Generation running v3.1.3). The pamphlet for the USB port said it would work with Generation 1 or greater. But when I plug it into the USB port, I get an error message saying there are no files!

Any suggestions?

 

It does not disable the SAT function. It *does* add another tab called USB.

 

I got it to work with a new 16 GB flash drive from Verbatim (Store 'n' Go), formatted FAT32, USB 2.0. It now has 10 GB of music on it.

The random folder function works fine (hold the RAND soft key down for 2 or more seconds). You can use the ^SEEK and vTRACK buttons to go to the next track or the last track. You can also use the up and down arrows below the MODE button on the steering wheel for the same purpose. If you hear a song and decide you want to play the entire recording, you hit Select next to the folder field, wait 10 seconds for a list of five folders (CD titles) to display, and touch the folder that is displaying the current CD title of the track you are now listening to. You also have to deselect the RAND mode.

The main drawbacks of the USB interface are two:
1. The folders (CD titles) are displayed in roughly the order they appear on the flash drive. Finding a CD title out of the 180 on my flash drive is near impossible.
2. You can only search through the list of folders when you are not moving. Which is probably a good thing because the frustration of trying to find a CD title in a list of 180 pseudo-randomly organized folders is enough to cause an accident with even the most cautious driver.

 

I have a question about this. I found the drawback of not being able to select a file when moving to be very distracting. My passengers can't even move through the files once the car is moving. When driving on a freeway in LA this is very frustrating and more dangerous as I try to do this using the Seek and Find on the steering wheel. That was just as dangerous, trying to maneuver through the menu finding a folder that I want.

Selecting radio or SAT channels is not disabled, so I can do that, just not select a different music file on a thumb drive. I guess that was decided to be too distracting for us. Giving up, a friend plugged their IPOD into the USB port, and there it was, I could scroll through all the music as much as I wanted, no problem. Nothing disable, I could find a song, and hit play on the touch screen, up and down the menu.

So, why won't this work with a 2gb thumb drive, but was not a problem with an 8gb IPOD?

 

Yes, but it's your radio station.

 

Another quick question, when playing mp3's through a flash drive, is there no pause feature if you need to temporarily stop the music? It looks like the only option is to power off the audio system entirely. Is this correct?

Thanks.