Source
r/cars•
Hovsky

My car has bluetooth, but only for calls. Can I force it to play music too?

This is more an electronics question, I know, but I figured someone might've had the same problem.

When you connect your phone to a bluetooth device, it says the connection is for one or more of

  • calls

  • media

  • etc

So it connects for calls...shouldn't I be able to force it to connect for media? It would be nice to not have to use a new cable every 6 months because it starts to break.

Posted Sep 25, 2017, 7:40 PM UTC

521
Tangent_11 Z435i, 01 330i, 15 Fiat 500e•

My Fiat is like that and no, on that system at least there's no way to force it to play music. I ended up plugging this bluetooth to aux adapter in and my phone now pairs with the radio for phone calls and that adapter to stream music.

9
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Oh nice, that one's powered. I'd just seen one that had a battery and only lasted ~4h which seemed annoying, was about to search for one of those.

Thanks!

1
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Are the cables as flimsy as they look?

1
Tangent_11 Z435i, 01 330i, 15 Fiat 500e•

They're not the sort of cables where I'd yank the USB or aux adapter out by the cable repeatedly but they certainly don't feel flimsy. I just plugged mine in about a year ago and left it though so my cables don't exactly get a lot of strain. It has a small adhesive pad on the back of the main part of it and I put that in a convenient spot and didn't move it.

The only slightly annoying thing about it is that it doesn't automatically power up when the USB port gets power so you have to press the top button on it for a second to turn it on every time you start the car. After that though it's great. The top button functions as play/pause, and the left and right will skip forward and back.

2
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Is yours noisy? I bought a cheaper one, and I guess it's not properly shielded between the power and audio components, so it's kind of noisy if I turn the volume up and there's a quiet section in a song.

Although to be fair, it's 2x as loud as direct aux, so turning it up louder is something I couldn't do before.

1
Tangent_11 Z435i, 01 330i, 15 Fiat 500e•

Mine's nice and quiet but I tend to use it mostly for podcasts so I might not notice as much noise as I might with music...

2
nukelauncher95•

No. A lot of cars just don't support music over Bluetooth. You can't force it.

5
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Seems to me like audio's audio, but I have no clue how that stuff works.

Thank you.

1
nukelauncher95•

Bluetooth telephone calls are very low audio quality and mono only. It's been around since 2002 in cars. It is old as high quality as a landline telephone call.

Bluetooth music streaming is a lot higher audio quality and supports full surround sound.

Unfortunately it is what it is.

6
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Gotcha, looks like a powered bluetooth receiver->aux cable is the best way to go.

1
BadMofoWallet•

Bluetooth audio streaming is a different codec from voice call streaming. Bluetooth is woefully inadequate but it's been industry standard for so long now, that it's hard to move away from it. Wi-Fi direct is a better alternative but it'll be at least a couple of years before its more widely used.

2
jimbo392'16 Charger Scat Pack // '00 Turbo Miata•

Even if you could it would sound like crap. There are different bluetooth "profiles" for phone audio and music. If you somehow managed to rig your phone to put music out over the non-music profile that your head unit supports, it would likely be mono (non-stereo) and bad quality.

4
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Ah yeah, that makes sense. Explains why whenever a call starts up and it plays 1-2s of music over bluetooth it sounds like shit, while a normal bluetooth speaker sounds good.

Thanks!

1
earnedmystripes•

You're going about it all wrong. You have to smile and talk all sweet to it. Buy it a nice dinner. Then, if you're lucky, you may get the privilege of playing music.

2
HovskyOP2008 Volvo XC70•

Can't I just jam it in somewhere and hope it works?

2
raptorak•

Directions unclear: dick stuck in auxiliary in port

2
FuzzelFox'07 Lincoln Mark Zed, 95 Town Car "Fat Mustang"•

From your flair I'm going to guess it's that 2008 Volvo so I'm going to say, no. Think of the year it was built (likely 2007). The iPhone just came out, with no headphone jack, the iPod Touch didn't exist and Android didn't either. No MP3 player had bluetooth and most other devices didn't either. The only thing that did were cellphones (flip phones, Blackberry if you were special) for those obnoxious little ear pieces.

It just wasn't a thing yet, even though it feels like 2008 wasn't that long ago.

2
Rogerss932017 IS300h F-Sport - 2017 Yaris Hybrid Hatch•

The iPhone just came out, with no headphone jack, the iPod Touch didn't exist

Neither of these statements are correct

0
Ren-Ren-Ren2014 Fusion Ti•

Do you happen to own a Model 3??? But seriously no you can’t play music.

1
grimreaperx2Lexus RX350 | Lexus GS350•

My RX is like that, bluetooth only for calls. However the easy factory finish solution is to add a bluetooth adapter like this one. While expensive, it integrates seamlessly into the existing radio, plug and play, without breaking any existing functionality.

1
IDontWantAPickle348hp RWD M/T•

My car is almost as stupid. It plays music via bluetooth but it has no method of skipping songs. My $10 shower speaker can at least skip songs.

1