DaGrandMastah

I can't seem to find an updated answer on this. I recently purchased a 2016 Q5 Premium Plus with Technology package so I have the Bang and Oluffsen system. I'm trying to figure out how to shuffle all my music while still being able to see the artwork and NOT resorting to creating playlists.

Now, I know the Jukebox provides for all of these things and an album art browser but it's limited to 18.5 gb's of space.

Bluetooth can do this but you won't see artwork and have to control all of your music via the phone instead of the mmi system.

SD Card, from what I understand and what i've experienced so far, will only shuffle mp3's within a directory/folder...not the subfolders. So if you have everything organized by artist/album/xxx.mp3 then you can't just shuffle by artist and have it shuffle between all the songs across all the albums. It does allow for the artwork to be viewable. The current work around is to create random playlists and using that as the "shuffle". I used the link below and that does seem to work but it would need to be updated every time I add/delete an album from the SD Card.

https://trick77.com/mmitunes-create-...mmi-rns-e-mac/

Has anyone had any luck with using an external hard drive connected via USB to MMI. Will that route allow me to see artwork and shuffle within subdirectories? Conversely, would an ipod allow for that same functionality (assuming I'm using the red grommet cable which allows for album art to be viewed in the MMI)?

Ultimately, I'm just looking for all the features of the Jukebox without having to actually use the jukebox.

ex-quattro PETE

From what I understand, any drive you connect via USB will behave exactly the same as an SDxx card, so it won't solve your problem. Maybe someone can confirm.

If you don't like creating/updating playlists, another option would be to maintain a second SDxx card (kept in the second SD slot) with all the same content but dumped into a single folder and use that for shuffle purposes. However, depending on the number of tracks you have in your library, you might bump against the max number of files per directory limit. I think officially it's 5000 files per dir, but I haven't actually tested it to verify.

Then again, having to maintain a second card may be more work than having to create playlists...

DaGrandMastah

I actually thought of the same thing but seems like it's just more work than it's worth. The program I linked to actually makes updating the playlists really easy...and creates individual ones for genre's so not too bad. Just seems like a weirdly obvious function to exclude from the MMI.

Thanks for the response.

riceboy22

I'm using a 750 GB USB drive hooked up through my AMI interface. I haven't tried the shuffle functionality before, but I'll give it a shot the next time I'm in the car. With all of the storage space available on a USB drive though, you could probably just duplicate files into a random play folder.

DaGrandMastah

Yeah if you can test it out and let me know that would be great. Just curious.

You bring up a good idea about just using the extra storage space. That is another option but the whole playlist thing isn't such a big deal on the SD card as long as we're using the MMItunes app that I linked to. It makes maintaining the playlist when you make changes to the folders so much easier.

Yoshimura

Maybe connecting a iPod touch would let you do what you want?

DaGrandMastah

Yeah that was the other thing I wanted to ask. I just looked at the original post and realize I didn't include it.

How about an ipod touch using the "red grommet cable"? (for those that aren't aware, according to multiple posts, Audi ships with a blue grommet MMI cable which does NOT allow for artwork to be viewed in the MMI screen....the new red grommet cable DOES allow for artwork) Would that allow someone to shuffle all tracks, see artwork and control everything through MMI?

asmi84

I dunnow - I usually just dump all music into a root folder - unless I need some files to be played in certain order (mostly audiobooks and some operas/performances) I just don't care if I hear song A before song B, or the other way around.

DaGrandMastah

Yeah in your case it really doesn't matter. Any of the inputs would work since you can easily shuffle an existing folder.

The problem is that I sometimes like to listen to individual albums and other times just a mix of everything I have on the card...different genres and stuff. I know I can do what I want with an SD card and individual playlists...just trying to understand all the other options.

The HDD connected through USB appears to be the same deal as the SD card...just waiting to hear back on how ipod would work in terms of shuffling and viewing folders via mmi.

riceboy22

I finally got back in the car today. The USB drive functions the same as an SD card, so you can only shuffle within a folder.