USB Drives with AMI
Thread Starter
AudiWorld Member
Joined: Mar 2012
Posts: 396
Likes: 31
From: Northern Illinois
USB Drives with AMI
I bought a AMI-USB interface cable for $14 on Amazon. Not bad considering ECS wants $75. I plugged in a 32gig USB2 thumb drive and the music plays and sounds great. Plugged in a 500gig USB3 drive with 80gig of music on it and the MMI says it does not recognize the device. Is the drive too large or is the MMI not compatible with USB3?
Thread Starter
AudiWorld Member
Joined: Mar 2012
Posts: 396
Likes: 31
From: Northern Illinois
That probably eliminates a USB hard drive and puts me back to using a USB flash drive. They top out at 64gig. Too bad, I was hoping to put up to 100gig of music onboard. I guess I can split genres between the SD cards and the usb drive.
Thanks for the info.
Thanks for the info.
Thread Starter
AudiWorld Member
Joined: Mar 2012
Posts: 396
Likes: 31
From: Northern Illinois
I did some more experimenting. The MMI manual says there is a file limit of 4000, so I deleted all but about 20 files. No dice. Also reformatted from NTFS to exFat. No change.
I question whether power consumption is the problem since the portable USB3 drive is backward compatible to USB2 @ 500ma, which the MMI supports. Unfortunately, I don't have a USB3 flash drive to experiment with or I could confirm whether the problem is USB3 or power draw.
I question whether power consumption is the problem since the portable USB3 drive is backward compatible to USB2 @ 500ma, which the MMI supports. Unfortunately, I don't have a USB3 flash drive to experiment with or I could confirm whether the problem is USB3 or power draw.
Trending Topics
Audiworld Junior Member
Joined: Apr 2012
Posts: 56
Likes: 0
From: Warrenton, VA
From just reading the few posts above, I'd say that the power requirement is probably what's at the root of the issue.
A pricey option *might* be an SSD drive mounted in a portable enclosure. I like the acomdata branded enclosures (available at amazon) for laptop-sized drives (2.5"). The SSD drive will require less power over the USB cable, and may work. Best idea would be try to find a friend to try his/hers SSD drive before you spend decent $$ on a new SSD just for the car.
A pricey option *might* be an SSD drive mounted in a portable enclosure. I like the acomdata branded enclosures (available at amazon) for laptop-sized drives (2.5"). The SSD drive will require less power over the USB cable, and may work. Best idea would be try to find a friend to try his/hers SSD drive before you spend decent $$ on a new SSD just for the car.
AudiWorld Stories
Bringing Audi to Life for Audi Fans
Top 10 Most Expensive Audis Ever Sold on Bring-A-Trailer
Brett Foote
10 Audi Features & Options We Miss the Most!
Joe Kucinski
Audi Recreates Crazy-Looking Speed Record Breaker From 1935
Verdad Gallardo
Coachbuilder Recreates the 1995 Audi TTS Concept
Verdad Gallardo
Every Audi V10 Car Ranked!
Joe Kucinski
9 Audi Designs That Aged Like Fine Wine
Verdad Gallardo
2026 Audi Q5 Buyer's Guide (Every Model Explained)
Brett Foote
Ranking Every Current Audi 'S' Model From Worst to First!
Joe Kucinski
10 Best Audis That are FINALLY LEGAL to Import to the U.S.!
Joe Kucinski
AudiWorld Senior Member
Joined: Jan 2012
Posts: 623
Likes: 0
From: Detroit Metro Area
It might also be that the drive + enclosure isn't a pure USB mass storage device, but instead some sort of combo device due to the enclosure which causes the MMI to not support it.