i pod

[Sheilz]

I have just moved into the 21st century with Santa bringing me an ipod so that I can say goodbye to cds kicking about in the footwell of the car. Can anyone tell me what it is I need to connect it to Dougall's stereo? Does it involve more wires trailing around the centre console? Most days I have my sat nav plugged in. The long cable for that is enough of a cluttery nuisance so would like wires etc to be minimised.
Thanks

[Forbes]

I used to use a Belkin radio transmitter which was very good, involved no wires and you could tuck your Ipod away. Or does DOugall have a ipod connection?

[Delboy]

I'm pretty sure you'll have an auxiliary input socket at the base of the centre console (just above the storage tray in front of the gear stick - you need to really look for this!). If you get a jack to jack cable (same as the plug on your earphones) then you can connect your iPod by using this auxiliary socket and the headphone socket on your iPod. On the car stereo, select Aux input rather than CD or Radio and press play on your iPod (you will need to turn the volume up quite high on your iPod).

This is what I do to play my iPod in the car and it works great - no interference that you might get from FM transmitters, just a nice clean signal straight into your car stereo. I actually think you get a better sound from the iPod than from CDs in the car.

Hope this helps!

[ianking]

If your car is 2009 and has a chili pack then its most likely to have the USB connection next to the aux input. The USB came part of chili as of mid 2009 I think.

If it does then you need the lead from mini that has ipod connection at one end with the usb and 3.5mm jack at the other. That way your ipod is charged up and you can control all the songs from the radio/steering wheel (if you have multi function buttons). All the names of albums and songs are displayed on the radio screen.
The lead is about £45-£50 I gthink.
I have it in my car as part of the factory bluetooth and its great.

[Stewart]

I have what Del describes, cable only cost a few pounds and was good quality, I used it for my Zen and it worked great only thing is if you were on a long journey I needed to plug in the car charge kit as well to keep Zen going.

It just plugs into the ear peace on the I-pod and eight inches later into the car. But you really have to look for it, get your head right down and look up. Its right in that space in front were the two cup holders are.


After I discovered the CD player in the Mini was an MP3 player I have not used the Cable, getting over 100 songs on a CD is enough. When we went on the TWR this year I just had about five CD with about six hundred MP3 tracks and even better you can read the tracks on the car display.

Mind you if I plug in the Zen and put it on Shuffle I’ve got every song in my collection and that’s about 3Gigs worth. But in truth I’m happy with the MP3 player that comes with the car.

If you were local I'd have dropped the cable off for you.

[N16SHP]

Yeah, i've also got the same as Del. I'd love to have proper control of my ipod, but i can't justify spending money for the sake of not having to reach down to change my ipod by hand. Although it is probably safer!

[Sheilz]

Thanks guys will try and digest the info. Anything technical and my brain goes all fuzzy and foggy.

[dellie]

I have one of the pioneer dvd headunits that has the ipod cable attached to it, i would be well and truely lost without it!!

Prior to this i had what Ben described and worked without any issue.

[ianking]

best thing to do first Sheilz is to check if your car has the USB socket. It would be next to the aux input 3.5mm jack and it has a wee slide cover over it.
If it does then you have the best way of hooking up the ipod.