I just acquired a very small USB drive, so I thought I'd load some MP3s on it and plug it in to my '16 LX. "Unplayable file" it says. Strange, no reason why it shouldn't play so I went in and simplified the folder structure, got rid of all album art and for good measure, reloaded the files on after formatting it in FAT32. Nothing. Why does it struggle to play simple MP3s? This port is already too weak to charge a phone, what's the point of it?

 

The file names need to be under a certain length. If the USB has been written over a lot, it may no longer be viable. Flash memory can fail over time especially with a lot of re-writes. Otherwise not all MP3's were fully readable by the stock system. Not sure why. You could try ripping your music to wav and see if it still reads.

It's been years since I've had the stock system. I don't miss it.

 

I don't have any problem playing MPEG Layer 3 Audio (.mp3) even if the file is about 1 hour long.

 

Do you have your files in folders?

 

Do you know the length of the file name?

 

It's been so long. All I remember is that if the name was too long, it would not even show up, so I had to shorten them down. I used MP3tag or something like that to shorten the name.

 

I believe that for Fat32 the max length is sum of path names + file name cannot exceed 255 characters. So something like "Music/Springsteen/dance.mp3" would be something like 25 characters which is not a problem. I'm having difficulty seeing that as your problem, even with path names 255 characters is a lot.

Take an empty flash drive and format it with FAT32. Put a single music mp3 file on it - nothing else - and see if that will play. Use a small flash drive say no more than 64 gig. Sometimes large flash drives create problems.

 

No. funny fitfreak won't allow me to just say No, message too short.

 

what's wrong with simply using the bluetooth feature on the stock radio?

 

Sometimes certain special characters in file names such as # or & and various others will prevent mp3s from playing properly on certain mp3 players. I think I've even had _ prevent a file from playing on a cheap mp3 player before. I haven't run into it on my Fit, but mine is an EX.

 

I use that all the time but sometimes I just want a quick source of music ready to go that won't disrupt my other Playlist.

 

I'm fairly clueless, and mine works fine with my thumb drive.

 

Nope. It powers my garmin dashcam 56. The one inside the console powers my rear garmin mini cam. Totally useful.

 

Reviving this thread. I've tried several different drives with several different file formats and none of them work. Is there any specific format that Honda calls for? I've found that this port charges my phone adequately but I would like to use it for music as well, as I believe it would get more use this way.

 

For me, I found that the smaller drives work better. 8GB worked but 16GB didn't work. Nevertheless sometimes my 8GB drive wouldn't work even if it had been working in the morning. Absolutely no regrets switching to an aftermarket headunit. The OEM one doesn't have much functionality anyway.

 

1. Make sure all of your mp3's are tagged the way that you want (including ID3v1 and v2.3), I use MP3Tag. Make sure they are all "MPEG Layer 3" mp3's and not "Layer 1" (which can still be called an mp3, but won't be playable in your car). Any album art I have is embedded in the mp3, and not a separate file. And check the volumes too (I use MP3Gain for that... pick a number and use "Track Gain" on all).
1.5. I personally put everything I want to listen to into one folder on my computer to keep it easy (currently at almost 18000 songs). I prefer to have my music in order of song title https://www.butterflyexpressdesign.com/mp3list.html , you may like yours sorted a different way.
2. I use MP3Tag to rename all the songs as "00001-song1.mp3", "00002-song2.mp3" etc....... To do this easily in MP3Tag, use the renaming template to add leading zero's to mp3's (ie. 00001-song1.mp3, 00002-song2.mp3, etc.). Select all, click Convert>Tag-Filename, template is (exclude quotes)..."$num(%_counter%,5)-%_filename%" . (In the template, '5' is number of decimal places, ie. '00001') .... On my computer, I don't have them named that way. That is strictly for the USB drive. If I want to remove the characters from in front of the filename, template is (exclude quotes)..."$cutLeft(%_filename%,6)" ('6' is the number of characters that you want to cut from the left of filename (so that will take care of the zero's and the dash).
3. Format your usb drive (mine is a 128gb drive) as exFat (NOT Fat32 or Fat16), copy over the folder containing your renamed mp3's to the drive. I use FreeFileSync, but you don't need anything that fancy...I'm sure good old Windows Explorer will do fine.
4. Download mp3DirSorterE Das Fun Blog » mp3DirSorter . Check "Sort files alphabetically" and UN-check "Sort folders alphabetically". Drag the folder from your USB stick that contains all the music, and drop it onto the program window. It will take a few minutes to sort everything out (especially if you have 18000 songs) , be patient.
5. Plug it into your car and enjoy.

This is how I do my stuff for my '15 LX. But this is not the only way to do it! So feel free to ignore everything I just wrote if you want to .

 

Thanks for the details.