IS 250SE-L ML no CD track list👺

[PeteTP]

Gentle fold of the LOC,

 

Please can you solve a mystery for me? Since the day I got this fab car 13 years ago the wonderful ML system has refused show any track list on any CD I’ve played. Anybody offer any remedy?

Why now after all this time, I hear you cry?! Well, I finally time on my hands to address such issues hitherto overlooked.

🤞for some wisdom. TVM.

PeteTP

[PeteTP]

Fold? Duh....sorry...meant folk.

[Mincey]

I'm not sure mine ever did either. For the last five or six years of ownership I generally listened to the radio all the time though. Some more learned members here may be able to shed some light on the matter however.

[scudney]

Are they copied cd's or originals

[PeteTP]

Thanks Mincey...so I’m not alone.

No Scudney they are 100% legit originals. Weird, eh?!

PeteTP

[Mincey]

To be honest, I think I was always a little disappointed with the ML system's lack of technological advancement. The sound was great, but there was no indication of which radio show was playing or (as I'm getting surer by the minute now) any display of artist or track name on the CD player. The DVD player played about two movies during my time with the car. It was U2 Under A Blood Red Sky on both occasions when showing my new toy off to friends. My wife went through a Ford, a Peugeot, two more Fords and then a Hyundai in the time I had my IS250 and their ICE was always a little cleverer than mine. Annoyingly so. My IS300h lacks some of the cleverness which her Hyundai has which grieves me no end. There's no need to hold the wiper lever up for ten seconds then let it go down for another ten, then run round the car in an anticlockwise direction at precisely 5mph for six minutes without drawing breath to change the number of flashes which the indicators make. No, there's an option in the Hyundai system menu to choose 3, 5 or 7 flashes....

[PeteTP]

TVM Mincey,

It seems I’m not going mad. However, it begs the question, why have a system that plainly doesn’t work? Is it realistic to think that such a fundamental flaw could have snuck past Lexus QA dept?

Im too much of a novice at this stuff to know where to go with this other than appeal to the membership once again for some wisdom. Or perhaps you have a better idea?

PeteTP

[Mincey]

I've found a manual. It looks like no info "(NO DATA)" is displayed for CD music, but it works for mp3 music. It's from page 206 onwards. 

IS250_nav_manual_OM53A02U.pdf

[Mincey]

But then I found this: 

The music isn't really my cup of tea at all, but it is displaying what it is on the screen. I think I shall withdraw gracefully now, due to an overload of ignorance on the subject!

[PeteTP]

Mincey,

Youve found out more than me. I’m overtasked today but intend to put this poser at the top of tomorrow’s To Do List.

Still seems daft to me that we can’t see the track info for music especially as to me it’s more relevant than a video CD. 
 

We’ll get this sorted sooner or later🤞.

PeteTP

[Cotswold Pete]

The video clip shows the unit playing a CD but with MP3 files, rather than the Red Book standards of a normal CD (as written by Sony/Philips back in 1980s).

I would not expect any system to be able to read an index file for a Red Book CD, as there appears (as far as I can tell) to be no standard for file naming conventions on a normal audio CD.  You can witness the randomness of file names by downloading off the BBC Classical Magazine web site their weekly free tracks (they are more random in nature than Trump trying to spell Mississippi, or even say it)

The only way you get any info is where the CD has embedded CD-TEXT which sits in a sub-channel the the original CDDA standards,this came long in 1996, and it was a few years later that we saw HIFI CD players that would display this text.  I have a Sony home player that can read the text, but cannot display a Index of what is on the CD.

So MP3 encoded CDs are actually data CDs with files that conform the standards that computer file systems need to read, and computers must build indexes from these records (otherwise searching for files would take way too long), so just like when you use Windows Explorer on PC, the Lexus is using (my own term), MP3 explorer to give you heads up of all the music you can play.

So in summary I suspect the Lexus chaps just did not bother trying to read the CD-TEXT headers if they exist, and given that most CDs even today do not hold CD-TEXT they never saw it as a worry, especially as MP3 was starting to  take over in the mid 2000s.

If anyone thinks I am talking roobarb, please do correct me, as it is well over 15 years since I bothered properly getting my head around why my different players in different cars, and even the many different computers and HiFi CD players I have at home all did different things.

Nowadays I just plug my phone into the cassette adaptor in my LS then focus on driving rather than wondering if I listening to the edit version of Geek Love by Bang Bang machine, or the full blown remix by Ray Shulman (Spangle Mix).  With over 4000 tracks on my phone I sure as heck cannot remember them all.

 

[PeteTP]

Well Pete,

I could say that I knew that all along and it was sooooo obvious I reckoned it wasn’t even vaguely worth bothering to mention. Or, on the other hand, I could say whao what a first class insight into something that is way beyond me.

You are definitely the winner (unless of course somebody thinks they know more) of this challenge and I award you an imaginary LOC Gold Star complete with Certificate. You are now indestructible for 24hrs and should have a coffee and maybe a Twix or a bit of fruit’n’nut to celebrate. 👏🏻All around, whistles, trumpets and 🍾🎉

Nice one, TVM for enlightening those of us found it a total mystery.

PeteTP

[Mincey]

3 hours ago, Cotswold Pete said:

The video clip shows the unit playing a CD but with MP3 files, rather than the Red Book standards of a normal CD (as written by Sony/Philips back in 1980s).

I would not expect any system to be able to read an index file for a Red Book CD, as there appears (as far as I can tell) to be no standard for file naming conventions on a normal audio CD.  You can witness the randomness of file names by downloading off the BBC Classical Magazine web site their weekly free tracks (they are more random in nature than Trump trying to spell Mississippi, or even say it)

The only way you get any info is where the CD has embedded CD-TEXT which sits in a sub-channel the the original CDDA standards,this came long in 1996, and it was a few years later that we saw HIFI CD players that would display this text.  I have a Sony home player that can read the text, but cannot display a Index of what is on the CD.

So MP3 encoded CDs are actually data CDs with files that conform the standards that computer file systems need to read, and computers must build indexes from these records (otherwise searching for files would take way too long), so just like when you use Windows Explorer on PC, the Lexus is using (my own term), MP3 explorer to give you heads up of all the music you can play.

So in summary I suspect the Lexus chaps just did not bother trying to read the CD-TEXT headers if they exist, and given that most CDs even today do not hold CD-TEXT they never saw it as a worry, especially as MP3 was starting to  take over in the mid 2000s.

If anyone thinks I am talking roobarb, please do correct me, as it is well over 15 years since I bothered properly getting my head around why my different players in different cars, and even the many different computers and HiFi CD players I have at home all did different things.

Nowadays I just plug my phone into the cassette adaptor in my LS then focus on driving rather than wondering if I listening to the edit version of Geek Love by Bang Bang machine, or the full blown remix by Ray Shulman (Spangle Mix).  With over 4000 tracks on my phone I sure as heck cannot remember them all.

 

You Sir, have won the day. The month in fact.

[Cotswold Pete]

16 hours ago, PeteTP said:

 should have a coffee and maybe a Twix or a bit of fruit’n’nut to celebrate.

Just had a nice cup of tea with Dark Choc Digestive, so that'll do me.

Also forgot last night to say that coz MP3 files have Tags, the MP3 player software in the LS, or any other device reads Tags not the file names.

If however you do want on your Android Device a Music Player that allows you to sort by various Tags or the File name the Neutron Player is well worth paying for.

I'll be putting my LOC Gold Award next to my office picture frame - see attachment. This is a p*ss take of my managers, but none of them actually get that it is aimed at them!!!!

[MartinH]

Permit me to throw in a supplementary question. We are told that the CD player reads the tags on MP3 files stored on a CD, display them on screen, and play back the content. Good! However, why does it not recognize MP3 files stored on a DVD? 

There was a thread here several years ago describing a hack that would somehow spoof the CD player so it would read and play back MP3s burned to DVD , but it was long and geeky and I gave up. Does anyone know if there is a straightforward way? 

[PeteTP]

45 minutes ago, Cotswold Pete said:

Just had a nice cup of tea with Dark Choc Digestive, so that'll do me.

Also forgot last night to say that coz MP3 files have Tags, the MP3 player software in the LS, or any other device reads Tags not the file names.

If however you do want on your Android Device a Music Player that allows you to sort by various Tags or the File name the Neutron Player is well worth paying for.

I'll be putting my LOC Gold Award next to my office picture frame - see attachment. This is a p*ss take of my managers, but none of them actually get that it is aimed at them!!!!

Ab Fab 🤣😂👍

[Cotswold Pete]

3 hours ago, MartinH said:

Permit me to throw in a supplementary question. We are told that the CD player reads the tags on MP3 files stored on a CD, display them on screen, and play back the content. Good! However, why does it not recognize MP3 files stored on a DVD? 

There was a thread here several years ago describing a hack that would somehow spoof the CD player so it would read and play back MP3s burned to DVD , but it was long and geeky and I gave up. Does anyone know if there is a straightforward way? 

A CD laser uses 780nm light waves, a DVD uses 650nm lightwaves, so if the laser in the cars head unit only has CD style laser then it will never read a DVD of any sort.

Even if the head unit can read a DVD, it may not read all types of DVD - DVD Standards - Dont be stumped - this link tries to keep it simple, but it is a minefield.

As to spoof/hacks, perfectly do-able so long as laser can create a 650nm beam, but I can imagine doing that kind of stuff is not for the faint-hearted or even a part time geek.

Best to stick with looking at the road and guessing what track is playing.🥴

[PeteTP]

Pete you are a mine of info. Clearly this is your specialist area within your specialist knowledge of Lexus. 
 

You’re a top fella, some much so I think it only fair to extend your I destructibility for a further 24hrs. More tea and dark choc digestives👍. Result happiness.

 

PeteTP

[PeteTP]

I destructibility! Whoops...meant indestructibility. Must really improve my proof-reading 🤓

[markeyszoo]

Went to check mine and got these pics.

Disc is a CD not a DVD?

[Mr Vlad]

wow Mike your pics have really blown this thread apart. Ive started a thread on this subject and a reply suggested I read this thread. So details can show. Maybe it depends on the CD itself. 

[true blue]

Wow I to am impressed ;as an old timer I only play radio or CD on the system ,I have been playing CD s for the last 5 years and never seen a play list 

Dave

[Cotswold Pete]

On 7/11/2020 at 5:42 PM, Mr Vlad said:

 Maybe it depends on the CD itself. 

Tis true that not all CDs are equal.

I have a Sony home player that can read CD text, but I reckon less than 10% of the CDs I play have any Text Data.

You can create copies of your own CDs then edit any of the data (using Media Monkey), then burn a copy of the tweaked CD files and hey-presto text in the car or home.  Tis a bit of a pain to do as it just takes time.