On today's edition of the NPR program "Day to Day," I talk with host Noah Adams about my week-long test-drive with a new iPod-ified beemer -- and the future of digital music technology behind the wheel. BMW is revving up some vehicle models (including the 330Ci coupe I reviewed) with a new sound system integrated with the Apple iPod. What's new and cool about this: it's touted as the first-ever fully integrated iPod/car interface you can drive right off the dealer lot. Costs under $500 as an upgrade to price of the new car. Plenty of aftermarket systems are available to hook your iPod (or other digital music players) to your car stereo, but many of these use your FM radio or a cassette player to interface, reducing sound quality in the process. Here, the sound quality was super-sweet.
I loved the car, and I loved grooving out to my own digital tunes by way of the iPod. The abilty to select songs, playlists, and control volume from the steering wheel was great. But some aspects of the system seemed lacking. For instance -- the iPod sits inside the glove compartment, but just sort of bangs around loose inside there. No special case to protect it, and passengers in the car with me were always cramming keys or sunglasses in there. Damage seemed inevitable. Also, when I'm in iPod mode -- why can't I see what's playing? The stereo display shows you names of radio stations, even program and song details -- but you get nothing but playlist number and song number when you've selected the iPod mode. Other aftermarket products do display the names of songs when you're in iPod mode, and I was frustrated by the fact that this system didn't.
So, bottom line: super-fly car, and a fun first edition of a system that needs a few finishing touches to live up to feature demands of discriminating geeks.
Link to online archive for today's NPR "Day to Day" segment, "Future Mobile Sounds: A Beemer with an iPod."
Update: BoingBoing reader Becky says, "You note that there are lots of third-party items that let you use your iPod in the car, but in fact if it's a new car, in most cases you're SOL: cassette players (required for cassette-adapter iPod devices) are falling out of favor, and FM transmitter versions, in addition to not working well in big cities with lots of radio stations, fail if your windshield has UV coating that blocks the signal getting from iTrip or similar device to radio antenna outside.
I learned all this the hard way: my lime green Ion quad-coupe matches my iPod Mini, but alas, no device so far lets me use them together. Alpine's got one now, if you have their stereo system; just hoping others are on the way soon!"