I'm looking for an alternative to sat radio. I used to have it until sirius merged with xm and deleted the stations I liked.

So what I'm am thinking about is using an Iphone and running Pandora or similar and connecting to an aftermarket deck. Is this possible?

 

yeah why not, as long as the deck has an aux input.

 

yes, I use my iphone to play videos off of youtube, pandora, iheartradio, etc.. it outputs the sound via dock and the headphone port

 

What kind of dock is this? Is the sound high quality this way?

 

best bet find something that takes the data cable dock not head phone out.

pioneer and alpine support ipod hookup and play your music not sure if they will stream but i think on iphone you might be able to but either way you always have headphone for aux but quality is not as good as data cable

 

the iphone / ipod touch (read touch, not regular ipod) are very peculiar (spelling??)

i have an aftermarket kenwood unit with the ipod interface. i also have a cable that goes from rca inputs (red yellow white) to the ipod dock connector.. my setup is complicated but i'll explain it basic..

if you have any adapter that uses the dock connector to output sound.. (fm modulator, aftermarket interface, etc etc), you can just use the iphone/ipod touch normally and go to iheartradio, pandora, youtube, etc and it will stop palying from the ipod feature and play from whatever the sound is coming from. you can even send yourself mp3's through the mail and play it from your email..also, you can hold the home button (the black one with white square) for about 6 seconds and it'll "force quit" the ipod feature. this is useful when the interface locks and you get the "accessory connected" screen,a nd cannot pick the songs through the iphone/ipod. it'll let you use it like normal but you'll lose the ability to control it through the headunit..

i hope that makes any sense... i have a hard time putting my thoughts into words, any questions just ask and i'll reply.. i'm very, very, very, knowledable on this kind of matter.. i have spend hours and hours researching every combination

 

I want to avoid the fm modulator due to the sound quality issues. I know lots of decks have the capability for a iphone to plug straight into it, but I had heard that only works with the ipod part of it, and when you opened other applications like pandora the sound doesnt work?

 

no, it will work. your iphone has no way of knowing whether a pair of headphones are plugged in or an auxiliary input cable.. there's no difference..

 

Im looking at decks, from what it looks like they typically plug in an iphone via usb. What's the difference between that and aux?

 

auxilliary input is the 3.5mm "headphone" jack... the dock connector is the usb one..

dock connector sound will be better and can also provide charging, but is ipod/iphone specific..

the aux input only outputs sound but can be used with anything (i.e other mp3 players/phones)

 

I guess the main thing I'm getting at, if I plug in an iphone via usb to a deck, can you just start pandora and work?

 

yes, it should

 

Thanks for your insight so far, but could you or anyone else confirm this? I actually havent bought any of this yet, I wanted to make sure it would work before I do. The only reason I am wondering is because I had heard that usb works with the iphone playing itunes stuff, but when it comes to the other programs such as pandora it wont work. So just looking for confirmation before I start buying a iphone and deck.

 

i'll take a video later on if i have time showing how the iphone works with the dock connector and other apps such as pandora, youtube, etc.

i understand you wanting someone else to confirm, i take no offense and i would do the same..

last thing i will add before a video is that the iphone outputs any sound through the dock connector.

 

I use Pandora all the time in the car with the DLO TransDock. It's an iPod FM broadcaster that has an aux in (which I use for the iPhone). It doesn't charge the iPhone, but that's why I have an external battery.

Motorola has a bluetooth adapter with a built in FM transmitter that supposedly works very well. The iPhone currently doesn't support A2DP (stereo bluetooth), so it doesn't work right now, but the 3.0 update will make it compatible. A dash mount, a plugin charger and the Bluetooth FM transmitter should make for a servicable setup with a stock radio.

 

I wanted to avoid fm transmitters due to quality. Why use it if you can just plug in w/usb and turn on Pandora?

 

You can also get prerecorded XM on your iPhone.

 

I haven't upgraded from the stock head unit yet, so I'm stuck with the FM transmitter. Most of them suck, but the TransDock is pretty good. No hissing, static, or interference. One of these days I'll upgrade, but for now this works fine.

To you point though, if you do upgrade your head unit it should play Pandora, or anything really, from your iPhone.

 

I actually talked to a buddy of mine about this the other day. His knowledge of electrical systems far surpasses anything I have ever seen.

I want a single-DIN headunit w/ CD capabailities that also play Pandora. If you think about it, the only true need for this is a 3g signal and a contract with a service provider.

Cell phone capabailities could be built in to a head unit so that it can transmit and receive data just as a normal cell phone would...but only data.

You could then connect to Pandora and select from any number of your presaved stations to listen to with the scroll of a wheel.

FM/AM would still be functional.

It would be best if you could create new stations on your computer that automatically list when you start Pandora in your car...


I honestly do not know how feesible this is and it would almost assuredly have to be a 4G product, instead of a 3G like I previously mentioned.

It could work, but the R&D behind it seems like a lot...which we know Pandora won't do because it is free...


But just think. You could only buy this headunit at a wireless service provider which would then have a contract with a local installer to do included install on the car... I would be first in line for that... screw iPhone..

I want Pandorauto!!!

 

I put my music on my phone and bought a jabra 700 blurtooth speaker kit. It pairs with the fm radio and my phone plays the music out of the car stereo. Pretty sweet and simple. Nothing to install, just turn the radio to the station the unit tells you to. In my car it is 88.1 fm.

The Blackberry Storm can get pandora and Rhapsody, you could play them thru the existing stereo if you want.