The Ipod in your Car – Convenience Personified

From rock music to pop to classical, nothing beats the iPod in its functionality. A cute little gadget that has turned the music world on its head, the iPod is set to storm yet another bastion – your car audio. After all, it is natural for you to want to listen to music, as a music lover, anywhere and everywhere and that includes your car. This article is about how to hook on your iPod to your car audio, freeing you from those pesky earphones that bite into your ears if put on for too long, and add the thumping power of your car audio speakers to your music.

Using your iPod thus frees you from the shackles of conventional CDs and tapes since it allows you to download music in unlimited quantity from the internet. You can thus harness the explosive power of music software to enhance your listening experience. The free music software that comes bundled with the iPod would already allow you access to the plethora of songs/music on your PC, and get a fresh lot when you get bored with the old ones.

So how do we go about setting up our little project? Let us explore the various possible situations and their suggested solutions.

Some of you may be lucky and only need to pull out a cable to attach to the audio system – your car manufacturer may have been good to you and included iPod connectivity to your player. Go through the instruction booklet that came with the system. If you don’t find the cable in the glove compartment, chances are you may have been provided with a dashboard jack. The iPod is controlled through the car’s in-dash audio system, and even recharges while it plays! Alternatively, you may use the auxiliary input jack to hook on.

Most new cars already have inbuilt iPod compatibility, but it is well worth checking out while looking at the features of your impending purchase.

Already own a car but don’t have the connectivity? iPod enabled audio systems are commonly available, and all you need to do is venture out and get a new one installed.

Now let us look at the options available for those of us who have already invested their surplus cash in the iPod and cannot afford to buy a new, compatible audio system. Make use of one of the several options enumerated here. Direct connection to a CD or a cassette player is sure to result in the best quality, while FM broadcasts, though much more popular, have their limitations as well.

Making a direct connection between the car audio and the iPod allows you to use the full functions of your iPod, and is the recommended solution. Some car connection kits use a simple cable to connect the iPod (either of the dock connector or the earphone out jack) to the auxiliary input jacks provided. Others may utilize the CD changer port found behind several car radios.
Coming to the car radios which include a cassette player, you need to invest in a cassette adapter. Typically, these adapters look like a tape with a cable attached, and work by transferring the audio output signal from the iPod to the read head of the cassette player. Switching to ‘Cassette’, and pressing play will allow the iPod music to play over your car speakers.

Despite its typical problems, it is the FM connectivity that is going places. Use an FM transmitter to transmit to your car radio, which further uses an unused FM frequency to do so. While it enjoys the advantage of being wireless and easily portable, there is a definite loss in music quality. Another problem is finding a free FM channel in a busy city environment, though none of these deters this solution from being the most popular one as of date.

So go ahead and reap the benefits of technology by using any of the methods outlined above. Spread the good word, and meanwhile, appreciate that melody when you go out on the next long drive!