Altho my new E39 is a 2003 M5, I believe this may be a generic E39 situation. My question is: is there any way to install a USB or Memory Card (e.g.: SanDisk) reader as another input for the supplied DSP music system in this car? Not being able to load/cycle CDs - or any other music source - from inside the passenger compartment (there is only the CD changer in the trunk) is somewhat inconvenient, since I listen to a wide range of tunes. I do not (yet) do Apple iPod or iPhone. Alternatively, is it possible to install a normal AM/FM/CD unit in, say the glove compartment or alongside the center console in order to accomplish the same thing, with, say, a switch to cycle between the two program sources; the supplied in-vehicle DSP and the new outboard unit?? My 1st post here in umpteen years; good to be back! Stephen, Santa Fe, NM
To answer you question you should look into DICE kit for you vehicle. I have one in both my E46 and E39 M5. They both have bluetooth so I can play music from my phone without hooking it up and it works with SIRI to read my text messages and sends them to. This also works with any bluetooth phone that supports Ad2p music playing over bluetooth. It also can do a direct hook up through a USB stick, ipod or a aux port. And this will all show on your navigation screen music artist and title and you can still use you steering wheel controls to change song. There are two down sides to this product one is you will have to removed your CD changer to make it work since it plugs into the cd changer harness. The other one is since you have DSP you will have to purchase another adapter do it works with that. I personally like them in both my cars.
OTOH, if you're a Cheapass© like me, there are other possible solutions. One is, if you don't mind shuffle playing, just load up your CD changer with an esoteric mix and hit the 'Random' button. It randomly selects from all six disks, not just one, so you'd have at least a few songs between the same artists. Unfortunately, it won't play MP3 files like my last one did. For about $5 on ebay, some nice Chinese folks will ship you an ugly little blob of a device that plugs into your lighter socket and plays from a phone/ipod/mp3 corded input, USB input, or from an SD card! It offers you a choice of FM amplitudes to choose to receive its signal on your radio. It's crude but - well - cheap. If you're not cable-averse, there are also those converters that plug into your music player and into your cassette player. I haven't used them in my E39, but I did for years in my Jeep. My daughter and her friends loved it because they could plug in any of their phones with tunes on them. I liked it because I could stream Pandora or my own onboard music and still have voiceover navigation.
If you want to ditch the cd changer, you can get a GROM audio interface. It has an iPod connection and supports USB sticks. It plugs in where the cd changer would. My 525 did not have the cd changer but the connection was there. All I had to do was load the USB stick with songs ( I used both MP3 and WMA) organized into 6 folders. The GROM unit recognizes each folder as a 'virtual disk' hence the 6 folder limitation.....no subfolders allowed AFAIK. I believe if you get the optional long cable, you can run the cable up to the console area and use it from there.
