Safe Landing on The Planet of Sound

After a few weeks and around 8,000km of travel the music system has proven itself to be worth the effort involved in the acquisition and installation of the system.

The key objectives were:

• Large range of music available
• Music to be clearly audible at touring speeds
• Music must not skip or be unduly disturbed by road conditions
• Seamless integration of Voice Navigation commands into the audio stream
• Ability to have music without the Garmin Zumo590 LM attached
• Use of the built-in BMW audio controls where possible
• Retention of speed sensitive adaptive volume control

These have all been achieved and the control of the system, whether the Zumo590 is in place or not, is simple and intuitive.

The only real gripe at this time is that each time the Grom USB3 unit is power-cycled it defaults to USB mode rather than remembering, and reactivating, the mode last in use.

My habit was to set everything up and then start the engine and depart which, somewhat annoyingly, resets the unit to USB mode rather than retaining AUX mode which is normally what I want in order to receive Voice Navigation commands from the Zumo590 and access my MP3 playlists on that unit if I desire music for the journey. This slightly stone-axe approach means any time the engine is switched off (to stop and take a photo, fuel up on a journey, etc.) a more complex start-up procedure has to occur after the engine is running in order to swap modes.

Basically this means cycling through the input options on the OBC via the “CD*” key on the fairing until the correct option is reached and then quickly pushing the “>” (next track) key on the handlebar to swap the mode from USB to AUX.

It would be vastly preferable to have the unit simply remember the last mode used and return to it.
This is something I will raise with Grom Audio and hopefully they can address this in a future firmware patch.

Beyond that one issue, Shadowchaser has music to go and I am a very happy silvergreytourer…

The Final Solution

As the light at the end of the tunnel was slowly dimming and my dreams of music as I traveled faded into the background noise I retreated to the modern, but somehow time-honoured, practice of WILFing.

Somehow in my poking around – I think I was still on the trail of 12v powered inline amplifiers to boost the signal from my Zumo590 to the BMW head unit AUX connection – I came across a picture of a small box that seemed to be connected between a Becker head unit (though mounted in a car) and an MP3 player. At this point I was no longer looking at the forums, blogs or webposts, but instead looking at images (via Google’s Image Search function) for “something” that looked like it might work. Bizarre; yes, but in this case ultimately successful…

Like an old-time astronomer slowly bringing a planet into focus I gradually zeroed in on the device I hoped may be the salvation of my dream.

With an almost audible click the unit snapped into focus – a device called a “media bridge”; something completely alien to me.

The first unit of this type I came across was a “Yatour” unit. This looked very promising except that it was out of stock, no longer manufactured and/or not available in Australia.

Strike one.

The next was an Audiovox unit. This was heavily biased towards iPhone/iPod utilising voice control and therefore of little use. It also didn’t seem to be available in Australia.

Strike two.

…morale starting to sink…

Next up was a company named “Grom”.

Initially I found their German site but that swiftly, and fortunately, lead to a site in English.

One of their products seemed to be exactly what I had been looking for all this time. The fact that they appear to be focused completely on cars mattered little as I had already established that the unit in Shadowchaser was the same as supplied in a number of BMW cars.

An Australian dealer, Cushie Audio, was located and the Media Bridge unit – BMW GROM USB3, a “Data Cable (BMW)” and an “Extension Port to Auxiliary Cable (3.5mm) with USB Charging Port” – were ordered.

The USB3 unit is far more sophisticated than the primitive, home-grown, solutions attempted in the early stages and it made me realise with chagrin just how far off the track so many people in search of the Planet of Sound had been…

This unit is not just a collection of wires linking various contacts together. It is an intelligent piece of hardware with upgradeable firmware that connects via the CD Changer socket on head unit and fools it into believing that a six stack CD unit is installed. It also does far more, as will be seen later.

By emulating a CD Changer the media bridge unit can deliver an audio stream from a number of sources to the head unit directly.

It natively supports any device that presents as a FAT-16/32 structure – a USB stick, for example, via a standard USB port. In addition there are two female DIN 5 connections to enable a range of other devices such as a Bluetooth transmitter/receiver dongle and, simultaneously, an external source such as an XM receiver, GPS device, Radar detector, etc. to be connected via a DIN 5 to 3.5mm mini-phono cable (optionally with a female USB socket for charging only) – all of which are available from your Grom Audio dealer.

The built-in USB connection on the unit (as distinct from the power only USB connection on the ancillary cable) enables up to six virtual CDs to be presented for operation via the handlebar mounted controls. The fact that the audio stream is presented through the CD Changer connection means that actions such as selecting the previous/next “CD”, track selection, volume control and the mute function are accomplished with the standard handlebar controls. In addition the speed sensitive volume steps are preserved (as the speed increases, so does the volume at preset levels).

The limitations of the BMW On Board Computer (OBC) also, sadly, act to constrain some of the operations.

When using a USB attached device, such as a USB stick, the OBC expects to see no more than six virtual CDs presumably as that is the size of the standard CD Changer, or “CD Stacker”, unit. These virtual CDs are, in reality, simply folders in the root directory of the USB stick.

So long as the first character of the folder is numeric then the OBC can display and navigate through the first six folders. Any folders subsequent to that, or not in the appropriate format, are ignored by the OBC. This does not mean they cannot be accessed, but the method to do that is an artefact of the integration of the head unit and media bridge and is not an intended, or particularly usable, feature.
The head unit in the BMW car installations is able to display significantly more information than Shadowchaser’s OBC which, due to the physical constraints of the display area, is limited to CDn TRnn.

Regardless of the OBC and display limitations, I had suddenly gone from nothing to having a plethora of options for music at my disposal – a famine to a feast without doubt – and this was only the “USB” mode on the Grom device…

Using a key press sequence on the BMW controls shifts the USB3 unit from “USB” mode into “AUX” mode (complete with an audible prompt identifying which mode has been selected). At this point the audio stream from an externally connected device, such as my Garmin Zumo590LM Sat Nav, is connected through to the BMW head unit.

In this mode there is no control over track selection via the handlebar controls, however the volume and mute functions still operate as do the fairing mounted controls to select AM/FM etc. from the head unit. Track selection, playlist selection and other such things are accomplished by the external device controls – in my case the touchscreen on the Zumo590.

All the cables supplied were well made and of appropriate length meaning the USB3 unit was easily mounted into Shadowchaser’s glove box. The unit blocks the CD load slot on the head unit, but that matters not one jot. The installation is neat and tidy and the addition of another USB charging point in the fairing is a handy bonus.

Not with a bang but a whimper

The initial joy at having (non-skipping) music whilst riding disappeared as Shadowchaser accelerated away with me down the street. The realization dawned as the music faded away that in order to enjoy said non-skipping music, travel would need to be undertaken at no more than 50km/h.

Even the sound of my cursing under my breath seemed to drown out the music.

The Zumo590 has a volume control and it was already at maximum. Likewise every other switch, knob or option on the BMW head unit was set to maximum.

But it was to no avail. The puny sound issuing forth from the speakers was washed away to nothing at anywhere above 50km/h.

<Bah>

More research revealed others encountering a similar issue, with the culprit appearing to be the expectation of the head unit that anything attached to the AUX connection would be already pre-amplified. There were vague hints at methods by which the pre-amp level of the AUX connection within the head unit could be changed. These varied from button press sequences to direct physical hardware operations inside the head unit itself. Even then the descriptions often appeared to be for units different that fitted to Shadowchaser.

A long exploration of inline amplifiers and similar things ensued. Conversations with auto electricians resulted in not moving the problem forward one iota. Discussions with BMW technicians ended with no advice other than to “buy the latest model R1200RT as it does all that stuff”.

It was a series of dead-ends one after the other.

At this point it appeared that the only viable option would be to go down the full Bluetooth route using the Zumo590 to supply music and voice navigation to a Sena 20S headset with either stereo speakers mounted in the helmet or the aforementioned Earmold earbuds.

In other words pretty much everything I had been trying to avoid.

Over many days increasingly unlikely avenues were explored and ultimately, for one reason or another, discarded.

It looked like the end of the dream was at hand.

It was Bluetooth and music in the helmet, or back to the stone age of riding without anything but wind noise for audio entertainment.

A Sonic Diversion

Having come to the view very early on in proceedings that the built-in CD player was less useful than a handlebar mounted ashtray it was obvious a modern audio source needed to be plumbed in to the newly accessed AUX port on the rear of the BMW head unit.

The cable fabricated for this purpose simply connected pins 8,9 & 4 to Red (R+), White (L+) & Shield (GND), respectively, from a 3.5 mini phono male plug.

Once in place, all that remained was to decide on the audio device.

The basic choices seemed to be:

• An Android mobile phone using the internal memory as storage, a media player application and a cable from the headphone socket
• A purpose built mini MP3 player of some description (think : iPod Nano etc.)
• A GPS system with built in storage and media player application

Ultimately it is very likely that the rider’s mobile phone will become the hub of this type of system. Much of it is already possible and more features are being added almost by the day. Being able to get off Shadowchaser and get into my BMW M3 and instantly have access to all the same functions in the same layout etc. via my smart phone is the way things are likely to progress.

At this point it is possible, but there are compromises that still have to be made and the integration is hardly seamless as things stand now.

That ruled out the Android this time around.

The mini MP3 player definitely appeared to meet the desire for music, but it seem a rather one dimensional option when compared to other offerings.

That left the GPS device in the lead.

After a considerable amount of research a Garmin Zumo 590LM was purchased along with sundry fittings to connect the supplied RAM mount to Shadowchaser’s handlebar mount.

The Zumo590 was fitted with no great difficulty to Shadowchaser and the native audio output (3.5mm mini-phono female socket) attached easily to the previously fabricated cable, thus connecting the Zumo590 through to the AUX connection on the BMW head unit.

So far, so good.

One of the desired outcomes was to have the chosen solution integrate closely with the existing BMW system leaving as much of the control as possible over the audio via the existing handlebar and fairing mounted controls. It was obvious from the start that total integration and control would not be possible, however the more that could be retained the better.

Having the Zumo590 as the music source meant that music selection would be done directly via the touch screen on the Zumo590. The upside to that arrangement was the option to load a large amount of MP3 files, create playlists etc. and control all of that via the Zumo590 directly whilst the volume and mute functions remained controlled from the handlebar switches. It was also expected that the speed sensitive volume level steps would operate on the AUX connection as they did on the other components of the head unit.

In addition the Zumo590 would be able to mute the MP3 audio when it needed to provide voice navigation commands – something that would not have been possible with separate GPS and MP3 units.

A further attraction of the Zumo590 was the ability of it to talk to my Android smart phone, or any other Bluetooth capable device that may be acquired in the future.

With all the physical connections completed and the Tupperware reinstalled Shadowchaser was ready for her maiden voyage in the new age of sound.

Journey to The Planet of Sound

I like to hear music at times when touring.

I don’t always like it; especially if I am hustling a fully laden Shadowchaser through twisty bends, on unfamiliar roads, up and down mountains. But on long boring Expressway/Freeway/Motorway runs a few tasty tunes can certainly help the miles roll by.

A lot of people have embraced the Bluetooth revolution and have linked various devices to speakers mounted in their helmets or via products from companies such as Earmold . This seems to provide anywhere from “reasonable” to “high fidelity” audio and has the benefit of seamlessly integrating music, GPS voice navigation, telephony, rider-pillion and/or rider-rider communications etc.

All well and good, but I like my music outside of my helmet rather than inside of it.

Shadowchaser came from the BMW factory in the last month of 2005 equipped with what was thought at the time by the folks in Munich to be the final word in quality sound on a motorcycle: a combined Radio, CD, Amplifier head unit and a set of fairing mounted speakers – all controlled from handlebar and fairing mounted buttons. Nice!

Of course a child of ten or under could have pointed out that the inclusion of a CD player was a quite stupid idea. Unless the owner of the bike rode it only on billiard table flat surfaces and refrained from anything more than the most gentle acceleration the CD player would happily skip across the tracks. Even on a smooth motorway the expansion joints would cause the CD to skip, as could the lane divider reflectors. It seemed even the thick line paint on motorways induced skipping when traversed…

“Nul points” as they say in Europe.

Suffice to say, my dreams of sailing along the back roads to the sound of my favourite tunes lasted about the length of my driveway; being banished completely as I gently rolled over my gutter and onto the street to the sound of a madly skipping CD.

Even beyond that; the unit supplied (a re-purposed BMW E36 car stereo unit made by Becker) only carries a single CD (roughly 60 minutes of music at a maximum – frequently less) and the idea of changing a CD whilst zipping along at cruising speed on a B road somewhere is about as stupid as having to stop every ~50 minutes, take the gloves off, open the jacket, find the CD wallet, eject the current CD, put it in the CD wallet, extract the new CD, insert it into the drive, do the jacket up, put the gloves back on and then (finally) recommence the journey. The picture becomes even more complex when wet weather makes an appearance on the ride.

Like a lot of early CD players the unit supplied by BMW is not clever enough to read data CDs with MP3 files loaded onto them <sigh>.

The fairing mounted controls revealed, via the On-Board Computer (OBC) display, a tantalising possibility…pressing the “CD*” key cycles through a number of modes: Radio, CD, Intercom, Aux…

Aux?

The “Audio System BMW Professional 2000” manual that comes with the bike covers this in fantastic depth:

"AUX     External device in operation"

In forty pages of manual, that pithy and uninformative one-liner is the only reference.

To a bear of little brain, such as myself, it seemed logical that an external audio signal device could indeed be to what “Aux” referred. Some poking around on the web hinted that indeed it might be the path to the Promised Land!

The external and internal fairing components were removed, the waterproof box that houses the head unit unmounted from the sub-frame and the container opened to examine the head unit itself. Two rectangular 10 pin connectors on the back were revealed. The documentation and images obtained from the web indicated that one of them was for connecting a CD Changer unit (why have one CD skip when you can have seven skipping?) and the other appeared to be the fabled AUX connector.

Diagrams showing the pin outs of the AUX port on the Becker unit were studied, cables were acquired and custom made terminals (modified PC fan power lead heads) were created.

For a test music source an old iPod, one of the ancient models with a real hard drive inside it, was obtained. For obvious reasons this type of unit would not form part of the final solution, however the older models do have the advantage of pushing out a reasonable level of signal compared to some of the later super-mini sized solid-state memory items.

The moment of truth arrived and sure enough, when the iPod was connected to the AUX port on the BMW head unit, the AUX setting selected and the play button on the iPod depressed the sound of music issued forth from the speakers.

Excellent!

This meant that stage two could now commence: the acquisition of a music supply unit…