USB radio and wonderful 250 gig HD plays 1 song=ouchie

gumbyandpokie999 · June 14, 2007, 02:43:53 PM

I have a Kenwood DDX-8019 ,ok I went a tad crazy with the headunit...Anyway I tried and put my Western Digital MYBOOK 250 gig on this via the USB dongle and it reads 1 song from RECYCLED.WHAT?!Why? Anyways I tried it both on the IPOD dongle and the USB dongle and all it does is that.1 song where I downloaded a song on accident.It plays that one!They all came from same place(the mp3s) but this one is RECYCLED.
Any ideas on making the radio "recognize" the songs on the hard drive.Its Formatted in FAT32 and falls within Kenwood's specs to work.

PS I tried my Phatnoise music keg and it doesnt work via its USB cradle either!odd huh?Thats only 60 gigs.It was working with its original interface cradle though so its not the Music Keg HD....

USB radio worthless?

judb · June 14, 2007, 04:40:15 PM

I believe that there was some software you are supposed to use to set up the drive to have the head unit play stuff off it correctly.. kinda like mCD for buring CD discs with audio on it, only for a drive.

Also the USB cradle for the DMS is not supposed to be connected to the head unit, only to a PC.

gumbyandpokie999 · June 14, 2007, 09:23:28 PM

Quote from: judb on June 14, 2007, 04:40:15 PM
I believe that there was some software you are supposed to use to set up the drive to have the head unit play stuff off it correctly.. kinda like mCD for buring CD discs with audio on it, only for a drive.

Also the USB cradle for the DMS is not supposed to be connected to the head unit, only to a PC.

The guy from Kenwood says you need a program called swissknife,only problem i dont know what to do with it,the file system is already FAT32,so i dunno

judb · June 15, 2007, 12:56:21 AM

im talking about how the music is organized.. swissknife is a formatting utility which we don't really care about much. Although how big is the partition and how did you format it?

gumbyandpokie999 · June 15, 2007, 03:40:37 AM

Quote from: judb on June 15, 2007, 12:56:21 AM
im talking about how the music is organized.. swissknife is a formatting utility which we don't really care about much. Although how big is the partition and how did you format it?

Its default set to 1 full partition.It does read one file in a RECYCLED folder it has a number on it ,the file was supposed to be DELETED but it shows up on the radio ,if I search for the file,it doesnt find it in windows even when showing hidden files.I numbered my folders,still dont work.Tried taking all files off except mp3s,that didnt work,tried throwing seagate USB drivers on,didnt work.Any ideas???Kenwood says it will play if it was a seagate,I lost lots of files on a new seagate so I dont wanna go there...Anyone any ideas?

markbowen · June 15, 2007, 09:23:14 AM

How are you getting power to the hard drive? The MyBook 250 is a desktop drive, and requires its own power source. No way will it work with just a USB connection. When you contacted Kenwood support, did you tell them you were trying to use a 250GB desktop drive?

Officially, the Kenwood USB interfaces support mainly flash memory drives, as well as iPods and some other HDD players. Some people have gotten them to work with notebook drives, almost always having to use an external power source. I have never heard of anyone getting a desktop drive to work. You might try with a flash drive to be sure the interface is working, and work your way up.

Worth reading: http://www.kenwood.co.jp/usb/english.html

gumbyandpokie999 · June 15, 2007, 03:19:31 PM

The drive runs off 12 volts ,which was nice,i simply made a wire and attached it to my car's 12 volt source.I just dont get why it reads only 1 song in a recycled folder I cant even see in windows....The Mp3 has a number,so I figured if I numbered the folders,that it might work,but nada,it still likes the one deleted song.I think theres something they are not tellin me like there needs to be a special file on the drive to make it work or smething.I cant possibly be the only guy thats tried this cause the kenwood rep told me a seagate drive worked somehow using that swissknife program.I am clueless.Maybe it needs multiple partitions of a certain size?

markbowen · June 15, 2007, 08:57:08 PM

How did you format the drive? Are you sure it's FAT32? If you formatted in XP, it will only do NTFS. Even if it is FAT32, give the Swissknife program a try. Just do a full format from scratch. Are you also using Kenwood's supplied USB cable? At the link I provided before it says devices may not work properly if you use another cable.

Again, you should test the USB functionality with a flash drive to be sure it is working in general. My guess is your drive is just too big for the interface to handle.

S80_UK · June 15, 2007, 10:03:24 PM

Quote from: gumbyandpokie999 on June 15, 2007, 03:19:31 PM
The drive runs off 12 volts ,which was nice,i simply made a wire and attached it to my car's 12 volt source.

Hi,

Just a friendly word of advice... Be careful... Your car is "nominally" 12 volts. However, cars have very inductive motors and solenoids for starting, for windows, for wipers, etc. Some of them can kick out some pretty nasty voltage spikes when the current through them starts or stops. I would be very careful about connecting your hard drive box directly to the car electrics - it's internal power supply will probably be OK up to 15 or 18 volts or so, but could get fried by some of the big spikes. When it does, it could take the internal drive with it as well. Automotive regulators are often rated to 40 volts or more for this reason. I'd hate for you to have an expensive accident just because it was connected when you started the engine one day.

Good luck,

Les.

SteveC · June 16, 2007, 02:57:26 AM

Have you tried just putting a couple songs on the drive, instead of hundreds/thousands? You may have reached the headunit's limit on how much it can handle. Remember, it has to scan the directory structure and build an in-memory index of the folder layout. Chances are the memory capacity in the headunit is getting maxed out.

Also, there may be a files per directory limit that you have exceeded. I _thought_ that the limit was 99, but I could easily be wrong. Should say in the headunit manual. Remember, a directory counts as a file for this, so 90 files and 90 directories in one folder may look like 180 files while it's scanning things.

gumbyandpokie999 · June 17, 2007, 03:12:13 PM

250 folders,250 directories.It'll never work !Man limitations suck!!

acem77 · June 29, 2007, 05:44:49 PM

delete more files then you will have more files to play.?

LloydDobler · July 23, 2007, 07:11:32 AM

If it works like all the other Kenwood Keg and USB functions, the head unit won't read the USB device folder structure automatically. It only does that on CD's. For USB drives it needs a DB file that is created on there by software. On the new units the software is Kenwood Music Editor, and it should have come with your head unit.

SteveC · August 09, 2007, 02:10:41 AM

Quote from: LloydDobler on July 23, 2007, 07:11:32 AM
If it works like all the other Kenwood Keg and USB functions, the head unit won't read the USB device folder structure automatically. It only does that on CD's. For USB drives it needs a DB file that is created on there by software. On the new units the software is Kenwood Music Editor, and it should have come with your head unit.

I haven't found this to be true on my Kenwood USB aware headunits. They read my USB drives with no trouble at all, without running things through the Music Editor.

gumbyandpokie999 · September 14, 2007, 12:35:13 AM

Ok what drive are you using ? I am trying for bigger than 100 gigs....
I have had the Freeagent 500 gig formatted to FAT32 using that swissknife program work so far with a few songs,but I cant add ALL my songs for some reason....Limitation?

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USB radio and wonderful 250 gig HD plays 1 song=ouchie