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iPhone/iPod Poor Sound Quality

17K views 15 replies 8 participants last post by  Kev50027 
#1 ·
Hi I'm fairly new to this so i apologise in advance if there is already a topic on this.

I have a 2nd Gen mini cooper 2 with MINI Boost CD DAB Radio and i also got the official MINI iPod lightning cable (Y-cable). Just recently i have noticed that the sound quality is very poor coming from my iPhone. It seems too "bassy" and there is a very bad buzzing noise when certain tones are hit.

However when i use the AUX part with a 3.5mm cable the sound is perfect.

Has anyone else had this issue?

Any help would be much appreciated :)

Thanks
Mike
 
#2 ·
Hello Mike.

I bought a fJCW last Saturday and on the same day bought the £55 lightning Y-Cable which I am returning tomorrow for the exact same reason.

I also have the upgraded HIFI.

The reason the sound quality is SO SO poor is because when you connect the Y-Cable from the iPhone to the stereo iOS sets the iPhone volume VERY low.

This means you have to set the AUX volume (remember because its AUX, its not a digital sound quality) VERY high on the stereo which makes it very fuzzy and muffled.

You can not change the default iPhone volume when you connect the lightning cable.

Ideally you would have the iPhone volume set to HIGH so you can have the AUX volume low and clear (which you can do using 3.5mm to 3.5 AUX cable, iPhone to Stereo)

The way I have fixed this is to dump the Y Cable because its £55 at poop, have an Apple Lightning cable in the car purely for charging when I need to, and then have a 8GB (or whatever size you like) USB Thumb drive plugged in.

This means its tucked away neatly, and because its purely USB its digital signal and perfect quality. You can also have multiple folders on the USB that act like playlists etc.
 
#6 · (Edited)
The reason the sound quality is SO SO poor is because when you connect the Y-Cable from the iPhone to the stereo iOS sets the iPhone volume VERY low.

You can not change the default iPhone volume when you connect the lightning cable.
I can confirm this as the issue. When using the y-cable it locks my phone to ~25% volume where using AUX I can set my phone to 90% and it sounds beautiful. I just spent the better part of an hour trying different eq's on the phone and dash settings and it sounds better but still not as good as AUX. It makes you wonder how the engineers who built this cable didn't notice this...

I wonder if there's a way to "fix" the default volume? My phone isn't jailbroken so I had to use a website that lists Cydia apps to see if they have anything. I didn't find any but if any of you have a jailbroken phone it might be worth a peek. The website I was using may not be a complete list.

If the default volume for connected devices is part of the OS I imagine a hack can correct it. If it's part of Mini Connected I doubt it can be fixed. I'm a programmer and have a few friends that write iOS apps so I'll speak with them and if I can figure something out I'll let you know!

[ update ]

I tried a 3rd party music player and it's also locked at 25% volume. I'd assume this means the default volume *is* controlled by iOS and a hack should be possible. I'm meeting with a friend who specializes in iOS development on Wednesday to discuss this, and as soon as a jailbreak exists for 8.1.2 I'll give it a shot.
 
#3 ·
Thanks for your info.

I see your point with the direct USB However it doesn't really solve the problem as the idea of using the iPhone is that it gets regularly synced with my computer rather than having to do it manually.

Thanks again
 
#4 ·
There is no 'fix' if you want to plug in your iPhone. The sound quality with a Y-Cable to lightning is terrible.

The other way around is to get an older iPod and use the 30 pin Y-Cable. My friend uses that and he says its doesn't have bad sound.

The only other way around it is an aftermarket head unit that has better bluetooth connectivity
 
#5 ·
The other issue you've got to realise is that if you want this Y Cable to work (which it won't) is that ever time you get into your car, you have to take your phone out of your pocket, plug it in to the cable, rest the phone connected to this cable somewhere (passenger seat) or stuffed in the cup holder, then select the audio device on the stereo.

All which you'll get tired of pretty quickly if you're just popping to the shop
 
#7 · (Edited)
Fixed it!!! No hacks required :cool:

So apparently there's TWO base volume controls? If you push the Musical Note button (bass, treble, balance etc) at the very end there's a line volume that I used when connecting via AUX. While using the Lightning cable this setting does absolutely nothing.

While your phone is connected click on LEV on the dash. Mine was set to 6, dialing it back to 1 made all the distortion go away! It looks like the dash is amping the signal and that's what causes the distortion. Oddly enough the volume bar on my phone is now completely grey, where before it was blue up to around 25% and grey for the remainder. A track I have with a lot of bass that was completely unplayable before now sounds perfect!

I'm using an iPhone 6 (8.1.2) with the OEM lightning y-cable connected to my 2009 Mini Cooper S.
 

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#9 · (Edited)
I don't have a Google account so I can't upload a YouTube video.

What's weird is while I'm connected via lightning the line volume under the Musical note button doesn't do anything when I dial it from 1 -> 6. The volume and distortion stay the same if it's at 1 or if it's at 6.

Last night I paired my phone to my car (BlueTooth) so I was messing around with dash settings. I never tried LEV before assuming it was just a mapping to the same setting. Apparently it's not, if you push it mine was defaulted at 6. Dialing it back to 1 made all the distortion disappear (and the volume decrease), dialing it back up to 6 makes it progressively worse until it's unplayable (and really loud).

With it set to 1, I have my phone set to the Dance EQ and every track I have, no matter how much bass it has plays as beautifully as it does with AUX. I have the bass and treble both set to 4 or 5 on the dash.

I'll take a video with my phone so you can hear the difference at 1 and 6 and see if I can host it somewhere.

[ update ]

When my phone is connected and playing music, if I go to the Camera app and select Video it fades the music out. I signed up for a Vimeo account but I'll need to borrow someones phone to record a video of the changes in action. I'll try to get one up in the next few days.
 
#10 ·
Hey Spjonez!

Ive been trying to get this setup you are explaining to work for weeks now, I have the OEM Y lightning cable.

few questions if you have a second:

Can you control the change the song on the wheel?
right now when i plug in Iphone6, i can only choose Aux and when i select USB it says USB error.
Boost radio without Mini connected?
same car. scratching my head,
 
#11 ·
Can you control the change the song on the wheel?
right now when i plug in Iphone6, i can only choose Aux and when i select USB it says USB error.
Boost radio without Mini connected?
same car. scratching my head,
I have the same setup, iPhone 6 with OEM Y-cable. I have the option to select 'iPod' via the Mode 'dial'. I can skip songs via the steering wheel. Also have Boost Radio without MINI connected. Do have Bluetooth carkit, don't think it matters.

The power to the iPhone from the USB/Aux ports is really low, so it doesn't charge quick, or sometimes not at all. And I get the this cable is not supported message...
 
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