I have three questions concerning the 40 GB Hard Drive:
1. Is there a way to check the space available on the drive?
2. What format is a CD burned to the drive (example: MP3, WMA, FLAC, etc)?
3. Can a laptop be connected to the HDD via the USB enabling the laptop to recognize the drive?
Thanks,
Gary

Based on what i have read and loaded about 2000 mp3's i believe the answers are.....

1. No ( geeks will find some setup menu with it someday) ( about9.7GIG dedicated to music as the HDD drive is partitioned for map guide , gracenote etc ) that speeds up the access time but limits storage .

2. 128 rate mp3 we believe based on about 2700 songs someone loaded. ~9.7 GIG ( lots of threads on this issue)

3. no , device must be flash drive ( and not all types read OK) There is a tread on that in here - search it :)


I used a dvd-rw to load 2000 mp3's took about 45 min and a max of 1069 songs.( per the manual)

3. no , device must be flash drive ( and not all types read OK) There is a tread on that in here - search it :)


USB powered external USB HDD's such as the WD Passports are also supported.

I have three questions concerning the 40 GB Hard Drive:
1. Is there a way to check the space available on the drive?
2. What format is a CD burned to the drive (example: MP3, WMA, FLAC, etc)?
3. Can a laptop be connected to the HDD via the USB enabling the laptop to recognize the drive?
Thanks,
Gary

On the non-nav HDD system, press the HDD button on the radio control console and then press the "config" button, and if I recall correctly you will see the "% HDD used". % of what is still a mystery -- supposedly less than 10GB is available on the nav system, but not clear how much is available on the non-nav system (assuming a lot more since no map data is stored there).

Anyone tried to upgrade the hard drive yet? Where is it located in the car?
-Jason

i actually didnt use the harddrive to store musics at all yet-_-

The HDD is built into the radio unit itself.
So is the XM receiver (if you have XM)

I put a CD down on the HDD. Then I played my iPod and compared the two.
The iPod won.
So, I bought a Nano specifically for the Caddy and DLd about 6GB of music down.
Oh yeah, the reason the Ipod and Nano sound better is because I buy the 250Kb when I can and when I load my CDs into iTunes, I record at 250Lb.
I have tested this until hell froze over.
I CAN her a difference between 128 and 250.
I cannot hear a difference between Original CDs and 250. (Allman Bros, Chet Atkins, Jake Shimabukuro, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, etc)

I can't see the HD having any value for me.......

Yea, the only value the HDD has for me really is the pause and rewind of live radio, and also the few times I forget and leave my iPod docked at my PC (I have a few token albums on the HDD, but not the patience to transfer the rest).

I like these opinions. just got an iPod for my birthday and I now believe it is a better way to carry tunes in the car and elsewhere than the HDD.
plus it saves the trouble of erasing the car's drive at lease end.
looking at CTS website recently they have a disclaimer about the 40G leaving only 10G or so with nav. don't remember seeing that before.
rg

That has always been the case. 30 gig for the nav, 10 for the hdd. I use the hdd a lot becasue i don't have an ipod so for me it is great to store all my cd's on there. I realize there is a sound difference but I can live with that.

People complain about the sound quality produced when they burn their CDs to the HDD because of the default bitrate the car system uses. Why not burn them on your computer at whatever bitrate you prefer and then transfer them to the HDD? Wouldn't that provide the higher quality MP3 in the car that people desire?