Recommend unit for use with external hard drive.

[ronnieoverby]

Ideally I would like to put my music on a large external usb hard drive, maybe 300gb +.

Does anyone recommend a stereo for this? I have seen some that have the usb port in the front but I dont know if i can use a large drive.

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[Mike465 10+ year member]

I have a Pioneer 4000dvd in my girl friends car and I bought a 260GB HD and it would not take it. It will only take USB Sticks, so I got a 16GB stick and it works fine

 

[greynolds 10+ year member]

The Kenwood DDX-812 / DNX-8120 will read a Western Digital Passport 120GB drive. The UI seemed pretty sluggish though - not sure if that's because it was busy indexing the tagging data and would have gotten faster once it was done. With a loaded 8GB flash drive, the UI performance is fine. The USB ports are on the back, but mine are extended into my glove compartment (1 for the iPod interface, 1 for USB devices).

 

[Minburn 10+ year member]

Recently had a Pioneer USB adapter hooked up to a 800PRS HU. Has no issues working with a WD 160GB "My Passport" 2.5 in HDD (this unit has a 500 mA requirement) in a 2001 Civic. I'm be trying this out with a 700BT in the next few days to see if it will work well with that HU.

The adapter, well . . . . to a degree, issues with it's performance re: text display. But it's (to me) relatively decent speed performance for full CD listening, the benefit of large capacity, reasonably good quality lossy files . . . . . . I'll keep it.

 

[lvjeffro 10+ year member]

Alpine ida-x100 has a great hdd UI and accepts 160gb western digitals...I bought a maxtor 250gb and it wouldn't see it...I like mine...

 

[Kai Winters 10+ year member]

The Alpine ida-X001 will also accept a WD Passport 160gb hard drive.

 

[Lothar34 10+ year member]

I had a Kenwood KDC-X590 (in the for sale section now) and it would work with an external hard drive. It will only read FAT32 file system though, so you're limited to about 120GB.

The only issue is that it takes it about a minute to index the drive and load the voice prompts when you start up the car. The more files you have, the longer it takes. You get used to it after a while though.

 

[buggsson 10+ year member]

Alpine iDA-X200 will also take a HD and it is cheaper. You can also hook it up to the Imprint stuff I you will. There are certain factors about the drive that need to be taken into consideration for it to work, file format, mass storage class, how you organize the filest etc. I don't think the drives size per se is a problem, there is for all HUs I've checked so far, a maximum folder number and a maximum file number as well. I think I recall the X200 accepts something like 10 000 music files. I've checked Alpine X200 and clarion and Kenwood, and non needs a larger drive than 160 gig, because non can handle the amount of files contained on a larger drive.