Porsche made good on OTA promise last night...

[Mwa3aan]

My Apple Music icon (not CarPlay) changed from the old white one to the new iOS 14 red one overnight. It must be the smallest OTA ever delivered to a car

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[Pjjameso]

My Apple Music icon (not CarPlay) changed from the old white one to the new iOS 14 red one overnight. It must be the smallest OTA ever delivered to a car

Now if we can find a way to get rid of Sirius icon or at least move it to the end. Does anyone actually subscribe anymore considering we have Apple Music and internet music?

 

[Reg]

Now if we can find a way to get rid of Sirius icon or at least move it to the end. Does anyone actually subscribe anymore considering we have Apple Music and internet music?

I think it would be great if everyone would make that request.
I expect that Porsche gets $ for every icon that is still on a car as a reminder that you can always re-subscribe

I didn’t even take them up on the $2 for 3 months offer. LOL.

 

[Miwa]

Now if we can find a way to get rid of Sirius icon or at least move it to the end. Does anyone actually subscribe anymore considering we have Apple Music and internet music?

I certainly do. There's more than music, and I prefer to have someone else pick the songs. (And with legendary DJs on First Wave, I like the commentary too).

Lots easier to get VSIN via siriusxm than trying to stream from their website and hope it'll be an available show. Same with other sports stations.

 

[HelfFL]

I certainly do. There's more than music, and I prefer to have someone else pick the songs. (And with legendary DJs on First Wave, I like the commentary too).

Lots easier to get VSIN via siriusxm than trying to stream from their website and hope it'll be an available show. Same with other sports stations.

I do too. Big fan of SiriusXM. I use it way more than my Apple Music.

 

[Reg]

My Apple Music icon (not CarPlay) changed from the old white one to the new iOS 14 red one overnight. It must be the smallest OTA ever delivered to a car

I just checked this on my car. At first it was not there, then after a couple of minutes it changed to the red. I wonder if it was the phone itself pushing the icon into the system (if that makes sense). I did get a map upgrade the other day, but there was an announcement of that.

 

[Mwa3aan]

I just checked this on my car. At first it was not there, then after a couple of minutes it changed to the red. I wonder if it was the phone itself pushing the icon into the system (if that makes sense). I did get a map upgrade the other day, but there was an announcement of that.

Good question but I didn't have my iPhone with me. I had a Samsung Galaxy Fold 2 paired.

 

[Td78]

My Apple Music icon (not CarPlay) changed from the old white one to the new iOS 14 red one overnight. It must be the smallest OTA ever delivered to a car

I was just as excited, hoping the red icon = OTA update = the wireless CarPlay On my original order Sheet.

My PCM is still showing as version 3276, just like before... oh well. An early Christmas present OTA would still be nice.

 

[jimithing]

Now if we can find a way to get rid of Sirius icon or at least move it to the end. Does anyone actually subscribe anymore considering we have Apple Music and internet music?

I do. Symphony to calm the wife, Kidz Bop for the kiddos & CNBC/Bloomberg radio for me. It's cheap and easy.

 

[evanevery]

Now if we can find a way to get rid of Sirius icon or at least move it to the end. Does anyone actually subscribe anymore considering we have Apple Music and internet music?

I don't use Apple Music, as I expect many other Android user do not...

I also do not "stream music" via the Internet as the in-car streaming platforms (SmartPhones) do not provide hi-res music quality without an external DAC. This specifically includes the iPhone and Apple Music. Additionally, you can't even use an external DAC on your SmartPhone (to improve sound quality) with the Taycan as there are no direct analog audio inputs to the PCM.

The best possible music quality for the Taycan is not going to be streamed out of your SmartPhone in any case (Android or iPhone). Its going to be delivered by digital hires audio files (ie. FLAC) directly fed to the system via the USB port.

For what its worth, I do, however, use Sirius XM as an alternate source when I'm feeling lazy and just want someone to play music for me. (Despite its fairly lousy sound quality)...

 

[Mwa3aan]

I don't use Apple Music, as I expect many other Android user do not...

I also do not "stream music" via the Internet as the in-car streaming platforms (SmartPhones) do not provide hi-res music quality without an external DAC. This specifically includes the iPhone and Apple Music. Additionally, you can't even use an external DAC on your SmartPhone (to improve sound quality) with the Taycan as there are no direct analog audio inputs to the PCM.

The best possible music quality for the Taycan is not going to be streamed out of your SmartPhone in any case (Android or iPhone). Its going to be delivered by digital hires audio files (ie. FLAC) directly fed to the system via the USB port.

For what its worth, I do, however, use Sirius XM as an alternate source when I'm feeling lazy and just want someone to play music for me. (Despite its fairly lousy sound quality)...

The way Apple CarPlay works is as follows:
- Your files are streamed and temporarily stored/cached in their encoded format in an encrypted envelope on the device. Apple Music uses 256 AAC while Amazon use variable rate FLAC that includes high rez files if the DAC supports it.
- The player (Amazon Music or Apple Music) decrypts the audio stream but keeps it digital and then hands if of to the car's Head Unit in a file format rather than a USB DAC audio format (this is important because should you plug you Mac into your Taycan you will not see a DAC in the midi list. The car thinks it is an unsupported USB storage device).
- Lightning cables lacks an analog out pin. All data traveling over lightning is digital.
- There is no DAC capability in a standard lightning cable unless it is a headphone where the DAC is either in the lightning adapter (Apple's cheaper earpods) or in the headphones itself.
- When your phone is connected to your car's head unit in either "iPOD" mode or "CarPlay" mode with a lightning cable the original digital source is stream to the Head Unit as a file, not a USB encoded audio stream (which is a defined DAC standard).
- The Head Unit is responsible for decoding the file data using its DAC and then amplify.

In other words, If you use Amazon Music streaming high quality FLAC files, the Taycan's DAC decodes the audio into analog, which is exactly the same as if you had a USB stick with FLAC files.

Your iPhone supports ALAC but you need to use iTunes to sync the files from your computer to iPhone.

One caveat is that to allow for highest compatibility the digital file stream out from an iPhone to CarPlay uses 48Khz max as a sample rate to ensure the car's head unit can handle it. There is nothing you can do to change this. The iphone converts the files in higher bitrate to a 48Khz file stream.

So, even thought your FLAC files might be 96Khz your iPhone wont send that to the DAC in the head unit.

Another reality is that modern cars use extreme post DAC equalization to get a flat gain level across all frequencies. Bose and Burmester EQ the heck out of the different audio levels before they go to the speakers to ensure what you hear is their "sound signature".

The only way to bypass this is to install an after market DAC in the car. The Porsche Head Unit has the ability to use toslink to send the digitial data to an external DAC and EQ.

I did this in my Panamera where we replaced the DAC and EQ with an ARC Audio PS8 Pro. You get a Toslink control unit that keeps all Head Unit functionality in place but allows you to use the external DAC, EQ and your own speakers.

Thats a lot fo work but was worth it. We could balance the audio to perfection and get the benefits of the higher bitrate audio files.

Wireless carplay works different because of the combination of Wifi used for visual and audio data and bluetooth for handshaking. However, the audio file is still streamed in a file stream format over wifi to the head unti where it is decoded

So it is possible to stream FLAC and use the car's DAC, BUT what is not possible is using an external DAC and streaming analog music to the head unit.

You can play higher quality FLAC files from a USB stick than from an iPhone because the iPhone samples the output format to 48Khz when it is using CarPlay.

You will always be stuck with 48Khz in CarPlay.

Honestly, with road noise and post DAC EQ from Bose and Burmester it will be almost impossible for a normal person to hear the difference between 48Khz Flac and 96Khz Flac. I know some audiophiles can do this but it is a very well trained ear that can hear that above all the other noise in a car.

Upgraded speakers and Amp will make a dramatic difference that you will actually be able to hear.

This turned out to be a lot longer post than I planned and I am not sure it adds any value because like evanevery said, unless you rip Head Unit components out and replace them with after market we are stuck with what we have in the Taycan.

 

[Reg]

The way Apple CarPlay works is as follows:
...

This turned out to be a lot longer post than I planned and I am not sure it adds any value because like evanevery said, unless you rip Head Unit components out and replace them with after market we are stuck with what we have in the Taycan.

awesome post, thanks for doing this!

 

[evanevery]

Yes, but we can specifically control what we feed to the head unit by providing the associated RAW digital files directly via USB storage. No need to work around the architectural limitations of Apple Music, Amazon Music, iPhone, Android, etc..

I typically don't stream anything from anywhere (other than SiriusXM when I'm lazy). I've literally never used Amazon Music or Apple music on my phone at all... (As that was the question I was originally responding to...)

All my music is ripped directly from CD's that I have purchased. (I don't download music). In the car I use a 256 GB Thumb drive with over 160GB of FLAC files on it... Just for testing, I've also tried a 2TB (2000 GB) storage device (NVME SSD to USB enclosure) and have not had any issues with it in the Taycan (other than a relatively long time for indexing). We have also seen some issues in PCM startup with more than 3000-3200 files on a storage device. This is also documented elsewhere...

I do use Tidal at home (via several BlueSound Node 2i's) for MQA "master's" playback but not via my phone in the car. However, I have streamed Tidal to studio headphones via an external DAC (Dragonfly Red) connected to my phone - but obviously not in the car...

We have had several threads here trying to find out specifically what type of DAC we have in the Taycan. Also, whether that DAC would be in the PCM hardware (feeding analog audio to the Burmester) or in the Burmester itself. IOW: Does the Burmester option actually bring with it an upgraded DAC?

Regardless, if there ever was a car best suited to hearing the difference between marginal and very high quality music the exceptionally quiet Taycan may very well be it. Especially with the insulated glass and the Burmester option...

 

[tigerbalm]

One caveat is that to allow for highest compatibility the digital file stream out from an iPhone to CarPlay uses 48Khz max as a sample rate to ensure the car's head unit can handle it. There is nothing you can do to change this. The iphone converts the files in higher bitrate to a 48Khz file stream.

So, even thought your FLAC files might be 96Khz your iPhone wont send that to the DAC in the head unit.

Looks like the PCM can only read in 48Khz anyways, even from a USB stick.

 

[tigerbalm]

Does the Burmester option actually bring with it an upgraded DAC?

The fact the technical data specified in the PCM doesn’t change its input capabilities regardless of which audio option a Taycan has suggests the DAC to me the DAC is the same in all cases.

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