I've searched the Scion forums several times, read through the CD player manual,
spoke with the dealer, and even tried calling Pioneer support about this, but haven't
gotten an answer yet. So, here goes...

I have the base Pioneer audio system (model T1807) in my Scion XB, and listen
almost exclusively to WMA files burned to CD. Operationally, the player works fine:
all of my CDs are read successfully, the WMA songs play and sound great, and the
basic information such as track title, artist name, and even album title (which the
manual says will not display) are displayed successfully.

But....

Only the first 16 characters of information are being shown on the player's display,
which often results in the song title being truncated. According to the manual, there
can be up to 2 "pages" (i.e. screens) of data shown when scrolled using the Text
button (see page 13). Also, it is supposed to be compatible with the ISO9660
level 2 formats, including Joliet, which are capable of more than 16 characters (see
page 25). I've tried all kinds of different approaches to rip'ing and copying the
songs: Using WMP to rip and Nero to copy to CD, using WMP to rip and copy
to CD, riping with WMP and copying with MusicMatch jukebox, etc. But nothing I do
will get the player to display the right-pointing arrow which indicates there is more
information to be scrolled through.

This is how I know that it technically should be able to happen...my wife put her copy
of the Dixie Chicks CD "Wide Open Spaces" in one day, and when I looked at the
player I saw that the right-pointing arrow was lit up! And this was for a "normal" (CD-
DA) retail CD besides! I nearly wet myself. Sure enough, I held in the Text
button for a few seconds and the second page of information for the track title was
displayed. I just couldn't believe it, especially when nothing I tried could get the
WMA files to do the same thing.

So, if anyone has been able to figure out a way to get characters 17 through 32 to
scroll and display for compressed digital WMA or MP3 files, I will be grateful if you
can explain how.

 

I'd heard its possible, but you have to hold down the text button, and then it scrolls. i'd never allow Dixie Chicks in my car, so i couldnt verify the scrolling option. But, Ive seen similar things done on xA's

 

Yes, as I mentioned the scroll option did work when holding the text button down
for a few seconds. But so far the only CD this has worked successfully for was the one
I mentioned. And yes, I know the Dixie Chicks aren't everyone's favorite (including me),
but I actually enjoyed that album and I'm glad my wife did bring the CD along, otherwise
I would never have known that the CD player actually could display more than 16
characters.

Still hoping for someone with the well-kept secret on how to get this to work for WMA
files.....

 

I burn my cds in the mp3 format, and holding the text button works for me.
I never tried wma files yet.

 

Thanks for the encouraging reply, kewlbox. Can you please share what software you use
for riping & burning your MP3 files, and how the important configuration settings (like CD
format, Joilet/Romet, etc) are defined?

 

nero, mp3, text button works doesnt bother me if it didnt, i know all my music well enough.

 

Again, what program do you use to create the MP3 files? I have Nero as well but it
doesn't rip the music (only burns the existing files to CD). I'm not interested in the
scroll feature for the music that I know well. I'd like it for those songs and albums I
just recently bought or downloaded. It's not likely that I will go through the work of
converting all of my WMA files to MP3, so I still am interested in anyone who knows
how to get the scroll feature working for those type of compressed files.

It's also a matter of principle to some degree. The unit documentation says the feature
will work. It has been demonstrated on certain select types of CD data. It shouldn't
be this difficult getting it to work with WMA files. One of the greatest features with these
kinds of files (digitally compressed) is the ability to display information about the music,
and 16 characters just doesn't cut it in most cases.

 

I didn't really use a program. Just riped it useing windows media player set for mp3, and then just copied and paste the albums to the burner.
I don't really know a ton of stuff about mixing editing stuff like that.

And i think the display has 12 characters to display.

 

I did a test and ripped an album with long titles using WMP, but changed the default
setting from WMA format to MP3. (I would never normally think to do that because
the WMA format is much better in quality. 64Kbps in WMA is just as good as
128Kbps in MP3, and takes up half the space).

Anyway, the scroll feature worked successfully for the MP3 files. (My display
shows 16 characters on each "page", so a total of 32 characters max when
scrolling the track or album titles). Makes me wonder now if the player's inability
to do the same for WMA files is an undocumented limitation (a.k.a. defect). Still
hoping someone out there can prove me wrong...

 

its more a limitation in the codec, i will burn a damn wma tonight to see.

 

Mine works, but I have only made 3 MP3 discs to use in my ride. Off the top of my head I couldn't tell you if the source files were MP3 or WMA. If I had to guess, they were MP3 going by what you have already experimented with. What I would really like to see if scrolling text instead of having to hold the text button down, but I know that is only a pipe dream.

 

Yeah....MP3 files seem to work (in terms of the scrolling feature), but WMA files do not,
at least according to the evidence so far. I agree that scrolling text should be a standard
feature with WMA/MP3 players, even a base model like the Pioneer T1807. Most
after-market CD players have that as a standard feature now, although I wound up
upgrading the CD player in my last car with a Panasonic I bought to get more advanced
display features.

Another "wish list" item: when the player is in random (shuffle) mode, have the
skip control actually move to another random song, instead of the next sequential
song after the one being skipped.

 

Well, there are plenty of reasons to use MP3, rather than WMA. WMA is a proprietary format, you're stuck at the wim of Microsoft. You'll find problems with compatibility all over the place (imagine if you bought an ipod - can't use wma). It's the same argument to avoid iTunes (not to mention DRM) & ipods, proprietary formats.

Ogg would be the best, as its completely open standard/source, but there is very little support, perhaps only iRiver as far as I've seen.

While mp3 has some slight snd quality issues vs. other formats, its fine within the tolerances of most equipment. MP3 is still the best compressed audio standard for compatibility. If quality is a real issue, you should be using stnd audio cd's anyways. If your worried about size, using variable bit rates (VBR) will give you quality and smaller file sizes, but hell, cdr's are pennies, so who cares..

Grab yourself CDEX for ripping/tagging & RazorLame for encoding (both free) and make the switch to mp3 and be compatible with your Panasonic radio and every other player available...

 

The burning software that I use is called Vertias: Record Now. It will scroll wmas and MP3s on the Scion Pioneer base stereo.

 

Yeah, I was really surprised to see no scrolling. Every device now'er days does that, from the top of the line to a free cereal box mp3 player.

 

Support for WMA is just as widespread as most other formats; all of my portable digital
players handle it just fine, as well as all of my PC-based players (and, of course, the
Scion Pioneer with a couple of limitations described previously). It does NOT handle
Ogg or any other open-source formats....that could be another forum thread all by
itself.

From what I can see, Record Now no longer is supported by Veritas, but has been
taken over by Sonic Solutions. It seems to be comparable to other software offerings
bundled with CD/DVD drives & players, so I'm not sure what would be different about
the WMA files created by it.

I'm almost to the point of just giving in and buying an OEM player again, not just for
the scrolling but for other advanced features that are missing from the Pioneeer. But
for now, the songs play well enough that it's lower down on the priority list.