Z CRAZY

I have the standard 160-watt system in my Z. Then I go and pop in an MP3 CD and my car cannot play it.

I bought a nice Sony portable that plays MP3 for around $100. Why can't Nissan put an MP3 CD player in this car?

Just venting, mostly.

phreezee

Why the heck are you mad?
The only car I know of that comes with an mp3 player is a mazda mp3 (special edition protege). Considering that some benz's still come stock with a TAPE player, and charge $500 for a CD-Changer.... I'm happy with the in-dash 6 stack!
Mp3 player would've been nice... but shouldn't be expected.

Z CRAZY

I'm just saying that if a portable MP3 CD player is that inexpensive, why can't Nissan (or other car companies, for that matter) include the MP3 format in their CD players.

zland

You are 100% correct. The bean counters of nissan are missing an opportunity. Every CD player now should play CD, CDR, and MP3. I am sure that a high percentage of younger/more computer savy buyes would see this as another reason to buy this car vs the competition...Nissan,,,,are you reading our website, HELLO!

Slareau02

Most CD players play CDR. But I cannot reasonably assert that you expected the CD player to play a cd full of songs in an mp3 format. Like it was said before a whopping one or two cars on the market today come with a mp3 compatible cd player. And that being the case don't you think that if Nissan had decided to include this on the base stereo system they would advertise it? I mean come on, don't gripe about something that you should have realized didn't exist. That being said, I agree, it would be nice if more car companies had a MP3 compatible cd player as an option.

350zSpeedRacer

MP3 format would be VERY nice, but my guess is that all the nusic execs are preventing this jump b/c they know how much it will cost them! Look at what they did to Napster!?!?!?! I don't know about you, but most of my MP3s come from downloading them for free.

mydogscool

Because MP3 music reproduction quality is terrible. MP3's are just kiddie toys.

zland

They are much more common in Asia then here and being a high school teacher, I know that the next generation is totally into MP3's so the car manufacture that clues into that market segment will benifit from that decision. Remember, if you hook a younger person on a brand such as Nissan, they will buy it for their entire lifetime. I am 45 years old, I will not buy as many cars in the future as lets say a 25 year old. I would be shooting for the younger market. After all, the infinity coupe is marketed for the older/softer buyer. Most Z owners are more interested in performance and if not young, are youngert at heart.

JeepRage

the ford focus now plays MP3 cds FYI.

zland

I was speaking as a consumer not from a profit perspective. I have experience talking to designers for car companies and they are sometimes forced to cut the design of a product to save $10 per car. The example I was given was cutting a really nice headlight design that would have made the product really attractive (for $10). As you can see, I think those decisions can be a poor decision. People are attracted to cars like the Z because of the price but also because of the product being distintive. Again, I only se it from a my little perspective. At least nissan is again designing cars witrh some passion. That is why we are all here right!

mark754

because then, more people would be happy with the base system and there would be less incentive for them to upgrade to the (higher profit margin) models that have the Bose system, which does play mp3's.

The marginal cost of enabling a cd player to play mp3's is probably negligible.

zland

Are you sure the bose plays MP3's? I am ignorant if it does not does not. I know I am not getting it because of how many people posting are really unhappy with it plus it is expensive to repair speakers after warrarnty ends...

Mike821

Some cars don't have standard Zenon lights, other don't have standard sun-roof, others don't have standard power seats etc...

If every single option was available on every car then you'd spend your whole salary on your car.

Nissan, and every other car manufacturer, have to cut corners somewhere. The real question is - why not make it optional? My guess is that they don't consider the investment to be profitable, especially on a sports car.

Just my 2 cents...

Mike821

I don't believe the Bose system plays MP3's - but honestly I didn't try yet. I haven't seen it anywhere on the documentation and I assumed that it doesn't.

If it does, then it answers my question above...

Grey Matter

The Bose will not play MP3s. But it will play audio CD-Rs and CD-RWs that you can make from MP3s.

mark754

"The Bose will not play MP3s. But it will play audio CD-Rs and CD-RWs that you can make from MP3s."

Sorry, my mistake. I could have sworn I read that it did. Oh well, I guess I'll have to continue using my mickey mouse setup (portable mp3/cd player with the cassette adaptor) in my Z when I get it.

Electro Z

Okay.. Reality check here... No no MP3.. right.. causes you to go out and upgrade later.. perhaps clarion/bose will have a replacement head unit in the near future.....

Is it a great loss.. not for me.... I have a nomad 3 40 gig Jukebox and I can just fm modulate to the head unit... MP3 not good quality sound... no it has cd quality sound.... cd quality.... if your jamming a bunch of songs at the lowest quality so they fit.. yeah thats garbage music.. but... like I do.. 830 albums... and a whole hell of a bunch of playlists.. who listens to FM?

Yeah Nissan may not have wanted to stall production until clarion had a mp3 player available... also.... its a new format.. not real new.. but new .... how long after cds were available did you have one in your base sports car?

So... be happy.... not sad.... your in a Z... I listen to the engine more that anything else... LOL

Oh.. and I did get my Amp replaced today... and I rocked on the way home.. yeah baby!

EZ

ZIV

If you really want MP3s, take a look at the Sony 10-disk add-on changer. It plays 'em all (Audio CD, CD-R/RW, and has am MP3 decoder built in) and with 10 disks you can load up well over a hundred audio CDs worth.

Steve

N74DV

not so fast dogdude...... mp3's are what you make of them... encode at a high bit rate and 44.1 khz sample rate and I'll bet even you wouldnt notice the difference......

kinda like jpg and bmp...... if you don't crush a jpg too much there's no way in hell you could tell a 50K jpg from a 1.5mb bmp.

I'm sooo sick of "audiophiles" defacing mp3 compression. If you want true untouched audio put a freakin record player in your Z cause even CD's are sampled and not considered "lossless"

and MP3's are kiddie toys??? nope ..... about 95% of ALL radio stations today play mp3's on a daily basis. At the video/audio production studio I work at we send out all our audio production to radio stations as mp3.

They're only "kiddie toys" when you don't know how to use it.

CZredZ

Sony/Nissan Conspiracy?????

Could it be that sinister?

Maybe Nissan got a good deal on a bunch of Bose factory seconds, so Bose can make room for the MP3 Players for the 2004?