[q7xvh97o2pDhNrh]

> And here I am driving a 2003 Golf with a tape deck (and CD player).

That sounds wonderful.

There was a brief, magical moment in history when cars would come with AM/FM radio, a tape deck, a CD player, and an aux port so that you could plug in audio from every other device that humanity would invent for the rest of time.

It feels like the most fleeting of moments, and it was so long ago. Maybe it was just one summer afternoon in the early 2000s.

Anyway, I think we've largely been going downhill since then. For whatever reason, humanity achieved a lovely little peak of engineering, and then we immediately abandoned it for worse options.

[dylan604]

Don't forget the adapters that plugged into the 1/8" jack on your Sony WalkMan with a cassette shaped adapter that went into the tape deck. There are also those weird devices that plugged into the 1/8" jack with a low power radio transmitter to tune your in dash receiver to hear. (A local station I listen is on the low end where these devices operate. The station is lower powered college station with the transmitter located where I'm pretty close to the edge of its range. From time to time at stop lights, a stronger signal will come in to interrupt and disappears after the green and cars separate. I'm guessing one of these is being used)

[_jackdk_]

Perhaps coincidentally, it was also around the same brief beautiful moment in time where one could talk with all of one's friends using a single messaging client, possibly even over federated XMPP.

[thaumasiotes]

I had a car with just a tape deck. This turns out to be all you want.

I went through two phases:

1. I ordered some type of Walkman-like car kit that came with a portable CD player, glue strips to adhere the CD player to your dashboard, and a cassette tape adapter that plugged into an aux port (on the CD player) and inserted into the tape deck. I'd burn CDs to play in the car that way.

2. I got a Zen Stone, a tiny mp3 player with no screen that was easy to operate by feel. I stored mp3s on it... and plugged the cassette adapter that I still had into it. That was as good as in-car music can get without being voice operated.

They still make the adapters: https://www.amazon.com/Arsvita-Audio-Cassette-Adapter-Auxill...

[mc3301]

I had that PLUS a mini-disc player, all stock on a dirt-cheap car.

[criddell]

When I was buying my last car, I was searching for something with a CD player option. Turns out there are no new cars with CD players and the last manufacturer to offer one was Lexus in 2022.

I ripped my collection to my phone and I use CarPlay and it works well enough. But still if I could, I'd buy a car with a CD player.

My next car might be a Slate truck because they supposedly support single or double DIN radios and there has to be an aftermarket option that would work.

[imp0cat]

If you could go back in time and show your younger self Spotify streamed wirelessly from a phone via AA/AC, now that would be magical. Pretty much endless amount of music delivered instantly.

But I understand that it is a different kind of magic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-kqUkZnDcM (VW Cabrion Pink Moon ad)

[throw0101d]

> But I understand that it is a different kind of magic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-kqUkZnDcM (VW Cabrion Pink Moon ad)

I also found the 'night drive' ad to be interesting:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U9I7QrpSkk

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_Milk_Wood

* https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0608221h.html

[bigstrat2003]

My younger self wouldn't be interested in endless music any more than my current self is. It's pretty rare that I discover a new band I want to listen to; otherwise I listen to the same music I already like and have.

[kleiba2]

> > And here I am driving a 2003 Golf with a tape deck (and CD player).

> That sounds wonderful.

I don't know if people are really serious but there seems to be a good market interest in car's that's not just equipped with touchscreens and Apple CarPlay. It's interesting (and perhaps understandable) how no car manufacturing is interested in tapping into such a niche segment.

[BuyMyBitcoins]

I remember being blown away seeing one of those tape-deck to aux cable players for the first time. Plugging my late 2000’s era iPod into my early 90’s car was magical.

[throw0101d]

> That sounds wonderful.

Except that rust is eating it and I'll have to replace it soon-ish.

[idiotsecant]

I donno Bluetooth is pretty universal now

[dylan604]

"For whatever reason, humanity achieved a lovely little peak of engineering, and then we immediately abandoned it for worse options." <=> "I donno Bluetooth is pretty universal now"

Your comment does not disagree with GP's in the way you think it does

[idiotsecant]

I guess what I'm saying is 27 different media players duct taped together does not seem like the peak of engineering. A single wireless protocol seems pretty good.

[dylan604]

Back in the day, we'd rate ourselves by how many dongles we'd string together to get things to work.

[jonhohle]

Some time after the Thunderbolt 3 MacBooks were released I had to get data off of a FireWire 400 drive. Thunderbolt 3 to Thunderbolt 2, Thunderbolt 2 to FireWire 800, FireWire 800 to FireWire 400. Everything mounted up just fine.

[dylan604]

That's pretty impressive. The closest to that I personally dealt with was back in the days of Mac Quadras and the ADB port where software was protected with dongles that would daisy chain via ADB.

In audio connectors, I've had some pretty crazy builds getting from various formats when the exact right thing isn't available but a giant milk crate of random cables was on hand.

[mbs159]

A single protocol seems to be very limited, especially if your collection of music is purely physical, and for a lot of people it is

[ssl-3]

It's been over 20 years, and Bluetooth audio still usually sounds bad, still evades troubleshooting when it is working suboptimally, and increasingly drops out in some areas as interference increases.

I've never had any of those issues with a short piece of wire operating at audio frequencies.