RCD500 Not Playing own CD/MP3 CD's

I tried to play some of my own CD's on the RCD500MP3 player, I have a couple of CD's I did myself and these play fine on all my CD Players, the CD players in my previous two cars, my wife's car and previous car and my brothers car. But not this Passat :mad:.

I burnt an MP3 CD and this plays on Passat, well sort of. It plays then jumps then plays then jumps and so on.

I am no Audio buff so it may be something I have not get right, my dealer says the player is working fine with MP3 discs.

The CD's are:
CD-R74 74 min / 650MB 1-12x Compatable and says 'Mr Data' it says on the label.

I am converting standard CD's to MP3 using:
Mp3 Wma Converter
Converting/recording at MP3 44,100 kHz; Stereo; 128 Kbps;

I am burning standard and MP3 CD's using:
Nero Express 6
Burning at Write speed of 52x (7,800 kbs)

Can anyone advise on what the problem might be? I have never had a problem before.

I have not heard of Mr Data CDs before.

I have had success using Windows Media Player to convert CDs to MP3 and then used File Explorer to copy the MP3 files to CD, about 10 albums per CD.

I used Maxwell CDs - I have had success each time with no problems.

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Originally Posted by Trapper

Burning at Write speed of 52x (7,800 kbs)
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Try writing to the CD at a lower speed, say x16, and see how it goes. Also, are you selecting 'finalise CD' when writing. Some older players play better when written at a slower speed and when the Cd is finalised

Thanks for the advice, I do not have 'File Explorer' on my PC, but do have Windows Media Player so I will give that a go. I will also try a slower speed. I do finalise the CD after burning.

I don't see why my previous CD's won't play in the Passat when they work fine in every other CD Player I have or can lay my hands on!

I have some Memorex CD-RW 650mb so will have a go with these next week.

To get to File Explorer in XP, right click on the Start button on bottom left hand corner, then click Explore.

After the files are copied to your PC, and in doing so make sure that they go into a folder per album.

After you have put a blank CD in your PC you normally get a box asking what do you want to do. I normally exit out of this. From within File Explorer you can select the albums you want to copy to the CD, by holding down shift etc. Then right click and you get the option to copy to blank CD, or something similar.

If once you have tried this you do not have success, send me a message and I will post you a copy of one that works on my RCD500 - if this does not work then it would be time to take it to the dealer for repair.

Don't think it's a related problem, and I don't have much experience of this type of thing, but I've noticed that burnt CDs don't play as well as originals on my RCD 300.

I'm not saying that there's a problem once it's up and running, but there's defo a problem sometimes the CD playing at all, particularly if the car is restarted while playing a CD or if I toggle from the CD to the radio and back again.

Skipping between tracks usually gets it going again, and failing that toggling to the radio and then back again sometimes 'unjams' it. As a last resort the CD has to be ejected and reinserted.

Not a huge problem really, just a slight annoyance, but it doesn't do that with original CDs.

just to add to all the good advice you've got already. Some players don't handle RW (re-writable CDs) very well. Perhaps you could try some cheapie regular CDs

Hi Ridgmont, my start menu does show an Explore link, this seems to be the same as Windows Explorer in that all it shows is a map of my system and folders:confused:

In order to write to cd's or convert file types takes a specific program and for the life of me I can't see how explorer would do this.

I can amongst others, cut, copy, send to, rename, see properties, scan, play, delete, etc. Nothing about changing types.

Maybe these early starts recently have loosened my brain cell, I think there's one left somewhere in there.....

The Passat audio info says it will accept CD-RW's so as I have a few spare I will give it a go. Can always do with a few spare coasters:beerchug:

as long as you have windows xp or later, you do not need a third party program to burn cd's, windows has that functionality built in. just pop a blank cd in, cancel any autorun program that starts, then go to my computer and double click on your cdrw drive. the 'blank' cd window will open and you can drag and drop mp3 (or any other files) to it, before clicking on the 'burn these files to cd' link on the left hand side

I agree with the above, Windows Explorer was what I was taking about and apologies if calling it File Explorer has confused things.

You can effectively drag and drop to the blank disk - it will be shown as "Files ready to be written to the CD" at the top of the list, then click on File on the top menu and you have the option to "Write these files to CD", Explorer will then do the rest for you.

This will mean that you are not using a 3rd party bit of software such as RecordNow to do the recording - but to be honest I don't think that the piece of soiftware for doing the recording will make the difference but I would be tempted to try a different brand of CD.

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You can effectively drag and drop to the blank disk - it will be shown as "Files ready to be written to the CD" at the top of the list, then click on File on the top menu and you have the option to "Write these files to CD", Explorer will then do the rest for you.

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Ensure you select Data & not Music CD for MP3's It may/may not ask you.

I normally use Roxio easy CD creator for making my MP3 CD's. It is quite an old version but works OK. From what I remember Roxio code is embeded in Microsoft Windows for burning purposes.

Thanks for the help guy's, I was a bit confused with Explorer so thanks for clearing that up. I will not be able to try it out for a couple of days due to a having very little spare time at the moment.

Just to be sure Gazza when you say

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Ensure you select Data & not Music CD for MP3's It may/may not ask you.

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Assuming it does ask I am to select Data although I am burning a Music CD with MP3 tracks? Apologies if this seems a stupid question!

You are actually writing data files as far as the operating system is concerned. Just ensure that you have enough MP3 files to fill your 700MB CD as the disk will be finalised & you will not be able to add more files. What I do is create all my music in folders, ie albums & mixes then drag the folders to the CD, my individual files are usually at a bit rate of 192, so on average I get about 7-8 folders per CD. It is worth getting a couple of RW (re-writable) CD's to practice on.

I haven't had time to record any more CD's but I found a Creative Stone Plus MP3 player (Free gift from BT Internet) and transferred my MP3 files onto that.

Now, whether on the MP3 player, from my hard drive as a WAV file or from a home or bought WAV CD the volume on my PC is the same level when played, But put the MP3 player in the Passat plugged into the AUX In socket and I need to have the volume at 50% in order to hear it normally. When playing the radio or CD's around 20% is fine. Should I change to CD or Radio without reducing the volume means I deafen myself:(

Anyone got an idea how to equalise the volumes between the radio/CD and Aux In? Or is it another visit to the dealer:(:confused:

I do not get the same problem when I plug in my portable DAB - have you tried adjusting the volume on the MP3 player - the volume control on my DAB also changes the output volume on the RCD500.

The MP3 player is at 100% volume, even with this the MP3 is much quieter when in the car.

I use Itune's "burn playlist to CD" option plus cheap (Aldi) CDs. This works fine and gives all the flexibility of Itunes playlists. Only issue to make sure you import music as MP3, not Apple's own format.

I tend to use read/write CDs and make new playlists every now and again. Just make sure that any playlist is less than 700MB - but that would be about 180ish songs