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Thread: Custom Android Tablet integration w/ RNS510 Way better than Android Auto or Car Play!

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
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    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Custom Android Tablet integration w/ RNS510 Way better than Android Auto or Car Play!



    I've just been through the whole range of options to upgrade my RNS 510 on a 2010 R36 I've owned since new.
    No problems with my current one, i just wanted something more up to date and looked around at all the Android RNS510 replacements but they all seem to have their own draw backs, particularly in the sound quality department.

    Im also fussy about audio quality and wanted to try get bit perfect playback of FLAC and DSD files via Aux line-in with option of fully integrated bluetooth and also get an Android Auto type setup.

    Compressed MP3s over Bluetooth sound pretty decent with the 9W7 BT kit but what I've come up with sounds loads better and works WAY better than Android Auto or Apple Car Play!

    What I've come up with will blow your mind!

    Before I get into the detail, here's the shortlist of features I've crammed in;
    Android Auto features (what I've come up with is way better)
    Bit perfect playback of FLAC and DSD files (DFF and DSF) from my own library (and any audio format you can think of)
    Spotify integration
    Play back from microsd, harddrive, DLNA and remote servers
    Wifi Hotspot
    Airplay support
    Chromecast support
    Full factory bluetooth AVRCP and A2DP integration. (id3 text and streaming BT audio/Nav/voice control)
    Large Car friendly APP launcher thats fully customisable
    Easy to install - no modification to factory RNS 510.

    How is this possible???? Well I'm glad you asked.....


    Lenovo Yoga Tab 3 10 Plus LTE with 128GB microsd running a custom Lineage ROM based on Android 7.1.2 (you could use any Android tablet or ROM but some features may look different or not work.)

    Car Launcher AG android launcher App (replaces home screen and launcher - customisable for apps and colours and car logo - full transport control integration for media players including album art and id3 text)

    2TB Western Digital Wireless Pro plus running twonky server as a DLNA server

    FiiO E17 DAC for USB audio from the tablet to the RNS 510 line-in

    Neutron Audio App for Android (the most complex and complete audio app you'll ever see, play anything from anywhere, and tweak the crap out of it, or play pure bit perfect sound.
    Its also EXTREMELY well laid out for use in the car. It has heaps of audio tweaking with compressors, normalizers, 4 band to 32 band parametric equalizers (configurable) Fully customisable color schemes, font and icon sizes and way way more features than you could poke a stick at. Way too complex for what most users would need, but if you've got the patience, this is the BEST android audio player to have, and it is actually pretty simple to use once you get used to its idiosyncrasies with navigation of the options. In actual use once it's setup, it really easy to use and perfect for use in the car.

    Spotify integration - use google voice to request a specific track, album or artist

    Full Google Voice and Navigation integration (run WAZE or whatever NAV you want)

    Custom battery powered Raspberry Pi 2 with 1TB SSD running JRiver Media Centre as a media server

    JRemote for JRiver Media Server for streaming audio from the home server and from Raspberry Pi
    My favourite Audio player and server setup. (easier to use and more reliable setup than the Neutron/WD DLNA 2TB setup but JRemote is not quite as car use friendly. (It's not far off though)

    I can Launch ANY app - not just Android Auto Apps.

    I have also installed a modified Apple Airport Express to stream bit perfect audio via airplay into the Aux line-in (from iPhone X)

    Tomorrow I'll also play around with a google chromecast audio for streaming bit perfect sound from the android tablet that will probably become my default choice going forward. (chromecast supports upto 24bit/96khz bit perfect streaming which is even better than the Airplay devices can do)

    Here's a pic and 10min Youtube demo. Hope it give you guys that have been thinking about upgrades an option to consider!

    Here's a bench-test pic with my custom raspberry Pi server sitting underneath.
    Jremote on tablet for the car by Hilton, on Flickr

    Youtube Demo!!!!!!!!!
    YouTube
    Last edited by R36VW; 27-11-2017 at 10:43 PM.
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jun 2010
    Location
    Sydney
    Posts
    4,040
    Users Country Flag
    Love the DIY approach - off the shelf doesn't fit your needs, so build something that does!
    2011 Skoda Octavia vRS TDI DSG wagon|Revo Stage 1|Race Blue|Leather|Dynamic Xenons w 6000K|9w7 BT|THA475 Amp+active sub|Whiteline ALK|RVC|
    2009 R36 wagon|Biscay Blue|RVC|Tailgate|ECU and DSG tune|LED DRL/Indicators|3D colour cluster|Quad LED tail rings|Climatronics upgrade|Dynaudio retrofit|B7 RLine Flat Steering Wheel|3AA CCM|TPMS Direct|B7 Adaptive Cruise with Front Assist|Discover Media retrofit|PLA 2.0|Lane Assist|BCM retrofit|High Beam Assist|DQ500

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Location
    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Thread Starter
    Yeah thanks I'm pretty happy with it.

    I made a few more modifications to the setup to simplify it now.

    I now have a chromecast audio setup along with a creative labs E5 DAC.

    Amazing little DAC that I've had for a while now, I dont know why I didn't think of using it before instead of the FiiO DAC.

    Using the E5 DAC allows me to run optical out from the chromecast to the optical input on the E5 and then line out to the Aux input on the car. Everything auto powers up and connects without any fiddling because when the DAC senses power on the usb input it powers up and just passes through the optical input to the line out.

    By using optical im bypassing the pretty average DAC in the chromecast and getting 24bit 96Khz straight through to the E5 DAC without messy USB DAC connections.

    I've found that USB DACS on Android are pretty fiddly and the global android DAC driver isn't very good compared to android players like USB Audio Pro and Neutron Player that can go USB direct to the DAC bypassing the Android drivers and really clean up the signal. Not to mention it's really fiddly to switch audio players to the DAC without unplugging it and clicking on which device you want the DAC to connect to when you reconnect. Now all those hassles are behind!

    I also found when connecting a DAC to the USB with anything else attached on a USB Hub introduced a lot of noise. So going via chrome cast I avoid all that, and get a great clean digital signal and it leaves the tablet USB port to run whatever I need. (SSD storage)

    The other benefit is I can now avoid the hassles of portable DLNA servers and just play from local storage attached to the tablet or stream bit perfect via JRemote from my home server. Simpler and faster!

    Video to follow shortly.
    Last edited by R36VW; 27-11-2017 at 10:29 PM.
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
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    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Thread Starter
    Video explaining and a demo!

    Last edited by R36VW; 12-12-2017 at 03:25 AM.
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
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    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Thread Starter
    This works way better than I had expected, and it doesnt look too out of place in the age of displays popping out of dashes.

    It remembers last playing track and you can set a couple of the apps to auto start playing again a well. The only manual intervention at the moment is to start casting to the chromecast, but it's 2 easy button presses for casting and a quick flick on the Phone to tethering screen.

    Sitting in the office


    Car Launcher in the office by Hilton, on Flickr


    The App Launcher that I forgot to show in the video. You press the Apps button bottom right. You can also set it to hide Apps you dont want to see in the car and it has an unhide button. (the eye in top left on the Apps screen)

    Car Launcher in the office by Hilton, on Flickr


    There is no Car Battery drain when in Standby.
    The DAC is plugged into the cigarette lighter and has it's own onboard battery and switches off automatically when the ignition is turned off. (there's a 2 hour idle delay timer so it doesn't turn off and on when jumping out to get petrol or do a shop - the DAC battery is good for 8 hours so it's never a problem, it always automatically turns on and recharges the next time you turn the car on)

    The Chromecast is also connected to the cigarette lighter and just turns on and off with ignition- it pairs into the network in less than 30 secs.

    The tablet will last hours on it's own massive battery in the bottom spine (a full day at least)
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  6. #6
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    Thread Starter
    Some of you probably already knew this... the chromecast audio can handle 24bit 192khz streaming and optical output. The internal chromecast DAC also handles it without resampling and actually sounds quite good even without the Creative Labs E5 DAC connected.

    chromecast 192 by Hilton, on Flickr
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
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    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Thread Starter
    Hi

    Some more updates.

    I played with llama and tasker automation to try get the tablet to cast automatically but haven't got it working yet. Ideally you just want to get in and have it work like Bluetooth does. I'll persevere with it.

    I've removed the 4g router for now because in IOS 11 on the iPhone you can swipe down and then press hard on the networking group in the widgets to open a shortcut to personal hotspot and then turn it on and wait for both devices to connect. That only takes a few seconds and you can get on with driving. I also have Automate running as well now on the tablet to get a clearer less cluttered view of what's playing. It supports JRemote, Spotify and Nuetron, so you can swipe left/right to skip tracks and click on the album info to switch back to JRemote. When you pick something in JRemote or the other audio apps and press play, Automate switches back to the foreground automatically. I'm still in two minds about Automate and Car Launcher AG so I still use both at the moment.

    I bought a Bluetooth OBD2 dongle today and got some other interesting stuff out of the car into a program called torque . It displays 100 or so car sensors over the OBD2 port via Bluetooth to the tablet. Speed, temps, Gforces, acceleration, RPM and all sorts of things.

    The next step is to hack into the canbus of the car and get steering wheel commands via OBD2 Bluetooth to control media operation on the tablet. It's already been done before so I'm just researching now. I've already got a terminal session into the canbus working to monitor the bus. There's thousands of commands and data being sent over the bus every second, so it's a matter of finding the right canbus IDs of my steering wheel media controls and then programming another app called carbusinterface with the correct media codes from the canbus. It might take a while but there is an established process of elimination using logging to csv and using excel pivot tables to isolate the data you want. Then again, I might get bored of that pretty quickly as it's a bit tedious, and navigation to next track is only a swipe away!


    If I have time on the weekend I might post a couple more pics and a video of my progress.

    PS. The creative labs sound blaster E5 DAC is also connected to cigarette lighter 5v USB so it automatically turns on when the car is started. It's also lithium powered and it turns off after 2 hours of idle time, ready to start again the next time automatically, no buttons to press.
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

  8. #8
    Join Date
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    Location
    Leichhardt, NSW
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    Thread Starter

    Well....

    After fiddling with chromecast and wireless hotspots with all the different media player and server solutions... I've come back to JRiver Media Center 23 for Pi running on my battery Powered Pi with 1TB SSD.



    There were a number of different reliability problems across all the moving parts, mostly related to Hotspot reliability/bandwidth WD wireless HDD wifi, and Neutron player idiosyncrasies. It had complexity and reliability that's just not right for use in the car.



    I've finished testing my newly upgraded Pi that I upgraded from Wheezy to Jessie Stretch and from MC21 to MC23 and configured a new faster wifi dongle.



    I was worried all my customisations for the Pi would have to be redone from scratch with such a big software upgrade. Thankfully my power management and custom multi function control buttons and LEDS on the Pi survived without touching a line of code!



    For the car
    JRiver Media Centre 23 on the Pi w/ 1TB SSD - tethered via wifi to > 10" Tablet in hotspot mode casting JRemote to > Chromecast with optical output to > E5 DAC optical in and line out > Line in on the car.
    (still using Spotify etc on the tablet as well)



    Headphone listening around the house
    MC23 Home Server wifi > JRemote on the tablet or iphone > Sony MDR-1ADAC headphones



    Portable speaker around the house
    MC23 Home Server wifi > JRemote on the tablet or iphone > Sony SRS-X7 speaker (DLNA end point)

    I'm the best of the tweakers and fiddlers, but even I have my limited patience when it doesnt work reliably and easily.



    Part 1 - It's a simpler life

    Bench testing.... again

    Updated Video demo





    Part 2 - and it works!

    I had success with the new edimax wifi dongle on the Pi in the car.

    I was able to use the chromecast audio with no dropouts or buffering while driving around for a few errands today!



    It looks like the biggest weak point of the old setup was the wifi capability of the WD wireless Hard Drive and the old Pi Dlink wifi dongle.

    Skipping tracks is so fast now it's instantaneous, even with large 5000kbps 24bit/192k FLAC files. (much faster than the WD wireless HDD could stream)

    I'll be ordering a Pi car power supply and wiring it into the ignition system so it will automatically switch off with a delayed controlled shutdown and auto power-on restart.
    After I've put the Pi car power supply in, the whole system will be automated and just power on and tether automatically. The only manual step will be to turn casting on which I have a shortcut App for.



    Updated video of it in the car >


    PS. I've asked the Devs of Automate Car dashboard to add (full) JRemote support.

    Oh and yes I can watch Netflix and Foxtel too. (via bluetooth audio to the E5 DAC that also has BT to avoid the casting delay) ;p
    Last edited by R36VW; 12-12-2017 at 03:41 AM.
    IceGrey MY10 R36 Sedan - Sunroof - Tint - Ipod - RNS510 NAV - 9W7 BT - Voice Control - Adap Cruise - Lane Assist - Front Assist - Adap Chassis - Omanyts 19" replicas 255/35R19 ContiSport 5P

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