I've got a 2018 XLT with the small-screen SYNC system. Up until now, I had a 16GB USB flash drive (Staple's Relay, nothing fancy) with a bunch of music on it. I just had the MP3s and MP4s loaded on it in folders and the system read them adequately for what I used it for.

So, now I keep adding music and feel the need to upgrade the USB to a higher capacity. So, I went on Ebay and ordered a cheap 128GB drive so I wouldn't need to keep buying them as I filled them up.

The problem is that the truck doesn't index correctly and doesn't manage the folders/songs like it did with the other drive and even completely misses some of the albums/folders. When I put the newly-added music on the old drive, the truck read it fine, so it's not a formatting issue with the new music.

I think I read that SD cards above a certain capacity use a different format (read something about it when researching for a game cam). Is it the same with USB flash drives?

I even went as far as "full" formatting the new USB drive before re-loading the music on it...same results. When the system boots up, the truck says "Indexing <gibberish>", but doesn't recognize a large number of the folders.

So, is this:

• A limitation of the audio system (i.e. limited to 32GB or something else)? The manual just states that it's capable of something like 50,000 songs, but doesn't state a USB capacity limit, or format specification.
• the fact that Aqualung is a cheapskate and bought a crappy drive?

Thanks.

Aqualung

 

Format the drive using FAT32. I have a 256GB drive in my Sync 2 system and it sees all of the songs / folders.

 

I agree with B-Man - try formatting the drive as FAT32. If you're using Windows, there is an extra step or two involved since Windows does not natively support formatting of larger drives to FAT32. The link below should help.

https://www.howtogeek.com/316977/how...32-on-windows/

 

Thanks guys. I'll use the app, since when I reformatted the drive last time, it pretty much took all night (NTFS, I think).

Appreciate your help.

Aqualung

 

FAT32 will square you away. I just converted to .wav files for music (no loss) and no issues with playing with a 128gb drive.

 

I've never had a problem with exfat in the full blown sync 3 fwiw.

 

All USB drives are not created equal - some are better than others. Also, some devices prefer specific USB drives, so it's best to buy brand name units with the latest technology. Older USB drives can also be very slow compared to newer drives. I'd try another drive made by Kingston, SanDisk, PNY, Samsung or other top quality brand. You'll probably have better luck.

 

Just wanted to come back and let you know that my 128GB is working great, indexed and everything. Thanks to B-Man and Stooby.

Thanks for the advice.

Aqualung

 

Stupid questions from a computer ding dong. First, what’s the point of uploading music onto Sync, is there any advantage? Second, can I just do it from my iPhone?

Yes, I’ll read my manual, but I’m more interested in the answer and opinions to my first question.

thanks Guys!!

 

Consider the SD chip as an included song library on the radio. You do not need AM/FM/Satellite/Cellphone coverage to listen to the library.You could use a smartphone via Bluetooth for a library also but in my case the phone is used to hold audio-books and the phone app is needed to listen to them. I have 2 128GB chips in rotation for album memory and audio books from Audible or the public library (currently around 75 unabridged books), on my phone. KM