Ill be installing my new F-900BT in the next few days and I would like to figure out my music situation and figured i'd asked the pro's a few questions...

1) Why is there a 2GB limit if you add a USB flash drive for music/movies? Is this something that can be upgraded in the future with new firmware from Pioneer or is it a hardware limitation? Also why can you have up to 8gb on SD but only 2gb on USB flash drive?

2) I know the average harddrive won't work due to power consumption but have people tried these low power consuming 1.8" harddrives? I read 1 user who said he had great success with it, but I don't really want to spend $100 on a harddrive from just 1 person who may have gotten lucky. I'd prefer using a harddrive due to the fact that i've got tons of movies/tv shows on my computer and it would make for easy transfering.

3) I know people will probably just say "get an iPod" but the reason why I want to avoid that is because I don't really want to spend $$$ on an iPod since I already have an iPhone... and I don't want to have to reach into my glovebox and plug my iPhone in everytime I want to play music from it. Also it is a lot easier just to transfer files from either usb flash drive, sd, or an 1.8" external harddrive then having to spend hours converting videos for iPod format to be able to play in the vehicle.

Sorry for the newb-like questions its just I bought this unit because from my research neither the Clarion nor the Alpine that I was looking at could play video files from USB flash drives, only audio, which made me want to get the Pioneer, now im stuck again...

Any help is greatly appreciated

1) Why is there a 2GB limit...

 

2) I know the average harddrive won't work...

 

3) I know people will probably...

1) USB's limit is higher than two gig; but the unit is picky and won't take just any USB stick. I have tried a sixteen gig stick and it worked; I think another user reported a sixty-four gig stick working

2) Not to my knowledge; you could always give it a try yourself. It isn't just the issue with power although that is a show-stopper, the big deal is that not every single harddrive controller will be compatible with a unit that skimps on drivers to save space for its core programming.

3) Please rephrase in the form of a question

I have a Corsair 32gb USB memory stick that works just fine with the 900bt... but I still prefer my 32gb Itouch simply because of the ease of navigating the media.

I have also used a 16gb SD card on the 900bt... So that is also an option for you.

T

There's a big thread in another forum about that.

1.8 drives sometimes work even without external power. 2.5 drives need external power, but do work (with all caveats about AVIC's ratter brain dead implementation of non-iPod sources)...