Well, I just went out and scrolled through a few dozen albums (even ones I KNEW had album art that was huge and extremely detailed) and they all looked the exact same degree of pixelation.

William - what happens if you take the Ting Tings art you said looked bad from your iPhone and viewed it on the Nano model that these other decent looking images are on; is there a difference then?

I'd be interested to try and narrow it down to just device, or if the art is somehow always crappy, when other may not be, no matter the device - let us know.

(Edit: Also, as far as I can tell, the art looks just about the same as the pixelation on my 5G iPod to tell you the truth - I mean, since I don't have that album myself, it's hard to say, but I might buy even one track just so I can take an image to compare them to see if your resolution is the same)

Cheers,

Kev

ALL album artwork looks perfect on my iPod nano - well, as perfect as I've ever seen on the Avics. There's definitely something wrong with the way these artworks are being rendered on the Avics by the iPhone, various iPods, my old iPod nano 1st gen etc. Don't forget these artworks are never going to look as good as they do on your computer etc because the AVIC is an 800x480 resolution device. That tiny square for your artwork isn't very many pixels anyway. That said, it shouldn't look as bad as the other images posted, and should look as good as my images. This does appear to be device dependent.

Don't buy any tracks to test this. Just go to Amazon.com, save the cover art and put it into a track you downloaded already in the "Get Info" of the track. I tested the Ting Tings track by downloading the cover art from Amazon's Ting Tings page and applying it to a Muse album I already owned. No need to buy any music to test this.

Have we not got a definate answer on this yet, it is highly annoying on such an expensive item

Have we not got a definate answer on this yet, it is highly annoying on such an expensive item

And despite my discussion on the fact that there are multiple pieces of art/thumbnail in the MP3 process, it's as if no one has seen it.

The answer is that it's not a 100% every unit, every song, every ipod situation.

Following on from MR WOMO's post, I've done some further research into this. I too have seen the pixely artwork, I've got a 80GB 5.5G Ipod, and a 16GB Iphone 3G, hooking into a F900BT. When I first tried my 5.5G ipod, I thought the album artwork on the headunit was a bit pixelated...until I tried the iphone, and it was much much worse...

Made me want to accept the slightly pixelated artwork from the 5.5G Ipod as good Don't know what you have until you lose it!

Anyway, a bit more research into this revealed the following post from an ipod forum:

http://forums.ilounge.com/showpost.php? ... stcount=94

As can be seen by the chart, it seems to be taking the lowest resolution album art it can find on the ipod/iphone(not sure if the ipod is sending the artwork, or the F900 is pulling the artwork) and using that for the artwork. so for the ipod, its taking the 100x100 artwork, and for the iphone, its pulling the 64x64 artwork. Confimed this by looking at the pictures that MR WOMO posted as example images. He seems to have similar hardware to mine with respect to ipod/iphones. The one he's listed as "Terrible album art" is from his 5G, and I did a quick count and guesstimate of the number of pixels that picture is showing and I would say its close to 100x100. Did the same thing with the one listed as "Super terrible album art" which is from an iphone 3Gs and that would come close to 64x64.

The album artwork is stored on the ipod/iphone on .ITHMB files and I've been trying(unsuccessfully) to manipulate these files to display the artwork in the higher resolutions(which our AVICs screens are more than capable of I'm pretty sure), but no luck so far. on my ipod, I have two versions of the album art, one's a 100x100(currently displayed on the F900BT), and a 200x200, both stored in different .ITHMB files. I tried stuff like renaming the lower resolution .ITHMB file(caused the ipod not to be recognised), and other weird stuff.

Maybe some code can be changed on the AVIC headunits to try and pull the higher resolution artwork, rather than going to the lowest?

Anyway, hope this helps someone else who might be looking into this. Right now, the album artwork is "acceptable" from my ipod, but thats due to blind luck that the lowest resolution artwork my ipod stores is at 100x100. If i had one of the other ipods with even lower resolution artwork stored, I would be pretty annoyed.

i know my ipod touch 8gb is pixelated bad

Interesting thread, I'm curious to see if a solution is possible. I have a 32GB iPhone 3GS and I get terribly pixelated artwork for most any song I've looked at on the unit.

I doubt there'll be a fix ever since I noticed the problem, I've been trying a few things, manipulating the thmb files on the ipod/iphone, trying to get the headunit to pick up the higher resolution pics, etc..no luck so far.

Think this will require some code change on the headunit itself.

Hello,

I have an ipod touch 64gb and also have the frustrating album art issue. I had avic 910's installed in both of my company trucks and my employee has a 160 Ipod classic, his art shows perfectly.

Pioneer advertises that there artwork will "display beautifully" and is compatible with Ipod touch and Iphone. As we have all seen this is not the case.

I am 99% sure that this issue is thumbnail related and specifically determined by which ipod you're using, it seems the Ipod touch and Iphone are susceptible to this problem, while most of the older models work fine.

I am sure there is a way to rectify this, and if every one on this board called pioneer at 1.800.421.1404 AND filled out this form on their site: http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PUSA/AboutPioneer/Contact+Us

they would issue a firmware update to rectify. If you are within you're warranty period I would specifically mention this to Pioneer, as whether intentional or not, these units do not work as advertised.

And buy all means, if anyone discovers a workaround/fix, please share. Also if you all have contacted Pioneer and gotten nowhere, please let me know ASAP, as I'll probably return mine.

Hello,

 

I have an ipod touch 64gb and also have the frustrating album art issue. I had avic 910's installed in both of my company trucks and my employee has a 160 Ipod classic, his art shows perfectly.

 

Pioneer advertises that there artwork will "display beautifully" and is compatible with Ipod touch and Iphone. As we have all seen this is not the case.

 

I am 99% sure that this issue is thumbnail related and specifically determined by which ipod you're using, it seems the Ipod touch and Iphone are susceptible to this problem, while most of the older models work fine.

 

I am sure there is a way to rectify this, and if every one on this board called pioneer at 1.800.421.1404 AND filled out this form on their site: http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/PUSA/AboutPioneer/Contact+Us

they would issue a firmware update to rectify. If you are within you're warranty period I would specifically mention this to Pioneer, as whether intentional or not, these units do not work as advertised.

 

And buy all means, if anyone discovers a workaround/fix, please share. Also if you all have contacted Pioneer and gotten nowhere, please let me know ASAP, as I'll probably return mine.

Just FYI guys, I used a 16 GB iPhone 3G last summer with the F90BT and the following happened:

entire album art: pixelated

some albums slightly less blurry but still crappy: yes

tried loading literally one song onto iPhone with high res album art: Yes (still blurry on AVIC)

So, please note though that this was when I was still on the initial firmware the F90BT was released with...I no longer have an iPhone (switched to the BB Tour and love it) but I have upgraded to 3.02 firmware and will try album artwork again with a 5G Nano...I'll update again with my experience...

In the Meantime, the following email path between myself and Pioneer might shed light on how little they know of or care about the problem when I immediately contacted them after reading barabbas70's post:

My Message......

--Original Message--

From: [email protected]

Date: 11/20/09

To: [email protected]

Subject: Feature and Specification|B00002|2062273199[#1277576]

FirstName:Angelo

LastName:DePaolo

Email:[email protected]

Address:********************

City:Seattle

State:WA

Zip:*****

Phone:**********

Inquiry Type:Feature and Specification

lstPublishers:0002

lstTitles:B00002-Car Products-Navigation

Inquiry:My AVIC-F90BTcannot correctly display album art from my Apple iPhone 3G. The artwork looks beautiful on my computer, and my iPhone. On the F90, it looks terrible, meaning pixelated and very blurry like it is attempting to show a very small thumbnail image versus the native image that is much better quality. Please advise. Thank you.

Pioneer's Message...........

[email protected]

to me

show details Nov 23 (1 day ago)

Thanks for contacting Pioneer Electronics, Inc.

Based on your e-mail request, we feel that we can be of better assistance if you contact our Product Support line.

Please contact us at (800)421-1404 for further assistance.

Thank You,

Pioneer Support Group

I have not called them since I was just curious if they'd share some info on acknowledging this issue really exists but without my 5G Nano I still need to get, it seemed pointless to call them and troubleshoot right away. oh well, keeping my fingers crossed since I did so much work to get "beautiful artwork" on my computer.

i just figured that i would add that i am seeing the same thing with my x910bt and my iphone 3gs 16gb. hopefully pioneer can come up with a solution. for the time being, keeping the artist info below the smaller thumbnail makes it bearable to look it.

I just signed up due to finding this thread...although I lurked here before deciding to buy my AVH-P4200DVD HU.

Just called pioneer customer support and had a short and unhelpful call with a customer rep.

I explained that my iPhone 3G displayed very pixelated/blurry art work and that it was a common problem being discussed in various online communities. The rep said she was aware of some minor issues and placed me on hold to check for an updates.

Within 2 minutes she came and explained there was no fix, there were plans for a fix, and there was nothing they could do about it. I questioned her about ongoing development of the product which was new for 2010 and if there would be any software updates or if I could escalate this to anyone else. She rather testily explained she could transfer me such that I could log a complaint and that there was no escalation path for me to pursue in efforts to resolve this issue.

Very poor customer service in my opinion. I watched product demonstrations and read everything I could find about the head unit before purchasing it...seems I didn't make the good decision I thought I had.

Anybody else have any updates?

well i can say that i now have an ipod classic 160gb and it is not even close to as blurry as with my iphone 3gs. i can only imagine it it something about the way certain ipods & iphones send the album art.

well i can say that i now have an ipod classic 160gb and it is not even close to as blurry as with my iphone 3gs. i can only imagine it it something about the way certain ipods & iphones send the album art.

Yes, we've been saying that for over a year, the ipod touch and the iphones present the artwork to the AVIC in a different way then the Classic's do.

Supposedly the new iphone firmware(v4.0) fixes this issue, as has been reported in other threads in this forum.

Out of luck though if you have an older ipod which still comes up with blurry album art, as I doubt Apple will be releasing firmware updates for long superseded models. My iPod gen5.5 80gb has "slightly" blurry art, while my gf's year old nano comes out super sharp.

Hi,

I have done extensive research on this problem. I had a Kenwood that would display blurry artwork. I tried my Ipod on a Alpine, and that too displayed blurry artwork. So its not a Pioneer problem. I have tried various different resolutions, still the same. The Kenwood also display artwork from a USB stick, so I tried with that and it was clear. Used the same file with the same artwork embedded into the file it was blurry. So I determined that the problem lay with the Ipod. I then reset the firmware to the original setting it came with from the factory, still the same. I then borrowed different Ipods from friend, I tried a Nano, it was clear, tried a 5th gen 30gb and it was clear, yet my Classic 80gb was blurry. What was different between the 5th gen and Classic, since the Classic replaced the 5th gen. I then came across a web page that described how the cover flow works on the classic. I checked and the 5th gen does not have cover flow. For some reason the cover flow Ipods do not get the artwork from the embedded artwork in the file. Instead it takes the embedded artwork, and transfers it to a separate folder in the ipod somewhere, when it does this is looses its quality when transmitted to another unit. The embedded artwork it still there, but does not get transmitted. From what I can see, only the Classic and newer Ipods have this problem. I don't know if Apple have ever fixed this problem since I gave up and got a 5th gen. From reading on here no.

Koush