[Coastali8]

Yesterday I climbed into my i8 to download some new music into the files stored on the hard drive in the car. I closed the door and pushed the knob on the radio and selected “media” on the controller. I never touched the drive readiness button. After updating my music files I decided to sit in the car and enjoy the music for a few minutes. After about 10 minutes the radio turned off on its own just like it is supposed to...to protect from accessories draining the battery. I pushed the knob on the radio again to turn the music back on and continued to listen to my new music for a while longer. After a few minutes I noticed that the charging circuit had switched on because I still had the car plugged into the high voltage charger on the garage wall. The high voltage battery was now being charged.

My question is....
What is powering what?
I thought that the 12 volt battery was running the radio, interior lighting, door activation, electric windows, etc. and the high voltage battery just powered the electric drive system and high power draw accessories like heating and air conditioning.

When I read through the owner’s manual it states that if you are going to store the vehicle for an extended period of time, it is recommended to remove the 12 volt battery ( but don’t open the hood ) or place it on a trickle charger. Why not just leave the car plugged into the high voltage charger? If the high voltage charger is also charging the 12 volt battery there would be no need to charge the battery’s separately?

Is the radio being powered by the high voltage battery? What is the 12 volt battery supplying power to? Is the high voltage charging also charging the 12 volt system at the same time? Why did the radio even turn off if the charger was plugged in and the high voltage battery could be kept charged, if the radio is actually being powered by the high voltage battery? Why does the manual say to charge them separately?
Can I turn the driver seat into an electric chair and fry my brain?

I’m confused

[NGR]

All of the usual electrical items such as entertainment systems are powered from the 12v - same hardware as in other normal BMWs.

I believe the 12v battery is indeed charged from the high-voltage traction battery, which would explain why your main battery started charging after listening to music for some time - 12v depleting and in turn depleting the main battery. If the aircon/heating running, it would take much more out of the main battery than the sound system.

Pretty sure we haven't had a definitive explanation as to why you shouldn't just plug it in and leave it alone for months but I'm sure some people have and not had any problems. If I was going to leave it for a while plugged in, I'd probably remotely turn on the pre-conditioner every week just to exercise the batteries and climate controls.

Another mystery for the boffins at BMW to explain!

[Coastali8]

Thanks for the information.
There definitely seems to be a connection between the low voltage system and the high voltage system. As you say, when the 12 volt system started to be drained the high voltage system kicked on to charge it.

The air conditioner and heater wouldn’t run very long on the 12 volt battery. The manual says the pre condition only works if the vehicle is plugged in and charging or if the high voltage battery is “sufficiently charged “. That tells me that the AC and heat are powered by high voltage or maybe the low voltage backed up (charged ) by the high voltage battery?

That leaves the other normally 12 volt systems being powered by the 12 volt battery.

Then by deduction...the 12 volt battery must be connected to the high voltage system also. And leaving the vehicle plugged in should charge both batteries.
That all sounds good except for the statement in the manual about connecting a trickle charger to the 12 volt battery if the vehicle is to be stored.

Seems like BMW should tell us these things. They might be surprised that some people want to know.

I’m less confused... but still a little.

[JasH]

I can confirm that if not plugged in, the high voltage battery WILL allow the 12V battery to drain down to zero, without charging it.

This happened on the faulty courtesy i8 I had, which would not switch off its heating.

[JasH]

Originally Posted by Coastal i8

Yesterday I climbed into my i8 to download some new music into the files stored on the hard drive in the car.

How do you do this?

How big is the drive?

Can you transfer MP3 files from an iPhone to the i8 hard drive?


Thanks in advance

[Maxxsirrah]

Originally Posted by JasH

How do you do this?

How big is the drive?

Can you transfer MP3 files from an iPhone to the i8 hard drive?


Thanks in advance

OMG, you are like one of the biggest and oldest i8 fans on here and you didn't know that you could do that? (Not meant to be disparaging) (that means making someone look small for our American colleagues) (ooh, now I'm being disparaging to our American colleagues, sorry!)

[JasH]

Nope

So, what are the answers pls?

[Maxxsirrah]

Originally Posted by JasH

Nope

So, what are the answers pls?

Ok, think its 20gb, download from a usb stick into the HDD, might be able to do it thru Bluetooth, not sure, but really simples by the USB method

[JasH]

Thanks, I guess that explains it.

I've often spotted the "music on HDD" option, but never seen an option to transfer from my connected iPhone.

Logical really I guess, as iPhone undoubtedly encrypts its files. Annoying though.

[Coastali8]

Well...
I’m still a little confused about the battery charging scenario.

Regarding putting music on the hard drive in the car...
It’s fairly easy.

I think the capacity is 30gb

You first have to put your music files on a USB thumb drive on your computer. iTunes works well and there are other programs available also.

You can’t transfer files from your phone or via Bluetooth.

Just plug the USB drive into the USB connection in the center console and select Media on the controller. Select the USB hard drive from the menu that appears on the screen and select transfer files.

This is a short and not very complete explanation, but you can find many “how to” videos on YouTube that will explain the process to you in more detail. Videos about transferring files to a USB drive from your computer and videos about transferring files to the BMW. None on the i8 specifically but the BMW in general.

After saying all this, sometimes I think it’s all a wasted effort if you already have the music on your phone. Just connect via Bluetooth or the USB cable and you have the same thing. The only advantage of putting the music on the hard drive in the car is not having to connect your phone every time you get in the car and possibly better fidelity.

[JasH]

Thanks for the detailed explanation for MP3 transfer

The benefit might be more that there are times when the i8 inexplicably just refuses to play music from my iPhone X. I think the i8 software is badly out of date.

On those occasions, I could just play something from HDD.

When it happens and I am driving, it is too awkward to try and fix it on the move.

[drlonline]

Originally Posted by Maxxsirrah

OMG, you are like one of the biggest and oldest i8 fans on here and you didn't know that you could do that? (Not meant to be disparaging) (that means making someone look small for our American colleagues) (ooh, now I'm being disparaging to our American colleagues, sorry!)

Hold on, now. I thought we settled this little squabble between our two countries more than a couple of centuries ago. Remember, your king agreed he wouldn't collect taxes on our tea and we agreed we'd stop kicking your arses (that's your hiney for those less erudite readers, and erudite is, well, what our POTUS is not ).

Now back to the technical discussion, JasH, did you know that for the 2019 LCI i8, BMW incorporated a hidden feature in the infotainment system whereby one can connect an 8-track player or turntable as the music source? Very cool and super useful if one has a vast vinyl collection of classic Beatles' LP's. The option is hidden deep within iDrive 6.0, accessible via the following clicks: Media, Now Playing on Apple CarPlay, Apple CarPlay icon, Other, Miscellaneous, Can't Believe You're Still Clicking, Old Farts, Prehistoric Old Farts, How to Reset Your VCR Clock, Obscure Media Sources Your Kids Won't Recognize. Of course, you can shortcut these clicks by assigning one of the eight programmable buttons, but I find it best to avoid that and make finding it a memory test to ensure my cognitive functions are still active.

Oh, Munich is going to be so much fun.

[JasH]

[NGR]

Originally Posted by JasH

I can confirm that if not plugged in, the high voltage battery WILL allow the 12V battery to drain down to zero, without charging it.

This happened on the faulty courtesy i8 I had, which would not switch off its heating.

In this case Jas, it sounds like the main battery went flat (because of the air con/heating running) and so the 12v naturally couldn't be replenished - it's a fairly unique situation i.e. the car was knackered! I believe the climate control will be driven by a 12v system (i.e. the electronics, displays etc.) but the heat pump that actually cools or heats the air runs off the main battery.

Pre-conditioning, on mine it works even when not plugged in - is this a European thing that isn't enabled on US cars?

[JasH]

I can't prove the state of the main battery, because I failed to check it when the 12V battery was recharged using jump leads. I wish I had checked But given the amount of energy it stores I find it unlikely that it could run flat overnight.

You are correct about what the 12V battery runs, and I am sure also about the heat pump. It was warm day & night though.

My pre-conditioning also works whether it's plugged in or not. But mine is also UK of course.

[JasH]

btw, whoever goes to Leipzig next; these are perfect questions to ask the i8 team about.

As well as why they used a heavy lead acid 12V battery, instead of Lithium. Especially as the weight is quite high up, and is ahead of the front axle

After all their talk of weight reduction of every last gramme.

At least the near 1kg cupholder is removable

[JasH]

Originally Posted by Coastal i8

I think the capacity is 30gb

I tried using a 500GB portable HDD, and the i8 worked perfectly with it

The catch of course is that a 30GB capacity in the i8 is tiny

I transferred a few files as a test.

I couldn't see a delete option for the i8 HDD. How do you delete files on it?

[NGR]

Originally Posted by JasH

The catch of course is that a 30GB capacity in the i8 is tiny

30gig small? Small for storing UHD videos maybe but MP3s? At decent sample rates, that's about 3000 tunes or 300 CDs, many more if you increase compression.
Slightly better than the 6 CDs/60-100 tracks you used to get on a CD changer.

I must admit I'm surprised BMW went to the trouble of using such small drives but I suspect it's down to the system being based on 2009ish models and using a specific hard drive that is known to work and handle the harsh environment that a car can be.

[JasH]

Yes, it is small by current HDD standards. I've no idea what (if any) other cars have.

I've got about 40+ DVDs full of MP3s. That's over 200GB.

Plus all my original music CDs, but those are on my 256GB iPhone.

[Coastali8]

I’ve got about 1200 music files in the HDD in the car and it is only using 6GB. Also the HDD In the car is 20 GB capacity.

If you want to delete a music file, select the file then press the option button on the controller. Delete is one of the options listed.

[JasH]

Thanks, yes I found that today, thanks to Ghetto2315's post in the other thread

Yes, 20GB confirmed, from that menu that opened when I tried to delete files.

[evanevery]

Originally Posted by JasH

Yes, it is small by current HDD standards. I've no idea what (if any) other cars have.

I've got about 40+ DVDs full of MP3s. That's over 200GB.

Plus all my original music CDs, but those are on my 256GB iPhone.

You might be better served to maintain your master library of music in an open source, generic, repository (folder of MP3's) rather than committing it to all the proprietary nonsense of the iPhone universe...

I have ALL of my music ripped to MP3 and only then do it copy it into iTunes. That way I can get to my music from any device, anwhere, anytime and not be subject to what devices and methods that have been blessed by the Apple marketing engine. Yup, I still got everything in iTunes if I want to go that way, but I can also easily copy any of my music out of my master MP3 library to any device (like a USB drive) to be played anywhere with no Apple or DRM issues...

You don't NEED to be a slave to Apple!