# A Model 3 Audio System for Dummies-type Question



## Charlie W (Apr 23, 2016)

Those of you who are tech & audio savvy may have trouble believing people like me still exist, but I find the Model 3 audio system a tad challenging. (Again, I apologize for being the last person on the planet with this problem.)

While I have no trouble picking out & playing any of the 1000+ songs on my flash drive using the "USB" button, or playing CDs thru an FM transmitter using a portable CD player & the "Radio" button, I can't figure out how to access specific streaming-items (I think that's the correct term) using the "Magnifying Glass" (search) button.

As a recent example, on the audio screen, I clicked the magnifying glass-icon and did a search for comedian "Jerry Seinfeld." Next, I tapped the "Songs" heading. Wow, I got 2 column of his stand-up comic routines. Then, I tapped the file I wanted to hear ("Horses") and ... something completely different played ... AND by another comedian! That happens to me again & again -- being unable to play specific files I saw being listed. Similarly, I can't figure out how to play the first item on the search results list and have it play/work its way down the list.

So friends, how do you do it? How do you get specific "things" -- comics, songs, podcasts, whatever -- to play? What am I doing wrong? Maybe there would be hope for people like me if someone made a "Model 3 Audio System for Dummies"-type book. (Just kidding ... I think.)

By the way, although I was initially disappointed that Tesla's don't have AM radios, I was willing to stream my favorite AM All-News station. And then on Aug. 6, my favorite station changed from being a "Tune-In" station to a "Radio.com" station ... and that was the end of that!

My final "By the way" concerns those on the eastern USA coast & Hawaiian Islands, considering the current stormy weather: Be careful & safe, friends.

~Charlie

Mods: feel free to move, edit, shorten, delete, poke fun at my post. I appreciate all you do to keep this the best Tesla forum. CW


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## FRC (Aug 4, 2018)

Are us non-moderators allowed to move, edit, shorten, delete and most importantly poke fun? Seriously though, I am also minimally tech-savvy and, while I don't get my car til next week, I'm sure I'll encounter similar issues. Thanks to all who are willing to lend a tech hand to us dinosaurs.


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## Ed Woodrick (May 26, 2018)

With the Slacker subscription available in the car, you are not allowed to create detailed play lists. The streaming license mimics one of a FM radio station. You can call a station to play a sing, they may, or may not so. If you don't like the songs that the station is playing, you can change the channel. That's just the way that the licensing works.

If you say "Play Jerry Seinfeld" you will get a mixture of works by him and others like him. You may get a specific skit, but you aren't allowed to do it more than once in a specific period, which is like a day.

There is a lot of pressure from folks to add other sources, so I suspect that they will be added at some point along the line.


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## John (Apr 16, 2016)

If you pay for a Slacker streaming subscription and then enter your login in the car, you can play whatever you want.
Otherwise, it acts like Pandora—you hear stuff "like" what you were searching for.

P.S. Those of us who already subscribe to Slacker have seen our playlists disabled for the past month. It seems like they are about to offer Spotify in the US, based on evidence users of the very latest software releases have seen from their routers. There is suddenly Spotify traffic in latest version where there has been none in the past.


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## FRC (Aug 4, 2018)

Going on a long range trip in October, are audiobooks a possibility with this system? I've been waiting 896 days for this car and this question just occured to me..


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## GDN (Oct 30, 2017)

I haven’t had a problem playing any specific song just by holding the button down and asking for it to play me a song, but I have not ventured off the path to have it list an artist and then select a song. Last week for the first time I was going to set an FM station as a favorite and could not quickly find out how. If it is intuitive and easy I just over looked it and made it harder than it needs to be I guess. 

And I can only speak for O’ahu but pretty much escaped Olivia. Lots of rain yesterday when we landed and this morning. Hasn’t stopped beaches, pools and alcohol this afternoon however. Still kind of overcast but the vacation will go on. 

Have seen the Tesla store, one X and a Ranger since arriving.


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## garsh (Apr 4, 2016)

FRC said:


> Going on a long range trip in October, are audiobooks a possibility with this system?


You can always use bluetooth streaming to play stuff from your phone. So if you can listen to audiobooks on your phone, then it will work.


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## Emerald AP (Sep 10, 2018)

OP's questions are not naive at all. I've been similarly annoyed with Slacker's innate desire to variety seek (jump from jazz to hip hop, or just abouts). I'm sure several of us are eagerly awaiting the switch to Spotify; just hope it happens and it's not random residual code fragments in the sw logs...


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