2007-2009 ACM (iPod) Owners : Happy?
 

I am picking up a 2007 XK without the ACM.

Dealer told me its still available but that it has been a source of trouble and advised against it.

So, how have your experiences been. Besides the obvious dated nature of the technology, has it been reliable? Decent sound quality? Did I ask about reliable (will it work when I ask it to all the time)?

As we are an iPhone family, I would probably do an Tune2Air or some aux connection (iPod to lighting for charge, aux in for audio).

Your experiences are appreciated.

-dsd

I use a roidmi fm transmitter in my glovebox outlet, which will both charge my phone, and will transmit via Bluetooth to the radio so I can play the tunes from my iphone over the car sound system. A bit clunky but it works. The phone itself syncs right up with no problem.

Android user here but just added tune2air for a test project and it works fine with my ACM. Prior to that I used an iPod Nano touch which also worked without glitches.

The ACM software is not being updated as time passes like your phone, so time may be causing issues that he's referring to. It's possible the newer tach iPhones have issues with the older ACM, same as the bluetooth phone module that comes with the car.

I use USB, an older I-pod, and CD's in my 2009.

Aside from I need some form of adapter I don't have to charge the I-pod, no problems.

I did have a time my USB stick stopped working properly, but I plugged it into a computer, took off and added some files, and it worked again.

Some of my music doesn't sound to great from a .mp3 format, for these I use the USB or CD.

Frankly, the sound system in the car is not a high point.

Same here. CDs sound the best I bought a couple of old iPods to use and they work perfectly. I like being able to switch tracks and playlists with the steering wheel controls.

I added an ACM to my old '07 XKR then took it out again. I removed it for two reasons, one because once you started playing music from the source it would keep cycling through the tracks or playlist even if you switched to a different source but the main reason was because the FM reception was affected.

I had disabled the electric aerial and added a marine one instead shorty after I bought the car so that had already affected reception but the ACM made my favourite radio station very crackly. When that eventually went off the air I decide to try the ACM again and bought a WMA1000/Tune2Air so that I could stream bluetooth music from Spotify. That worked really well although you didn't get any track information on the touch screen.

I am also an iPhone user and never had issues using it with any of them. That included an iPhone 8 Plus with the latest version of IOS.

I did try a couple of cheap FM transmitters in my other cars and although they worked fine the quality of them was no where near as good. I also had issues with radio broadcasts interfering with the signal as I moved from area to area.

I installed the ACM in my 07. I use a 4th Gen iPod and can't imagine life without it. I've NEVER had any trouble. Zero. I don't use the other inputs. Used 4th Gen ipods are cheap and all over ebay.

I thought it was a waste of money and hardly used it, but if that is the only factory option to achieve listening to my iPhone in the car I'd still do it.