FLAC Converted to MP3 No Longer Plays on Car Stereo

[aggielaw]

I've used dbPoweramp's converter to convert my ripped .flac files to 192kHz .mp3 files for playback on my car stereo for more than 10 years. Since last November or so, files I convert to .mp3 will not show in the directory on my car stereo, which is what happens if the file type is unsupported by the stereo. Nothing has changed since the last time I converted files and they played without issue in the car--no settings have changed and no hardware has changed. I have installed two updates to dbpower amp since last November, but I don't know if either updated the converter.

For troubleshooting, I've tried converting the files to 160kHz instead of 192, using the oldest supported Lame encoded available, converting the file on my hard drive before transferring to the USB drive the car uses, and converting the file on the USB drive itself. Nothing works.

Every file I've converted that does not play in the car plays fine on every music player I have on my Windows computer.

Every file I converted using the same settings before Fall 2025 still plays fine in the car.

Does anyone have any ideas for the source of the issue? Many thanks!

[Spoon-]

Do you have access to any older mp3 files? it could be the format of the USB stick rather than the files.

[aggielaw]

Circling back on this. I copied all the files from the USB drive to a HDD on my computer. I then formatted the USB drive and copied the files back to the USB drive. All files play as they should now.

I'm fascinated to learn why reformatting the drive worked. Every file I ripped over a ten-year period played fine on the drive, and then, suddenly, no file I ripped after last Summer would play on that USB drive. I reformatted the drive to ExFAT, which should be how I formatted it originally.

Whatever the case, many thanks for the solution, Spoon! ::high five::