Fairphone 6, eOS 2.03 - setting up the stock Music app

/e/OS Devices Fairphone
, ,
1

Hello! Previous iOS user, migrated to /e/OS with FairPhone 6 last week. Love it! Got a couple of questions and figured I’d separate each question in its own thread…

I want to listen to my music in my car. I subscribe to Deezer and have SoundCloud/Mixcloud accounts. My choice with /e/OS is to not install Google apps. Therefore the option to use Android Auto is not available to me at present. I also have my (old) music library which I sometimes add to, legitimately, backed up to Proton Drive.

I tried to look up a guide to using the stock Music app. It’s not very clear to me how it works. I thought it might be possible to connect the phone to my computer, and transfer some tracks and mixes to the internal storage for playback using Music. My Macbook does not recognise the FairPhone when it’s plugged in - however I have a feeling it’s because I’m using the charge cable and I think I need a data-specific cable. An apple USB-C cable didn’t work, so I will need to try buying the FairPhone one. However, the FairPhone cable is USB 3.2 - whereas the port on FairPhone 6 is USB 2.0 - will that still work?

I have tried to access the Files app, then Proton Drive, then listen from there… but the streaming quality is truly awful.

However, I am able to access Proton Drive and download music into the Music folder of the phone, and access that in the stock Music app. I really like the visualiser :slight_smile:

Whilst not ideal, this seems like a good workaround to get music on my phone. Now, when I connect my phone to my car (Toyota Yaris Cross Hybrid, 2023), it connects for Calls and Media - but no matter what, I can’t get my music to play through the car speakers.

I did notice other options in the Music app. Pressing on Fairphone allows you to add ‘Providers’ and then ended server details for Subsonic / Navidrome / Jellyfin. I’ve never heard of these - a quick look online shows these are media servers. I’ve never ever set these up - and it’s intrigued me. If I won’t use Android Auto, will using one of these servers work in my car? I am thinking no, but I am interested to hear anyone else’s experience of this app.

1 Like
2

macos cable detection woes? not sure if this still applies: Transfer your data to-and-from /e/phone via USB cable - #6 by petefoth

for a file centric life (music and in general), syncthing is great. Uses local wifi, there’s 2 macos packages: synctrain or the seasoned release: syncthing-macos. Adhoc transfer: localsend.

Car: this is FP6 via Bluetooth to car speakers and it isn’t working?

Subsonic support by default is great, it’s simple technology. The easiest way to give this a spin is to run navidrome on your mac? gives you access to the whole library while doing something else in the house, without prior file sync. That said, I had better results with other clients than the default: Tempo, Subtracks with my badly tagged library. But then I run adhoc supysonic from folders host side.

3

Yes, it is still the case that MacOS does not play well with connected Android devices in MTP / file transfer mode. I still use OpenMTP as described in that post. Of course you need a working cable as well :smile:

2 Likes