Which Bluetooth handfree car kit?
Discussion
I want to get the girlfriend a bluetooth handsfree phone kit for the car. One with some kind of speaker/mic - not an ear-wax remover as she won't use those (bought her one last year and it never got used).
I've seen a nice looking device from Parrot with a little remote screen - looks very trick.
Any suggestions for good options? Her car is an Audi TT by the way.
Ta.
I've seen a nice looking device from Parrot with a little remote screen - looks very trick.
Any suggestions for good options? Her car is an Audi TT by the way.
Ta.
Dont know about the Parrot one, but I went for a Nokia one (C7 thingy from eBay for £60). Works a treat and importantly connects automatically. Not sure if all BT car kits work this way, but previous ones I have had dont.
Basically, get in the car and start it up - connects to car kit and thats it. Turn off engine and it disconnects. Doesnt matter where the phone is and can use voice dialing or the handset. The little button even has a status light so you can tell if its working correctly or not.....
The Nokia one has a separate speaker so is OK on sound quality. But the parrot one works via the stereo doesnt it? I couldnt do this as the BMW I have is DSP equiped. This means the amp in the boot does all of the speakers and attempting to wire one to the headunit would be a technical nightmare and more effort than its worth. But thats BMW for you - check if your head unit can be done this way, as I suspect if your car has the Bose stereo it might be the same..... speak to a professional installer on the Parrot though, its not simple if the car is wired funny....
Oh, and worth checking out the electrics for the TT - a friend as a new shape A3 and its all bus electricals. No permanent live and everything is switched - so plugging in something into the loom is a nightmare and needs an adaptor.... bloody car electrics eh?
Edited to add : sorry if I am scaring you off - I am not. If you have a headunit which is nice and simple then its a sinch and a 30 minute job (including hiding the wires). But check things out first is all I am saying.
>> Edited by off_again on Friday 11th November 12:16
Basically, get in the car and start it up - connects to car kit and thats it. Turn off engine and it disconnects. Doesnt matter where the phone is and can use voice dialing or the handset. The little button even has a status light so you can tell if its working correctly or not.....
The Nokia one has a separate speaker so is OK on sound quality. But the parrot one works via the stereo doesnt it? I couldnt do this as the BMW I have is DSP equiped. This means the amp in the boot does all of the speakers and attempting to wire one to the headunit would be a technical nightmare and more effort than its worth. But thats BMW for you - check if your head unit can be done this way, as I suspect if your car has the Bose stereo it might be the same..... speak to a professional installer on the Parrot though, its not simple if the car is wired funny....
Oh, and worth checking out the electrics for the TT - a friend as a new shape A3 and its all bus electricals. No permanent live and everything is switched - so plugging in something into the loom is a nightmare and needs an adaptor.... bloody car electrics eh?
Edited to add : sorry if I am scaring you off - I am not. If you have a headunit which is nice and simple then its a sinch and a 30 minute job (including hiding the wires). But check things out first is all I am saying.
>> Edited by off_again on Friday 11th November 12:16
off_again said:
Dont know about the Parrot one, but I went for a Nokia one (C7 thingy from eBay for £60). Works a treat and importantly connects automatically. Not sure if all BT car kits work this way, but previous ones I have had dont.
Basically, get in the car and start it up - connects to car kit and thats it. Turn off engine and it disconnects. Doesnt matter where the phone is and can use voice dialing or the handset. The little button even has a status light so you can tell if its working correctly or not.....
The Nokia one has a separate speaker so is OK on sound quality. But the parrot one works via the stereo doesnt it? I couldnt do this as the BMW I have is DSP equiped. This means the amp in the boot does all of the speakers and attempting to wire one to the headunit would be a technical nightmare and more effort than its worth. But thats BMW for you - check if your head unit can be done this way, as I suspect if your car has the Bose stereo it might be the same..... speak to a professional installer on the Parrot though, its not simple if the car is wired funny....
Oh, and worth checking out the electrics for the TT - a friend as a new shape A3 and its all bus electricals. No permanent live and everything is switched - so plugging in something into the loom is a nightmare and needs an adaptor.... bloody car electrics eh?
Edited to add : sorry if I am scaring you off - I am not. If you have a headunit which is nice and simple then its a sinch and a 30 minute job (including hiding the wires). But check things out first is all I am saying.
>> Edited by off_again on Friday 11th November 12:16
Thanks. Our TT has Bose, but the same headunit as my A6 so I'll pull it out and take a look behind the scenes (I fitted a full Nokia car kit to my A6 so I'm OK with fiddling). Even just being able to mute the stereo might be sufficient... most have a mute lead hanging about.
T/.
I'll second the Nokia kits.
Previously had a CK-1W in a Bora and it worked perfectly.
Having a CK-7W fitted on monday in new car - Audi A3 - could be interesting bearing in mind off_again's comments re wiring system.
Will provide some feedback on Monday afternoon as to how installer gets on.
SMP
Previously had a CK-1W in a Bora and it worked perfectly.
Having a CK-7W fitted on monday in new car - Audi A3 - could be interesting bearing in mind off_again's comments re wiring system.
Will provide some feedback on Monday afternoon as to how installer gets on.
SMP
Yeah bloody BMW's! The DSP system is effectively a power amp in the boot (adds echo effects to the music if you want - which sounds crap anyway). The problem is that the feed from the head unit is fixed volume via a mini coax cable. It is then the amp which is controlled for volume etc. Ok in principle but the problem becomes trying to wire anything else in. You actually have nothing other than power and data information from the headunit (except the mini coax to the amp) - so there isnt any mute or even speaker wires to intercept (as in the Parrot solution). Everything needs to be done at the amp, and guess what - little information available on how this is wired!!!
This meant I needed an external speaker system and Nokia was the obvious way forward - especially as I have a Nokia phone. I used to have a Pioneer headunit which supported BT, which worked a treat. The only problem was that you had to connect to it each and every time. Bit of a pain if you forgot. But at least you can control the phonebook from the remote control, though there was an awful echo on it - something that the Nokia doesnt have.
As for modern Audi's / VW's - yeah bit of a problem. The A3 my friend has (and he's a bit of a whiz with electrics) is the new sportback model so very new. He didnt want to spend the £2000 for the premium stereo and phone setup so went for the basic Concert stereo IIRC. Ripped that out and added a top-of-the-line Blaupunkt one instead. But finding a permanent live was a real nightmare. It was connected to the bus electrics for the car and hence it received a pulse when the ignition was turned on. A small convertor in the headunit then picked up the message and hence powered on accordingly. But obviously this wasnt going to work with traditional headunit as it needed permanent live, earth and ignition at least. As a result he had to hunt around to find a permanent live and earth, resorting to wiring straight from the fuse box (which is fairly convenient at least - the BMW's is split between the glovebox and the boot!!!). Still, succeeded in the end but was a major faff. At least he didnt have Bose so no power amps etc and a simple block convertor for the speakers.....
I guess its a good idea, but complexity is a nightmare. Imagine what the amateur car mechanics will be doing in 5-10 years time? Plugging in computers to get the flipping lights to come on... what happened to just wiring the car up in the first place?
This meant I needed an external speaker system and Nokia was the obvious way forward - especially as I have a Nokia phone. I used to have a Pioneer headunit which supported BT, which worked a treat. The only problem was that you had to connect to it each and every time. Bit of a pain if you forgot. But at least you can control the phonebook from the remote control, though there was an awful echo on it - something that the Nokia doesnt have.
As for modern Audi's / VW's - yeah bit of a problem. The A3 my friend has (and he's a bit of a whiz with electrics) is the new sportback model so very new. He didnt want to spend the £2000 for the premium stereo and phone setup so went for the basic Concert stereo IIRC. Ripped that out and added a top-of-the-line Blaupunkt one instead. But finding a permanent live was a real nightmare. It was connected to the bus electrics for the car and hence it received a pulse when the ignition was turned on. A small convertor in the headunit then picked up the message and hence powered on accordingly. But obviously this wasnt going to work with traditional headunit as it needed permanent live, earth and ignition at least. As a result he had to hunt around to find a permanent live and earth, resorting to wiring straight from the fuse box (which is fairly convenient at least - the BMW's is split between the glovebox and the boot!!!). Still, succeeded in the end but was a major faff. At least he didnt have Bose so no power amps etc and a simple block convertor for the speakers.....
I guess its a good idea, but complexity is a nightmare. Imagine what the amateur car mechanics will be doing in 5-10 years time? Plugging in computers to get the flipping lights to come on... what happened to just wiring the car up in the first place?
Where do people hide that fugly Nokia speaker though? On the TT there is no room under the seat, I guess I need to mount it under the dash as far out of site as possible - but then can you hear it?
My brother has an E36 3 series into which we've installed a lovely Blaupunkt DAB 54 - I'm thinking I might get him a bluetooth car kit for Chrimbo now ... At least that will easier to pull live/mute cables from!
My brother has an E36 3 series into which we've installed a lovely Blaupunkt DAB 54 - I'm thinking I might get him a bluetooth car kit for Chrimbo now ... At least that will easier to pull live/mute cables from!
targarama said:
Where do people hide that fugly Nokia speaker though? On the TT there is no room under the seat, I guess I need to mount it under the dash as far out of site as possible - but then can you hear it?
My brother has an E36 3 series into which we've installed a lovely Blaupunkt DAB 54 - I'm thinking I might get him a bluetooth car kit for Chrimbo now ... At least that will easier to pull live/mute cables from!
My speaker is in the passenger footwell - right at the front and you cant see it. Sound quality is good and it does have a volume adjuster on it (on the master button). Works fine and easy to hear. Only problem is that you need to keep the mic and speaker as far away from each other as possible - to cut down on feedback and echo. But works fine this way. Its not perfect - that would be via the car stereo speakers - but its as good as it can be without spending large amounts of cash.
targarama said:
Where do people hide that fugly Nokia speaker though? On the TT there is no room under the seat, I guess I need to mount it under the dash as far out of site as possible - but then can you hear it?
I have a Nokia 610 Bluetooth car phone kit (been superceded by 616?) it connects to the car stereo and interrupts the music with 'Phone' display on the dash so that I don't need the speaker. It is a top piece of kit with full 'Car Phone' operation using sim access etc and very neat with just a small screen and a button/wheel/controller/thingy on show, only works with certain phones though (mine is a 6230i).
http://europe.nokia.com/nokia/0,,72588,00.html
>> Edited by catso on Friday 11th November 14:20
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