djawol
05-12-2002, 18:06
Parrott CK3000 Bluetooth Car Kit
I've now had a month or so of use out of the carkit so here's the review -
First things first, Bluetooth is a wireless communication standard, think along the lines of infra red ports on your mobile that you've used for a two player game of Snake. However the benefit of Bluetooth is that you don't have to have the two devices in sight of each other and it will theoretically work up to 50 metres away. (Makes for an interesting game of Battleships on the T68(i) in the office. :)
Forget your idea of a normal carkit, you don't have a big cradle stuck on your dash somewhere and you don't need to have a big speaker for the sound as it's routed through the standard headunit and front speakers. All I have is a microphone just next to the interior light and a small set of buttons that come out just behind the indicator stalk for taking and receiving calls (for use with a Nokia phone, for those of us with Ericsson's it's all voice activated. :)) See attached blurry picture.
When you get in the car for the first time, ensure that Bluetooth is switched on and turn on the ignition. The carkit will ask you to pair the phone which takes a couple of seconds and then if you have an Ericsson it'll download your entire phonebook into the unit for use. Then everytime you get in after that it automatically finds the phone and checks in case it has any new numbers to add. (If you have a Nokia with Bluetooth like a 6310 you have to use the onboard voice activated option) You can use it with up to four phones but only one set of numbers is stored locally.
It takes a bit of time to record a name to add to each phonebook record and then it's ready to use.
That's it, nothing to plug in. I keep my mobile in my pocket out of sight so I'm not tempted to touch it.
To make a call you say "Telephone" the unit beeps and then you say a name of one of your contacts i.e. "Sally". It will then dial if you only have one record or if you have your names stored with multiple numbers like :-
Sally
Home
Mobile
Work
it beeps again so that you can say Home, Work, Mobile.
To hangup the call say "Hangup" and it cuts off.
The unit will mute the Aura head unit quite happily and the display says "PHONE" on it. When you've finished it puts the
sound back at the "on volume" level that's set on your unit. If the head unit isn't on then it routes it to the speakers anyway.
When you have an incoming call it mutes the stereo, plays a tone and then tells you in your own recorded voice (if they're stored in your Parrott memory) who it is that is calling. You can then say "Phone" or "Hangup" to take or drop the call. Dead simple.
I've had no problems with it yet, it has a good clear sound and I've been able to hold conversations on the motorway quite
easily and people have even asked me where I am as they can't hear the car at lower speeds.
I bought mine from www.expansys.com as they were the cheapest and had next day delivery. I ordered it online at 11:00 and it was shipped at 12:15 the same day. I had it fitted by Amethyst before I picked the R up and they seemed to find it straightforward, it's just an ISO block for the stereo/speakers and it's working fine in conjuction with my Amp too.
:cheers:
Andy
P.S
I'm using this with an Ericsson T68 with the updated T68i software installed which if you didn't know is a free upgrade from
SonyEricsson. The T68 and i are exactly the same phone but in a different case. If you have a T68 and haven't had the update you're missing out. It's like a competely different phone, many times faster texting, as many pictures as you can fit included animated gif screensavers, Picture Messaging, the sound recorder can record up to 1879 seconds now instead of 140 seconds which considering it's the same size of memory is impressive. Well worth it.
I've now had a month or so of use out of the carkit so here's the review -
First things first, Bluetooth is a wireless communication standard, think along the lines of infra red ports on your mobile that you've used for a two player game of Snake. However the benefit of Bluetooth is that you don't have to have the two devices in sight of each other and it will theoretically work up to 50 metres away. (Makes for an interesting game of Battleships on the T68(i) in the office. :)
Forget your idea of a normal carkit, you don't have a big cradle stuck on your dash somewhere and you don't need to have a big speaker for the sound as it's routed through the standard headunit and front speakers. All I have is a microphone just next to the interior light and a small set of buttons that come out just behind the indicator stalk for taking and receiving calls (for use with a Nokia phone, for those of us with Ericsson's it's all voice activated. :)) See attached blurry picture.
When you get in the car for the first time, ensure that Bluetooth is switched on and turn on the ignition. The carkit will ask you to pair the phone which takes a couple of seconds and then if you have an Ericsson it'll download your entire phonebook into the unit for use. Then everytime you get in after that it automatically finds the phone and checks in case it has any new numbers to add. (If you have a Nokia with Bluetooth like a 6310 you have to use the onboard voice activated option) You can use it with up to four phones but only one set of numbers is stored locally.
It takes a bit of time to record a name to add to each phonebook record and then it's ready to use.
That's it, nothing to plug in. I keep my mobile in my pocket out of sight so I'm not tempted to touch it.
To make a call you say "Telephone" the unit beeps and then you say a name of one of your contacts i.e. "Sally". It will then dial if you only have one record or if you have your names stored with multiple numbers like :-
Sally
Home
Mobile
Work
it beeps again so that you can say Home, Work, Mobile.
To hangup the call say "Hangup" and it cuts off.
The unit will mute the Aura head unit quite happily and the display says "PHONE" on it. When you've finished it puts the
sound back at the "on volume" level that's set on your unit. If the head unit isn't on then it routes it to the speakers anyway.
When you have an incoming call it mutes the stereo, plays a tone and then tells you in your own recorded voice (if they're stored in your Parrott memory) who it is that is calling. You can then say "Phone" or "Hangup" to take or drop the call. Dead simple.
I've had no problems with it yet, it has a good clear sound and I've been able to hold conversations on the motorway quite
easily and people have even asked me where I am as they can't hear the car at lower speeds.
I bought mine from www.expansys.com as they were the cheapest and had next day delivery. I ordered it online at 11:00 and it was shipped at 12:15 the same day. I had it fitted by Amethyst before I picked the R up and they seemed to find it straightforward, it's just an ISO block for the stereo/speakers and it's working fine in conjuction with my Amp too.
:cheers:
Andy
P.S
I'm using this with an Ericsson T68 with the updated T68i software installed which if you didn't know is a free upgrade from
SonyEricsson. The T68 and i are exactly the same phone but in a different case. If you have a T68 and haven't had the update you're missing out. It's like a competely different phone, many times faster texting, as many pictures as you can fit included animated gif screensavers, Picture Messaging, the sound recorder can record up to 1879 seconds now instead of 140 seconds which considering it's the same size of memory is impressive. Well worth it.