Got a work colleague who used such a device- he also reported poor battery life.
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The one I'm looking at says a standby life of around 200 hours and talk time of 10 hours, plus it comes with an in-car charger lead. Even if those figures are on the optimistic side, the journeys that I undertake are always short distance so I don't think that will be too much of an issue. My main concern was call quality. Thanks guys, maybe I'll speculate forty quid......!
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Mine was a load of pony (people I was talking kept complaining it sounded like I was in a wind tunnel) and I took it back to the shop and exchanged it for a Bluetrek G2 earpiece one which I'm fairly happy with, but I have nothing to compare it to. Can't recall the brand but it was a silver box shaped thing with a small mic that stood out to one side and i bought from the Link if that's any help.
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They must be ok, JC used one in a top gear "race", its in the production notes on the Topgear website on bbc.co.uk, not used one myself but do use nokia bluetooth car kit and it works fine!
Jon
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I've used a Visorblade II in my 944 for a year plus, so good loads of my friends have bought them as well. Mine was £70 from T Mobile but Cuz bought one for £56 from Ebay. They quote 900hours standby & 16 odd hours talk time. I use mine a lot & have never flattened it, Cuz uses his a lot & charges it about once every three weeks! They come with car & mains chargers, highly recommended.
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Autoexpress tested these last week, the winners were the Parrot Minikit (talk time 10hs, standby 275) and the Jabra SP500 (20/480 hours).
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I am wondering why anyone would prefer a visor mounted kit over an on-ear piece of kit?
Surely with the visor job, anyone in the car can hear both sides of the conversation - you don't always want that - do you?
Do Parrot do an on-ear bit of kit that anyone can recommend? My Jabra doesn't work too well with my new Nokia 6300.
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I'm not trying to be negative mark - but my advice is do yourself a favour and just switch your phone off when in the car. Even with blue tooth, using a phone in the car is distracting.
We all think we need to be available or talking 100% of our waking time on the phone - but we don't. I refused to have a handsfree fitted to my car - although the company wanted to pay. And it's great - phone off, radio on and I enjoy the drive.
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You mean we like almost everyone before early to mid 90s don't need to be contactable 24x7 on our mobile. Even after that ???
I jest. My brother had a works car phone it his company car - he went to the States 1993/94. It was massive and had pretty poor reception at times.
Then GSM phones got cheap and we all got them but now people think we should talk and drive whilst using them... I do have proper hands free but avoid using whenever possible but useful to charge the phone. In fact work from home a lot know and phone gets flat all the time ;-)
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The wind tunnel effect heard by the other party is due to the vent blowing air towards the microphone. It happens on my Parrot hard wired kit, and if I move the vent away from the mike it is fine.
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I know its completely against any road safety advice, but I tend to use the phone if I need to stay awake. As my commute is about 2.5hrs per day, it tends to get very boring.
I'm currently trying to decide whether to buy a fully fitted bluetooth kit, get a visor mount or just get a mobile with a good speakerphone.
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I had various professionally fitted car kits, some of which were better than others. Best was in a Rover 75, where sound came through the radio speakers and muted the radio.
Got another one in a CLK, which was an annoyance, as it muted the radio with monotonous regularity, every time charging started, every time charging finished, etc.
Ended up changing my car too often to make it worthwhile, and got a Motorola sun visor mounted device, pretty good battery life, has a cigarette lighter charger.
Paid about 35 quid, I think, on special offer at Tesco.
It is really, really good.
Very clear communication: Much better than Nokia bluetooth devices, IMHO. All my colleagues have these, and they are constantly going wrong, reception is crackly, etc.
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My current company provided car kit is quite good IMHO. It's from THB in Germany, also use the name Bury.
It is fully wired and can use the car speakers etc. but when mine was fitted in 2003 the new Sony stereos in Mondeos needed a new lead which was not out. But it does mute the radio but I make do with a mono-separate speaker.
It obviously has speaker + mic and charges. The good bit is you can change the cradle. My official company phone is a Nokia 6310i and that is the cradle I have. But the cradle can be swapped without phone kit itself so gone via 6230i to an N70 and the phone kit remains the same. Bluetooth kit also available.
It will all move to the new Mazda6 in October but I might change the phone/cradle again soon...
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You have to wonder how much clear profit these BT companies are making out of their wares.
I just bought a DVD/USB/CD player head unit with MP3 playback, and full-featured Bluetooth built-in, for £65 delivered. The BT implementation is the best I've come across, integrates perfectly into the rest of the system and works 100% with the phone. The mic is in the form of a lapel device that is connected to a cable on the end of a self-retractor, so you clip it to the dash while not in use, and the cable pulls out to the required length and clips to your shirt when in use. Sound quality is 100% perfect, far better than anything else I've used, and if anything people complain sometimes about my voice being too loud rather than anything else, so I have to move the mic down a little.
Only problem is that because you leave the phone anywhere within reach of the BT signal, I have a habit of chucking the phone on the passenger seat or cubby hole infront of the gear lever, and forgetting to take it out with me.
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I am using a Blaupunkt radio cd with built in bluetooth absolutely superb cost £120 have a proper hands free,plays mp3 discs and has a auxillary input for your ipod.
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I bought a Pama sun visor unit which had a digital display and caller ID. The idea is great because you can load all the numbers off your phone sim card onto the unit, but the reception using my phone caused problems as the person on the other end could hear an echo.
So ensure any unit you buy (if you do) is fully compatible with your handset.
Carse
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Most Bluetooth kits do the job pretty well (I have one from a Spanish company called SouthWing which is fine) but the acid test is the microphone. With this kit and two previous ones I always connected a NOKIA original microphone and everyone who speaks to me when I'm driving says the sound is excellent.
If your kit hass a 3.5 mm jack, try it with a Nokia mike, fixed on the A pillar at head height. With window closed your client/wife/friend will enjoy excellent sound from you at least!
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I've used a Visorblade II i.... so good loads of my friends have bought them as well. .....They quote 900hours standby & 16 odd hours talk time. I use mine a lot & have never flattened it ......they come with car & mains chargers highly recommended.
Will second that. My Visorblade has never run out and I top up every now and then although not sure it is necessary. Did exactly what i needed so I bought the wife one as well. Did have a Jabra cheapie thing that was carp (but free!!) that was binned very shortly after first using.
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Another vote for the Visorblade. It was more expensive than others but so easy to use. What extremely impressed me was that it totally filtered out the wind and engine noise of the TVR I used to drive, so the caller didn't know I was driving.
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I completely agree, I still have no wheels (student he-he), but my father uses Jabra. Prices on kits are completely different, if you need something that is cheaper there still full of competing manufacturers who, in general, have good devices, and the price is completely different. If you rely on all sorts of reviews and tops of the bluetooth kit, then besides Jabra, other good manufacturers are also Parrot, Supertooth, iClever. That is, you will always have to choose from. Look at the Amazon or the ebay, or just in the store of your city. I hope you`ll pick up stuff you need.
Edited by Avant on 19/07/2017 at 01:14
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