Customer Reviews

Boss Audio 745BA Bluetooth Enabled CD/MP3 Receiver

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I bought the 745BA for my 2003 Civic. Some audio guys installed it for 40 bucks including a dash kit to make it fit perfectly. It is really a nice product. Do not expect the reliability of a Sony or Panasonic car stereo, it is still a stereo from a developing company.

I have not had any problems with it. Gave it a 4 stars because the low brightness and no clock all the time really bugs me. Try adjusting to a low light stereo in a city where there is sun 98% of the time.

Pros
Bluetooth handsfree connectivity for a cellphone.
MP3's, USB's, Aux's are all supported.
Nice sound quality, especially with CD's.
Text with MP3's.
Great price.

Cons
Low brightness on screen.
Need to click a button for 5 second clock display.
Plastic feel.
No AM (really no big deal, but still)
Tricky stereo controls.

The 745BA is a good bang for your buck in terms of BASIC features. It has bluetooth connectivity for your phone with a built-in microphone, has a USB port for thumbdrives, plays audio and data disks! However, I have some issues with it -- every feature it has is flawed in some way. If you want something that has ADVANCED features, spend the extra $100-150!

FEATURES & FLAWS:

BLUETOOTH PROS: Apart from dialing, the stereo provides you with the ability to drive "hands free". When you get an incoming call, the phone number is displayed on the stereo's screen. You can also re-dial the last person you called using a button on the stereo. Callers can you hear you clearly without you having to raise your voice -- you can talk as if they were sitting right next to you.
BLUETOOTH CONS: To hear the person you are talking to well, you need to turn your stereo up to nearly max volume. When the call is ended, you then have to quickly turn the volume down or else you might be unexpectedly blasted with noise. Do this too soon after the call ends, and it still resumes your music at the volume you had your stereo at for the call. When you have your cellphone connected to the stereo, a blue LED light continuously flashes. This isn't a problem during the day, but at night it is very distracting -- and annoying!

USB PORT PROS: Allows you to play music directly from your thumbdrive with virtually no fuss in regards to connectivity. Stereo recognizes typical music file types. Plays songs in the order you put them on the thumbdrive.
USB PORT CONS: It's a mini USB port, so a conversion cable is required (provided). Does not recognize separate folders - so if you have your music organized by genre on your thumbdrive, forget it. The stereo will only play them in the order they are in on the thumbdrive. As innovative as the USB port feature is, it's abilities on this deck are very primative/limited.

DISPLAY PROS: In my case, the display is very pleasing at night. It matches my Honda Civic's red/orange instrument panel very well. (I hated having a red/orange instrument panel and a blue stereo display.)
DISPLAY CONS: Another reviewer stated that he could not get the clock to display continuously. I initially had the same problem. Upon installing the stereo, I had the song information flashing and no consistent clock -- which was SUPER annoying! (It is much like the blinking Bluetooth LED!) However, my problem now is that the clock displays continuously and that I cannot figure out how to view the song information. In addition, the display can be impossible to read during the day! In fact, at certain angles it looks as though NOTHING is on the screen at all!

SOUND PROS: The stereo does have independent controls for bass and treble.
SOUND CONS: It only comes with ONE preout! You are likely going to need a y-spliter if you go with this deck. It has presets, but they aren't worth using. You are better off adjusting the bass and treble to your tastes as needed. Another problem is volume. I agree with the other reviews that it should have a much higher "max volume". Compared to my old deck, this one is wimpy.

If you're looking for something inexpensive with a lot of features, this is a good buy. People used to stock/base stereo decks will likely be fairly happy with this deck. But if you are used to moderate-to-high-end stereo decks, then you will likely be somewhat disappointed. Yes, it has bluetooth connectivity and a USB port, but if you are used to Alpine, STAY with Alpine! Get an Alpine deck that has the features you want! The Alpine will give you more control options and better meet your expectations for the bluetooth and USB port features! And you'll be able to rock it as loud as you want!

UPDATE: On 03/10/2011, the Car Stereo had a malfunction and shorted completely out! The Car Stereo was in only 18 months in my car...the last car stereo was an Alpine and was in for 4 years. I would not recommend this product unless you are only needing something temporary (1-2 years) until you can fork out more money for a better product/brand with the same set of features.

Bought this and it works good. USB is great. I connect an 8GB flash drive and works perfectly. MP3 CD's work well too. Only thing is that I never got the Blutooth to work on it. Tried different phones and none seemed to connect but I didn't buy it for that.

So far this unit has been everything that i expected, you can even stream music from some cellphones to the unit. Good equalizer. Nice sound output.
Comes with the usb adapter(it doesn't say it in the description).

In Usb mode, it doesn't read the folders in alphabetic order, i think it takes the modification date, but i can live with that, it has 4 search modes, and you can scan the folders quickly.

i highly recommend it.

After figuring out how to work this stereo, I must say that I'm pretty impressed. With the amount of features this thing has its a great deal. Its nice looking and the sound quality is good. The bluetooth feature was my main motivation for buying this and it works well. When I hop in my car, my blackberry automatically syncs up with the stereo. Any incoming or outgoing calls are automatically transferred to the stereo. People on the other line can hear me fine although not as clear as just talking on the cell directly. If you want privacy from other people in the car, you can easily transfer the call to the headset. Also whats fun is that this stereo supports A2PD which means it can wirelessly receive music from my blackberry phone or any device that supports A2PD. So now i can load up my phone with music, or better yet just listen to Pandora and have it streamed to my car speakers with no wires. Its almost as good as having satellite radio. Must agree with the other reviewer that the bluetooth LED that flashes is obnoxiously bright, but a little piece of black electrical tape solved that for me. I would definitely recommend this stereo. Nothing i found at this price range gives you this many features.

While I was buying the product, I had too much expectations frm this.. But was disappointing. The mp3 cd keeps skipping. The Bluetooth audio quality is bad.. The blue light on the system for blue tooth keeps blinking and is annoying during night drive...

For a little over a hundred dollars I bought this stereo and my son and I installed it in his beater 1978 Mercedes grease car. It was quick and easy. The bluetooth phone feature is the reason I picked this model and it works perfect..... loud and clear. I have bought 3 BOSS AUDIO car stereos and they all have fun features that work great... you won't be sorry about buying this one.

junk it dose not work right. buttons on the head unit when you push pre set 1 it goes to pre set 4 and so on;other ones do a variety of other things. Now this item is out of stock and the seller dose not know when it will be back in stock. DO NOT BUY!!!!!!

Bought mine March & hooked it up in April 2010 & a few weeks now it stopped reading my USB drive.
I tried several USB flash drives but still not reading.

This product is horrible, it does not work properly. Definitely not worth the money. DO NOT BUY