Customer Reviews

Belkin TuneCast Auto with ClearScan for iPod, iPhone 1G, 3G

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(46)

 

 

After reading lots of reviews on this, I had expected a good product. It was awful. When I pressed the autoscan button, it would scan to stations that were already in use, or partially in use. It rarely scanned to empty stations. I used to have a Kensington digital FM transmitter, and when I tuned to my go-to station, it would work no problem, no static at all. When I tried that same station with the Belkin, I heard static non-stop, along with my music. The only time I heard no static was when I went through a tunnel (obviously, since there's no radio station to interfere). I'm going back to my Kensington - very disappointed with this Belkin model. Note: I live in Fairfield County, and used this on the way to NYC. Maybe it would work better in other areas, but around here, it was terrible.

I bought this for my girlfriend and we were severely disappointed. She has a Nissan Murano (with the antenna in the front) and I could not find a clear station after cycling through the entire FM spectrum.

My complaints are completely inline with other folks:

* The signal strength is just too weak to get a clear, consistent audio experience. If you touch or move the unit around, you are sure to hear static.

* The auto tuner is horrible. Many times it seems to randomly pick a station. Sometimes with a signal strength so strong, I'm unable to hear anything being broadcast by the Belkin unit

* The iPhone complains about this not being a compatible device, although it does charge the phone (both first-gen and 3G) and transmit audio.

This unit is going back to the store today. Not what I expected from Belkin.

I bought this because I've saw mixed reviews on the iPhone car chargers. The charging works fine..although there were a few times when the iPhone would display "this product is not designed for the iphone,...do you want to switch to airplane mode?".

The FM reception is pretty choppy. If you can secure a clear station...I'd suggest you stick with that one. There is some static at times.

I'm not sure if I'd recommend this. If you're in an area where there's not a lot of FM stations..it may work well.

I live in Central Massachusetts, and recently upgraded from and iPhone to an iPhone 3G. I had been using a Monster iCarplay, and found that while it allowed me to play music from my 3G it no longer charged the device during use. I read the reviews for the Belkin TuneCast, and was skeptical. I love the Monster device, and was having a hard time finding something comparable so I decided to give it a shot. The bottom line, this device does exactly what it says it does. It allows me to play music from my 3G's iPod over my car radio, charges, and even allows me to keep the phone enabled without interference. I have two stations set using the memory buttons that seem to work the best with the device. I found that the "ClearScan" seems to mostly choose stations at random, and these are not always the clearest. I've found that if you place the tuner portion of the Belkin closer to the actual radio, it works much better, so I have applied it directly to a panel on my dash using sticky-back Velcro. HD radio this is not. If you want crystal clear sound with no static then install a stereo that directly links your iPod with it. There's some static, and sometimes you need to use a different channel, but for a device this affordable, that broadcasts over FM radio waves, I am satisfied with the product, and the sound.

I had an experience nearly identical to "CC" from Stamford, except that I live in rural NC instead of the urban, tri-state area. It was as if this thing were trying to find the *strongest* competing signal instead of an open channel. It's performance on a clear channel could best be described as "perpetual static." The kicker was that it completely stopped working after 24 days of use!!

What a POS. I will never buy another thing from Belkin, as I will never be able to trust a company that knowingly marketed an item of such poor quality. Why not change your logo to an extended middle finger at the same time?

I, too, had a better experience with Kensington and am going back. I had tried this because the Kensington *only* lasted 1-1/2 years...or roughly 25x as long as this piece of Belkin.

I bought this because I had previously purchased one from Walmart that worked quite well. That one actually sent the artist and song name to the radio via RDS too. I thought this was the same product, but evidentally there are two different models and this one doesn't send RDS info.

The quality of the music was fine however, but I don't expect a lot from FM modulators. It's good enough, and there are enough empty channels to choose from in my area.

I wish that these would tune lower though: my radio will tune to 87.5, but this only starts at 87.9 MHz.

Not bad, and it works fine with both a iPhone 16GB original (silver back) and an iPhone 16GB 3G.

I've had very mixed results with this, but the overall results have not been good enough to convince me to keep it. In cities, the ClearScan feature never seemed to land on an "open" station and the static was unbearable, to the point where I couldn't even tell what song was playing. Additionally, buildings, geographic features, and even buses caused interference with the reception. I've also taken this transmitter on road trips, where it performed quite well, especially on long, open stretches of lonely highway. When driving long distances, I found that I could leave the Tunecast on one station for several hours with a clear enough signal to listen to spoken audiobooks. Nevertheless, as most of my driving is in an urban area, I traded the Tunecast for a Griffin itrip, which seems to work much better.

I was very disappointed when I discovered that my 3G iPhone did not work with my Kensington. I opted for the Belkin because at the time it was the only available FM tuner product. I purchased and first used the Belkin TuneCast in Ann Arbor and the metro Detroit area. Unfortunately Ann Arbor/Detroit has almost no free FM spots on the dial. The TuneCast identified some free stations but did not always seem to work. Often I found myself manually looking for stations. As for clarity I can say that the Belkin worked fine as long as there were no other radio stations in the vicinity. I'm fortunate as I live in Europe where there are no where near as many radio station as in the US. My Belkin works perfectly here producing very clear and nice sound. If you plan on using the Belkin TuneCast in an area that does not have too many radio stations, you might want to give the TuneCast a try.

Got it because its the only fm transmitter that will charge my 3g iPhone. It replaced my monster icar play 200. The best thing about this is the clear scan works in 1sec. However it seems to work like a random number generator, not actually picking a station it will work good on. I live outside Portland Maine, so its not exactly a big city. My car has an antenna in the rear window. If I don't orient the display just right I get static. But If I get it in just the right spot it sounds fairly good, with a little static on the quiet parts of the music. It will over power some very weak signals, but mostly it gets overpowered. I get a warning message to goto airplane mode. If anyone knows a mod to this thing to boost the power I would like to know.

Terrible product, and nothing to do with phone interference, which is what most people are worried about when buying FM Transmitters for the 3G. The only positive is that it charges the phone, but you can pick up a straight charger for under 20 bucks. It was litterally unusable, and I've always used FM transmitters with my ipods, and am not picky when it comes to them. I can usually handle the minor static associated with these devices, BUT this one can not hold a signal. It wouldn't take over a single channel on my radio, if you were lucky enough to find a station it worked on, that luck ran out before the song was over.