Customer Reviews

Motorola Bluetooth USB Adapter with Mobile Phone Tools 3.0

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I just picked this up here in Italy. Desperately seeking an alternative shareware or another commercial software package that will work with this Bluetooth adapter.

The saga:

Motorolla V550 4 band phone in order to be able to use it in the U.S. and all over the world as well.

Picked up this Motorolla PC820 Mobile PhoneTools Bluetooth Adapter mostly for amusement (customize ringer, screens, etc.) but also to synch address book/calendar. Already synching yahoo address book/calendar with Outlook via Yahoo's software - reliable. Cannot comment on this synch between mobile and Outlook though initial take is that Outlook's calendar was at least not entirely scrambled - I only had one disturbing birthday reminder from four years ago (bizarre?) though my non-standard numbers did not come across into the mobile - okay normal in view of the fact I store everything in my contacts and in non-standard formats. Though yahoo and outlook play well together. The software did blame the mobile phone, error message: "1 or more of your 170 contacts weren't imported correctly" - then shows you the list of the 170 contacts. Very useful indeed!

Installation of the software - fully warned not to plug in USB bluetooth until software said to - then apparently Windows XP SP2 took over the install from then on completely overrunning bvrp.com's install of the adapter. The software from bvrp.com then could not find my telephone. (Yes, settings, connection, bluetooth, setup, find me enabled!) Post-firing up the bvrp.com software I was able to press F6, Communication tab, find modem, select "generic bluetooth" and it seems to find it fine, identifies it correctly and you can perform some tasks. However; each time I fire up the software I seem to have to do this - even though I save the settings.

I mostly played with their "Multimedia Studio". Transfering photos seems to work fine. Music clips on the other hand - if you "save as" them as MP3's they have a file length of zero bytes - interesting BUG - and hence won't transfer to the mobile. You must save them as ".amr" in order to successfully transfer them and use them on your mobile. If this is intentional it is certainly not specified in the brief Help files - (note: no mention of their website in help files - that is why I write it here - it *is* in the PDF). Also I believe my mobile does indeed supports mp3's.

I haven't tried using my bluetooth USB/mobile combination and this software to connect my PC to the net. I understand that 97% of you who buy this package are perhaps seeking that. With some luck either bvrp.com's development team was *really* working on that or perhaps Win XP has you covered there so you don't need to use this software anyhow - not sure.

Also right click on mobile phone icon, setup, liveupdate to download a newer 23meg version of the software which doesn't solve any of the problems above. But still you'd think if they had a newer version of the software they would at least prompt to check for an update during the install. Now each time I fire up the software it says it is an unregistered copy. I go under right click cell, Help, Online Registration and it says I already registered!

Why do companies like Motorolla choose shoddy software to accompany their hardware? It does not reflect well on them.

Once again if anyone out there knows of another software that is reliable shareware or commercial please do post it here.

This product is pretty cool. You can pretty much do anything you want with the phone's audio and visual media as well as sync it with your outlook. The only thing that I found a bit difficult was the install for Windows XP. I went to [...] then to the customer service section and selected bluetooth adapter. The next thing I new I was at the page that tells you that Service Pack 2 on XP has its own bluetooth program that you need to disable it. After you go through that, it's pretty simple. But anyway, the Motorola site will walk you right through it.

This seems to work well though I had to call customer support and get their help in linking my phone to my computer because Windows XP has it's own Bluetooth emulator or something. You will need to call Motorola as well unless they fix this glitch - which I don't think they are able to do as it is on Microsoft's side.

I am very pleased with the product. I use it with my bluetooth headset both for VoIP via my PC and to keep my phone list up to date. The ability to easily send SMS messages is also a nice feature. Installation was easy. This is my first bluetooth experience so getting to know how to bond with other devices had a slight learning curve.

I used the USB transmitter with a Motorola Razor phone and had great results. The mobile phone tools are very simple, but convenient. I would recommend both products.