Customer Reviews

Motorola T505 Portable Bluetooth Speaker Car Kit w/ FM Transmitter

5 star:		(67)
4 star:		(39)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

While I didn't buy it on Amazon, I thought I'd post here, for all to see. Ripped open the package, pressed the on button, sync'd with my phone, made a couple calls using the built in speaker phone. Plenty loud, but was not actualy driving, so it was very quiet in the car. Turned on the car, tuned the radio to the station that the polite slightly British accented voice told me to and made a few calls utilising the car stereo. If you haven't done this yet (with other devices), it is a thrill, you can make the voice as loud as you need to, it's perfectly clear, people can hear you loud and clear. I specifically chose this one because it's made to clip to your visor, so you have the microphone as close as you are going to get to your mouth without wearing a headset, so people don't complain that you sound "far away". Then for the real reason I bought this... I fired up the music on my phone. First a rush, holy cow it works, then disappointment the sound quality was not great, flipped through a couple songs and it was mediocre at best, I was bummed... THEN I got to Annie Lennox CD I had on my phone WOW! great sound, kept listening, got to a few other CD's... Really, really great sound from my factory stereo (Caveat - I'm completely over my "audiophile" days so take what I think of as great sound with a grain of salt). So, the crappy sound was MY music, must have been low bitrate MP3's, all this thing did was point that out to me all too clearly! Then - incoming call interrupts my listening, press the button, works like a charm. After the call, it doesn't automatically restart the tunes, I have to hit play on the media player. Also to make life a little safer in the car, I have the phone cradled in a made to fit my phone (HTC Mogul) cradle by ProClipUSA so the phone is always facing me and just as easy to touch buttons on as my radio. The funny thing is, I'm not a road warrior - 20-30min each way to and from work, maybe 1-2 hours a week travelling during work. Some of you are saying it wasn't truly zero config because I had to pair the bluetooth with my phone, you may be right, but for me zero config is when I don't have to bust out the instructions. Oh the other "Zero config" item I got this week? Creative's wireless X-mod. Again, never cracked the instructions, tore open the boxes and plugged the units in.

This device worked for me as advertised, out of the box, no issues. It does what the description says it will do, and does it well:

* Connect with your phone via bluetooth
* Play music out of your phone (if your phone is capable) and phone conversations via the built-in speaker
* Has volume control for the speaker
* Transmits whatever your phone is giving you (phone conversation or music) to your FM radio
* Next/previous track control when streaming music
* Allow you to use your phone's voice commands - again, if your phone is capable
* Announces caller ID for incoming call
* Speaker volume is adjustable
* Allows you to accept or reject calls based on caller ID
* Automatic last-number redial
* Mounting on visor puts the microphone close enough to your mouth that the other party hears you very clearly.
* Clear, concise manual

Some limitations are entirely a matter of the functionality of your phone, and are the result of the kind of interfaces your phone allows. Example: On my LG-Vu (CU920), you can have the phone play MP3 music, and the T505 will stream it to your FM radio. The phone allows you to "minimize" the player on the phone's screen so you can access other functions, like make a call. Now bear in mind, that to make a call, you have to pause the music-playing function. If you then go to the voice-command screen, the minimized music player disappears, and you have to re-start it after you're finished with the call, if you want to go back to playing music. The spot where you paused, of course, will be lost.

BUT - If you have your music player minimized, and a call comes in, you can pause the music and answer the incoming call, without losing the minimized music player, and when you hang up, you can go back to it and play from the paused location.

Well, that's what the phone is capable of, so that's what the Motorola T505 will let you do. So if I'm streaming music, and I need to make a call, I press a button on the Motorola device to pause the music, another button to make the call, same button to hang up, and then I need to fiddle with the phone to get back to playing music.

Minor issues:
* When you need to flip the visor, the microphone will be facing away from you, but the device can be mounted or double-taped anywhere else in the car
* Comes with a car charger (cigarette lighter plug) only, wall-outlet charger sold separately, and if you charge the device in the car, better take it off the visor or the cable will stretch from your cigarette lighter to your visor

A serious caveat: I wish I had known this before buying it, so I'll share it here: The "Station Finder" function for the best FM frequency on which to transmit, is a serious design flaw. When you turn it on, a friendly female voice announces a frequency that the gizmo estimates is the best one. Sure enough, tune your FM radio to that frequency, and try to make a call, it will stream to the radio flawlessly. However, it turns itself off after 10 minutes of idle time (nothing transmitting), to save power. That's fine. When you need it back on - say to make a call or answer an incoming call - well, you've traveled a bit in the last 10 minutes or more, and whatever the gizmo "thinks" is the best frequency is likely different than the previous one. Which forces you to re-tune your FM radio - which defeats the entire concept of "hands free," doesn't it?

Announcing the frequency by voice, rather than a power-consuming backlit LCD is a very nice idea, but I wish I had been allowed to SET the frequency myself and keep it where I set it. You can, according to the manual, make whatever current frequency was picked as a "preferred" station, which is given preference when the gizmo tries to scan for suitable frequencies, but there's no guarantee it will be kept.

For now, this is not a major issue for me yet, but man, what a way to mess up a killer product!

This was recommended on a news station where they'd done a review of similar items. I purchased it as a birthday present for my son. A risky thing to do for someone so picky. He loved it! It clips on his visor and somehow comes over his car radio, without wiring. The radio plays and when a call comes through it tells him the number, he pushes the button to answer. It's an excellent buy for the money.

You cant ask for any more out of this product for under $100. On top of easy bluetooth pairing, making and taking calls, the added nice is the FM transmitter. You can listen to callers thru FM stero, and also play your phones MP3's thru this unit, to your radio. Nice.

Received the item, charged it up and connected to my bluetooth phone without a hitch. The stereo connection is working just great, and my Mp3 sound wonderful over the radio. Call quality is nice and clear, no problems there. Worth the buy. Would give it a five star rating if I can just get the wife to understand it.

The T505 works very well for me. It linked immediately to my phone. I have it above my head on the visor and everyone reports that it sounds like I'm talking through the cell microphone. Hearing the audio come through the stereo is excellent. The clarity is very good. Only complaint is that you can't manually tune the FM frequency, but the auto-tune feature is fine.

I originally bought it at Radio shack, ripped it open, and tried it out. Love it.
I will be returning it within the 30 days do I can get it for much cheaper at Amazon. Paid 147.00 at Radio Shack. Ouch.

The T505 is an excellent piece of equipment for the person who wants to talk alot in the car and drives SOLO (or drives with someone who doesn't mind to hear your party mindlessly yacking away on speaker) This is a great alternative to using a wired or wireless headset or even a bluetooth earpiece to mess with. The extra bonus was that the unit works with or without the FM car function. You DON"T have to have the radio on, it comes with a very loud speaker aimed directly at your head. The location of the mic is cleverly hidden and it receives voice well. Feedback from people I've called indicate no issues with clarity.

When you decide to pipe the sound to the car audio FM, that method is very easy.
Click the button in the back, and the British voice tells you clearly what station to dial into. Don't like that station? Click the button once more until you find a clear station. Also, the Indicator lights are smart. The single Motorolla logo LED appears Green flashing (connected to bluetooth, in standby), Yellow (not connected to phone, but on), Blue flashing (searching for phone) and Fast Blue Flashing (pairing, which is only done once per phone). If you use more than one phone with the device, you'll need to pair it every time.

The other great thing about this device is that it has its own battery pack so you can take it with you from one car to another. You don't even have to be in a car. You can use it with a walkman or home stereo system if you don't mind clipping the unit to your shirt collar to talk.

The sound is increadible. There is NO feedback, or echoing either in the speaker mode or in the FM car audio mode. Leave the included adapter in and plugged into your cig lighter, or not.

The device is smart. It powers down 15 minutes if phone/unit connection is removed (i.e., walking more than 50 feet away or turning off your phone). It powers off completely if 30 minutes of no activity. If this happens, simply press the button in the back and hold for 3 secs and if your phone is nearby, you will automatically synch up.

The best part of the device is the music feature. For all of us who store our tunes in our phone, the device does an excellent job of playing tunes right from the unit, requiring no phone interaction, well, I can only speak for the LG8300VX I have.
Skipping tracks is simple with the press of one of the side buttons. Playing and pausing is done with the front mounted play/pause button. Couldn't be simpler.
The only issue I have is with my phone. My phone doesn't support Bluetooth Stereo profile so I hear mono tracks. However, I used my wife's phone, the LG Voyeger, and it does support the A2P stereo profile and the sound from that phone piped through the T505 was excellent.

Receiving a call is simple and straightforward. If you are using the FM radio mode feature, and a call comes in, both the unit and FM output sound off with a british voice announcing the call and the caller's number (again, this may be phone dependent). With a single click of the Phone button, the call is answered.

There is very little distraction to the driver and the audio quality is excellent.
I use it a lot when my daughter is in the car. she can talk to grandma from the back seat ...the audio pickup is that good.

It took me all of 5 minutes to get this bluetooth set-up and paired with my iphone (that includes the time I spent reading the manual). Very convenient as it searches for the best available FM station to transmit your calls or music to your car's stereo system. Also has a good speaker in case you live in a crowded FM area where there are no empty FM frequencies to use. It also turn out to be much smaller than I expected it to be based on the pics I saw, overall a nice design. Best of all seamless transition for my calls once I get into the car, works great. Come with a car charger and clip to hang from your visor. Would give it 5 stars if I had the ability to hard-wire the thing to my car's stereo.

Pros: Works great sending MP3s to the radio via Bluetooth. Good handsfree speakerphone via radio. Automatically stops MP3 music when receiving a call.
Cons: As a speakerphone without radio, persons on the other end say there is an echo and it sounds like I am in a tunnel. There are very few available FM frequencies available without interference. (One or two on my whole dial in Lexington) There is no way to choose a particular frequency. While you can indicate "preferred" frequencies, you still have to scroll through many to find a good one.
Bottom line: While it has some short comings, I am glad I bought it.

I had purchased this after buying a stand alone FM transmitter that worked good, but did not allow me to use my cell handsfree. I found this on Amazon at a great price and thought I would give it a try.
This T505 works fantastic. Sound is great through the device and when running through my car speakers.
The only thing I found a little annoying is when you change the FM station on the T505 from lets say 88.3 to the next in line of 88.5, there is no way to go back to 88.3 without pressing the button many times to cycle back through the recommended stations.. Not a real big deal after initial setup. I ended up setting it to 88.5 and have not had to move it yet.
I recenly used it on a 150 mi. trip and just loved the handsfree feature. The people on the other end did not even know I was using a handsfree device. Great job Motorola!
Audio streaming worked great as well. I stream both sermons and talk radio through my phone (EVO 4G) and it sounds great.
So bottom line, I would highly recommend this product if you are looking for a handsfree device that you can also stream audio through.
Hope this helps!