Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with Handsfree Functions Review

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We all like to take our music with us be it cds, ipods or mp3 players we’ve got our tunes on the go with us to partially keep us entertained and to partially block out the world around us. I’ve got an AT&T Tilt cellphone, or otherwise known as the HTC TyTn II, and it has replaced my mp3 player as my portable music device of choice. I have my phone with me always, so why should I have to carry another device to listen to my music when my phone does an excellent job of it for me? One small problem with that is when I’m in the car I’m still stuck with cds or even the radio, with the radio it’s always channel flipping because of people talking or commercials, and with cds it’s advancing to different tracks because not all of the music on a cd is good. I’ve got an FM Transmitter for my mp3 player that partially solves this problem, but again I have to carry another device with me, but not anymore…

Today on the review block I’ve got the Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with handsfree functions from our friends over at USBFever and it not only enables me to play my mp3s that are stored on my phone through my car stereo, but it features a built in microphone that allows you to use it as a handsfree device…

 

Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with handsfree functions

Author: Kristofer Brozio

Sponsor: USBFever

Tech Specs,Features or the Basic Info:

Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with handsfree functions

Product Code#:AK483-B166

Price: US$24.99

 

Highlights:

Now, using FM Transmitter is no longer the Privilege of iPhone or other Brands’ PDA / Smartphone’s using 3.5mm Audio Plug. You can have HTC / Dopod / O2’s special designed 11 pin USB connector directly plugged.

Features:

  • – As a Handsfree (with FM Talk, when calls in (while you are playing), the music will be muted and you can talk thru tuner / radio and the built-in Mic)
  • – Full FM spectrum (88.1MHz ~ 107.90MHz)
  • – Stereo output, high fidelity
  • – LED display for playing Frequency (see the notes below)
  • – Up / Down frequencies (each 0.1MHz interval)
  • – Memory of last frequency
  • – Powered by the car’s power source
  • – Range of up to 10 meters
  •  

Options:
Color– Black

 

Compatibility List: (more are available, pls see note below)

  • – HTC Trinity / HTC P3600 / Dopod D810 / Orange SPV M700 / Vodafone VPA Compact GPS
  • – HTC P3300 / HTC Artemis / Dopod P800W / Dopod M700 / T-Mobile MDA Compact III/ Orange SPV M650 / Qtek G200 / O2 xda Orbit
  • – HTC Herald / HTC P4350 / Dopod C800 / Dopod C858 / Vodafone VPA Compact IV
  • – HTC S620 / HTC Excalibur / Dopod C720W / O2 xda Cosmo / T-Mobile Dash / Orange SPV E600
  • – i-mate JasJam / Qtek 9600 / O2 XDA Trion / Dopod CHT 9000 / T-Mobile MDA Vario II / HTC TyTN / HTC Hermes / HTC Z / Orange SPV M3100 / Cingular 8525 / Dopod 838Pro / Vodafone V1605
  • – Dopod C500 / HTC Vox / HTC S710
  • – HTC Cavalier / HTC S630 / Dopod C730 / SoftBank X02HT
  • – HTC Touch / HTC P3450
  • – HTC Breeze / HTC MTeoR / Qtek 8600 / Orange SPV C700 / Dopod 595 / i-Mate SP JAS
  • – HTC Gene / HTC P3400 / Dopod D600
  • – HTC: Advantage, P6300, P6500, S620, S730, Touch, Touch Dual, TyTN II
  • – O2: XDA Argon, XDA Orbit, XDA Trion
  • – Orange SPV E650
  • – T-Mobile: Ameo, MDA Mail, MDA Touch, MDA Vario II, MDA Vario III
  • – Vodafone: v1415, v1615, v1640
  • – Vodafone v1605
  • – Vodafone v1615
  • – Vodafone VPA Compact V
  • – Verizon XV6800
  • – T-Mobile Dash
  • – T-Mobile MDA Touch
  • – T-Mobile Wing
  • – Sprint HTC – Mogul
  • – Sprint Touch
  • – O2 Nova
  • – HTC Atlas
  • – HTC Diamond
  • – HTC Elf
  • – HTC Excalibur 100
  • – HTC Hermes
  • – HTC Kaiser
  • – HTC Mogul
  • – HTC P3450
  • – HTC P4550
  • – HTC S620
  • – HTC Shadow
  • – HTC Touch
  • – HTC Touch Cruise
  • – HTC TyTN
  • – HTC TyTN II
  • – HTC Vogue
  • – Dopod 838 pro
  • – Dopod CHT 9000
  • – Dopod S1
  • – Cingular 8525
  • – AT&T 8525
  • – AT&T 8925
  • – AT&T HTC Diamond
  • – AT&T HTC Touch Cruise

 

– As long as the connector in your device is a 11 pin (Mini USB like) connector, it will be compatiable to. Pls kindly have a check your model before placing order

 

Package Contents:

  • – Transmitter x 1
  • – USB 5 pin Car Charger x 1

 

Packing:

– Color Box

 

Note:

HTC is a manufacturer for its own brand – HTC and HTC also OEM for the following brands(part of or whole series)

  • – Qtek
  • – iMate
  • – Dopod
  • – O2
  • – T-Mobile
  • – Orange
  • – Vodafone
  • – Cingular

Note:

– The LED may be face down or face up depending on different models. e.g. Touch Cruise I WILL BE FACE DOWN while Dopod Diamond, TyTn II, 838 Pro, Touch Dual… WILL BE FACE UP.

– You should keep the USB charger plugged to keep the FM transmitter functioning, unplugged the charger will lead no functioning.

 

A Better Look at Things:

The packaging for the Fm Transmitter is rather a bright orange, but nicely done. Through the front of the box you can see the transmitter itself and car charger, while the back has a lot of information including instructions and cool little pictures.

 

 

Unpacking everything we find the same things we saw through the little window, just a better view. Yes there is no instruction manual included as it is printed on the box.

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The Fm Transmitter has the name ‘FM Talk’ on one side of it, and no other identifying marks. There are two buttons with arrows on them next to an LED display on the opposite side and a USB male jack that plugs into your phone on one end with a USB female jack for the car power adapter on the other.

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That’s it really, there’s not much to this product, so let’s just move on shall we?


Installation, Testing and Comparison:

There is no real installation involved with this product, plug it into your phone, then into the power outlet in your car and your ready to go. It worked perfectly fine with my Tilt on the first try.

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To actually use the Fm Transmitter you’ll need to find a blank station on your car radio and then set the transmitter to that station, hit play on your music player and you’ve got tunes. Like any FM transmitter though it is susceptible to interference from other stations, as you travel around there is a chance that stronger stations will overlap into you music, when that happens you’ll have to find another ‘free’ station and tune both the car and FM Transmitter to that.

In the following picture you can see it was very hard to read the display on the device, in bright light you can barely make out the frequency, in direct sunlight you can’t see it at all. I actually cupped my hand over the phone, just out of frame to try and shade the display to get this picture, I think I took 20 pictures from different angles and this was the best I could get of the display. Yes I could have taken it at night, but what’s the point, you’re not only going to use this product at night right? Though this might not be representative of the product, I may have gotten one that had a bad or dim display, the pictures on the USBFever website show a much brighter display.

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The power for this product comes directly from your car, so there’s no need to worry about batteries. While this system is nice by not having to worry about batteries, it does though add more ‘stuff’ hanging around in your car. I also noticed that your phone isn’t charging through the connection, I believe it would be a much better product if it had the ability to charge your device while powering the FM transmitter, it can’t be using that much power can it? Having to carry the power cord around can get annoying as well, unless of course you leave it in your car, I think this would be a much better product if it did use batteries, or possibly a rechargeable battery, then you’d only have to plug it in to charge it as need be.

3

The handsfree system works well, I was told that people could hear me fine, but my phone is mounted directly to the right of my steering wheel on my dash, so it is fairly close to me, having the phone farther away might cause problems of course, I didn’t test the range of the microphone, as for my uses it worked fine.

While the handsfree setup is nice it’s a bit disconcerting at first having a conversation with your car and the voice coming from your cars speakers, after a few times though you get accustomed to the idea. Just make sure to lower the volume especially if your windows are down, that is if you don’t want other people hearing your conversations.

All in all though I do like this product and I do find it useful, it works well for what it is supposed to do, it’s nice to be able to play my own selected tracks in my car


Summary:

Overall this product is actually very cool and does what it’s supposed to do…

…but it has two problems, the display is barely visible in bright light, and invisible in direct sunlight, you won’t be changing stations when the sun is shining on it, and you’ll have a very hard time in areas of bright light. On the bright side though, if you do a lot of night driving you’ll be perfectly fine!

The second problem is more of an annoyance than anything, I would have rather seen a battery installed in this product than having to always plug it into my cars power source. It would have been very easy for them to stick a rechargeable battery in it and have the power cord for charging, and alternate power for the device.

Also I would have liked to have seen the phone be able to be charged through the device as well, seeing as I have to plug it in to use it why can’t I charge the phone as well?

It does remember the last station setting so there is a battery in there somewhere I would think, so as long as you know the frequency that worked for you in your car you can just turn the device back on and have it tuned to that station. The problem though there is that as you travel frequencies shift and will often times be overpowered by others, so you’ll most likely need to re-tune the device and car radio to find another clear signal.

Don’t understand me wrong though, I’m not really getting down on this product, it is a great product overall just with some flaws that need to be addressed.

If you need an FM Transmitter for your HTC or other compatible phone then I could suggest this one to you honestly, but with warnings about it’s problems, overall it’s not a bad product really.

As I mentioned I could have received one for review that had a faulty display, it happens with any product…

If it weren’t for the main problem of the display being barely usable, this product could have received a much higher score and I would have easily recommended it to others, but as it stands now:

 

DragonSteelMods gives the Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with handsfree functions a 4 out of 5 score.

 

 

Pros:

  • +Small and portable
  • +Uses power from car and not phone
  • +Easy to use
  • +Seems well made
  • +Vast compatibility options
  • +Handsfree system works well
  • +Inexpensive

 

Cons:

  • -Dim display, very hard to see in bright light
  • -Uses power from car, must be plugged in
  • -Does not charge phone

 

 

I would like to thank USBFever for the chance to review the Dopod / HTC FM Transmitter with handsfree functions and for their continued support of DSM.

 

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