phone prep and bluetooth

[rogdogg]

Hi,this is my first visit to the forum.Can anyone advise if the factory fiited phone prep ,when fitted with the dealer Bluetooth receiver will only work with the fairly poor range of siemens and nokia bluetooth phones the MB dealer has listed? I'm wanting to use my PDA,but don't want to shell out £300 to MB for the bluetooth cradle if it's not going to work.My car is a 2005 model.
Thanks for any thoughts/observations

 

[124coupe]

Hi, the bluetooth is not a cradle but a module that fits in place of the cradle - one with a handset "tethered" and one without.

Merc have a short list of phones and also list the supported firmware levels that they have tested and will support to make work.

Outside the list, phones with "SAP" (SIM Access Profile) might work but, if they don't Merc will not help you.

I have just sold on my module as my own 6230I worked but my wifes 6230I (from Orange) did not. Merc did not care as her firmware was not on the list (Orange mod it for their "branding"). Oddly, both work with the cradle.

Phones without SAP will definitely not work (all the Blackberries for instance).

 

[rogdogg]

Hi 124 Coupe,
thanks for the advice.Does that mean I need 2 things;a cradle plus the module then?I'll need to check out if the device has SAP.cheers

 

[124coupe]

No, they are either/or. Assuming you have the pre-req UHI, your armrest will have an edge connector (covered by a black clip). This connects to either a cradle (there is a list of cradles and supported phones for each cradle) or to the bluetooth module (which is shaped like a filled-in cradle.

If you decide on a cradle, they are often on Ebay new at £60ish rather than £133 from MB

 

[124coupe]

There are some niggles either way:

Both methods only support one number per contact in the phone (so if you have "Fred" with a mobile and a desk number, you have to create two separate phone entries or the car kit will ignore one of them).

Bluetooth tops out at loading about 100 numbers from the phone and then randomly ignores the rest. I tried a few tests but could not work out why it chose the 100 that it did!

Bluetooth cannot cope with placing the phone into the car or removing it while on a call (the cradle provides continuity on the call while you insert or remove the phone). This irritated me as I'm often on long conference calls and like to exit the car while still listening!

The cradle charges the phone while Bluetooth obviously does not.

 

[rogdogg]

I see;It's the sort of thing which could work well or give a lot of aggrevation.In my case ,probably the latter!I cheched out the PDA forum for my XDA device and got no hits for SAP so not very promising so far.

 

[124coupe]

The XDA doesn't have SAP and also there's no cradle for it!.

Search on Parrott - get a full kit for the price of the cradle....

 

[rogdogg]

Hi again and thanks for the top quality advice.I had a look at the Parrott site and they say they've car kits for any bluetooth enabled phone.As the xda isn't SAP,does this mean any bluetooth set-up won't work through the Comand?