Getting a Parrot MK6000...anyone else using Parrot car kits?

[Redflea]

I've ordered a Parrot MK6000 car kit (Parrot hands-free HW & plug-n-play wiring harness) from Safewireless Parrot Bluetooth Hands Free Car Kits and Plug N' Play Harness Adapters - Home (http://www.safewireless.com). They have been great - quick & detailed responses to emails and phone calls, and have the best pricing I could find on the Parrot MK6000 hands-free kit and wiring harness combo, at $184.

The MK6000 (Parrot USA - Parrot MK6000 - BLUETOOTH HANDS-FREE KIT WITH AUDIO STREAMING (http://www.parrot.com/usa/products/hands-freecarkits/parrotmk6000)) connects through your car stereo using the wiring harness, and allows BT hands-free calling and audio streaming (A2DP & AVRCP profiles) using the car stereo speakers.

Getting it installed this Friday at Circuit City ($65), assuming the USPS gets it here on time. Happy to be getting rid of my current Moto visor unit.

If this works out well I'm going to add the MK6000 to my wife and son's cars as well. CA has a hands-free mobile phone law going into play in a month or so to comply with...and frankly, I'm tired of my wife not answering my calls when driving because her phone is lost in the bottom of her purse! :)

Anyone else have any experience w/the Parrot MK6000 or MK6100?

[Redflea]

Nobody?! Feeling awfully alone here... :)

[Redflea]

OK...based on the huge interest/response (Yeah, like you guys even care...<sniff>), and the general lack of information out there, some pics of the hardware before install. Drool, baby, drool... ;-)

That's the wiring harness on the left...you specify your make/model/year to choose the right harness to go w/the Parrot kit.
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q202/RedfleaBucket/ParrotMK6000001.jpg

http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q202/RedfleaBucket/ParrotMK6000002.jpg

The mic and controller are both quite small...
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q202/RedfleaBucket/ParrotMK6000003.jpg

http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q202/RedfleaBucket/ParrotMK6000004.jpg

The Parrot BT module.
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q202/RedfleaBucket/ParrotMK6000005.jpg

[Deezer-D]

Got the Parrot CK3000 Evolution installed in my BMW and while it works very well when the BB is connected but it can take quite a while for the BB to actually connect to the kit. Not a fault with the Parrot but with the BB bluetooth - all my other phones have connected within seconds.

[Redflea]

Thanks for the info! That's interesting. Does your BB connect via BT quickly to everything else except the Parrot kit? I get fast connects on my Pearl to all the BT items I've used (Printer, laptop, various headsets).

[Redflea]

Got the Parrot CK3000 Evolution installed in my BMW and while it works very well when the BB is connected but it can take quite a while for the BB to actually connect to the kit. Not a fault with the Parrot but with the BB bluetooth - all my other phones have connected within seconds.

I am curious about where you put the controller and the mic. The 3000 uses the a controller very similar to the one the 6000 uses.

I have a "vintage" 530i ('95)...my plan is to put the mic centered above the rear view mirror, and to put the controller on the dash on the wood just to the left of the stereo/HVAC controls. It will be partly obscured by the steering wheel, but I don't want it up higher where the lights on it will distract me at night, and I will be using the controls via touch rather than sight anyway...

[Deezer-D]

Redflea, the only bluetooth device I use is the Parrot. Had a 8120 Pearl for a week before I decided to get the Curve and had the same issue which leads me to believe it's the BB bluetooth and not the Parrot. I'll have a look on the Parrot forums and see if it's a known issue with BBs.

[Deezer-D]

Had a look on the Parrot Forums and found this post
Parrot UK Forum / Blackberry Pearl very slow to connect with Evolution (http://www.parrot.com/forums/english/viewtopic.php?id=4826)
Will nip out to the car and try it now.
D

[Redflea]

Had a look on the Parrot Forums and found this post
Parrot UK Forum / Blackberry Pearl very slow to connect with Evolution (http://www.parrot.com/forums/english/viewtopic.php?id=4826)
Will nip out to the car and try it now.
D

Great! Thanks for the pointer to the tip. I hope it works...60s to pair isn't a deal killer, but it isn't good either...hope you report good results.

[Deezer-D]

Just cleared the memory on the Parrot and now it connects in 10 - 15 seconds - problem solved

[Redflea]

Woo-hoo. :-D

When you clear the memory what is "cleared?" Is it like rebooting the unit, or does it actually remove phone book entries you have put into it, or ? Just wondering if clearing the memory "costs" you anything?

Thanks.

[Redflea]

Never mind, I found the info - clears phones paired, contacts, and voice commands, etc.

[Deezer-D]

Think it will erase everything. I didn't have voice tags set up in mine because I had an iPhone before the BBs and it doesn't support voice dialing. The CK3000 doesn't support phonebook sync either so the only thing I lost was any existing phone pairings. You'l be starting from scratch though so you shouldn't have the delay issue as your BB will be the first phone connected to the Parrot.

[Redflea]

Well, it's installed, and there's good news and bad news.

Good news:

- Pairs very quickly
- Dials using BB VAD perfectly
- Dials from address book uploaded to the MK6000 perfectly (and I was able to use the feature on the - BB to just upload contacts w/a certain Category)
- Mutes the radio and "Phone Mute" appears in the display
- Called my kids and they say it sounds very good, I can talk in a normal voice
- Streams audio from my BB and audio controls work
- Updated the firmware to 1.03 version from my laptop via Bluetooth successfully
The not-so-good:
- Audible hiss from rear speakers (which are supposed to be muted) during a call
- Loud electrical "pop" when changing modes (starting/ending call, for example)

I'm going to talk to a supposed Parrot guru on Monday to see what's going on....the Circuit City installers (who were experienced and very nice) seemed to follow all of the instructions properly, but I'm hoping there's a tweak to apply to fix these issues...clearly appears to be a problem w/the muting of the rear speakers - something's not right there.

[Redflea]

Wirelessly posted

Looks like my problems relate to the fact that the BMW has the stereo amp in the trunk. I'm going to try a couple of work-arounds suggested by the harness vendor. Unfortunately there doesn't appear to be a harness extension made for my BMW, so I might have to live with the two issues, or rip it out and put it in my wife's car.

[Deezer-D]

I am curious about where you put the controller and the mic. The 3000 uses the a controller very similar to the one the 6000 uses.

I have a "vintage" 530i ('95)...my plan is to put the mic centered above the rear view mirror, and to put the controller on the dash on the wood just to the left of the stereo/HVAC controls. It will be partly obscured by the steering wheel, but I don't want it up higher where the lights on it will distract me at night, and I will be using the controls via touch rather than sight anyway...

I have an E46 330ci and have mounted the control unit in the ashtray. I also have a Connects2 loom which hooks the Parrot to the steering wheel controls. The only thing visible is the mic which is located at the rear view mirror.
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e333/deezer-d/Car/IMG_2684.jpg

[Redflea]

Thanks for the pic! I mounted my controller on the dash where the steering wheel blocks my view of it for the most part, which I prefer. I use it all by feel just fine, and don't get distracted by the lights on it at night. That part is good.

It's back at the installer's today to try some tweaks...I don't have a lot of hope, but giving it the college try. I'm almost getting used to the popping, so if they can't fix it I may just leave it as-is.

[Redflea]

Well none of the tweaks worked...I'm going to have to live w/the issues or remove it. Problem is, even w/the issues I like it so much I'll likely keep it...unfortunately there just aren't any wiring kits available for my BMWs amp in the trunk.

[Redflea]

In case anyone is looking into this kit, more comments.

Unfortunately, the more time I spend w/the Parrot MK6000, the less happy I am with it.

I'm finding that it won't kick off the BB voice-activated dialing reliably...in fact, most of the time pressing the green start call button on the parrot controller just displays the BT connection status dialog on the Pearl.

I talked to a tech at Parrot who has a CK3000 and a Pearl and claimed it worked fine for him, but he didn't have any suggestions to get it to work for me.

I'm going to spend more time w/the Parrot's voice-dialing system, but it is tedious...you have to record prompts for every contact you want to dial using it, something not required w/the built in VAD on the BB.

I just found out about another line of kits (EGO - Home - EGO Multimedia Bluetooth Hands-Free Car Kits (http://www.egohandsfree.com/index.php)) that I might try out.

<Sigh>

[French]

I actually have something called BlueConnect. My local installation place highly recommended the unit and said that they've had Parrot installs that came back and got the BlueConnect instead. Maybe my expectations are too high, but I'm not overly impressed with it.

It has its own self-contained speaker so it does not play through the speakers, therefore no automatic mute. And because it doesn't play through the car speakers I think it's harder to hear. And I've gotten very mixed feedback when using it. Sometimes people seem to be able to hear me clearly, and others I'm literally screaming into the thing and they can't hear me. I don't have the quietest vehicle in the world (Honda CR-V), but I would be lying if I said I'm happy with performance. In fact, I find myself transferring the call to the handset just to relieve the frustration of using the unit. If I'm going slow (under 40 MPH), it's perfect. Anything over that and it's just irritating trying to use it. And of course if it's a cell-to-cell call that just makes the sound worse.

Having said that, my BB Curve connects very quickly to it and works seemlessly. The Blueconnect does not pull in the phone book so that requires quite a bit of time to set up if you want to dial by name, but once done it is capable of voice dialing and it's darn good at that. It can dial numbers out of the box, so you don't HAVE to set up a phonebook if you happen to know from memory all the phone numbers you would want to call. It amazes me that people can't hear me very well going 60 MPH, but the BlueConnect seems to have no issues understanding what numbers I want dialed.

In all honesty, I think I would be extremely pleased if they had made it an option to route through my car stereo with auto mute. Who cares if they can hear me on their end. Actually, joking on that...but I don't mind repeating myself...however I hate that I can't hear them very well and have to ask them to constantly repeat themselves. I also think they should have made a separate microphone option. I think installing a microphone on my sun visor, that could be pulled down closer to my mouth, would have made a world of difference on how well they can hear me.

So as of now there really isn't any perfect unit out there. Or at least it doesn't sound like there is. I know this was about the Parrot, but I thought hearing about another device might help.

[MBW]

I just pulled a Parrot PMK5800 car kit out of the box - haven't tested it yet. The whole thing is a big, horsy extension of a lighter plug with a mike, a display & a small FM transmitter - it plays your audio & your phone calls through a vacant spot on your car's FM radio. Installation is easy enough, set-up only a bit tedious, but I haven't yet run it through our review process so I can't tell you much else about it.

[Redflea]

In case anyone is looking into this kit, more comments.

Unfortunately, the more time I spend w/the Parrot MK6000, the less happy I am with it.

I'm finding that it won't kick off the BB voice-activated dialing reliably...in fact, most of the time pressing the green start call button on the parrot controller just displays the BT connection status dialog on the Pearl.

I talked to a tech at Parrot who has a CK3000 and a Pearl and claimed it worked fine for him, but he didn't have any suggestions to get it to work for me.

I'm going to spend more time w/the Parrot's voice-dialing system, but it is tedious...you have to record prompts for every contact you want to dial using it, something not required w/the built in VAD on the BB.

I just found out about another line of kits (EGO - Home*-*EGO Multimedia Bluetooth Hands-Free Car Kits (http://www.egohandsfree.com/index.php)) that I might try out. <Sigh>



Well, it turns out the connection issue w/the Parrot was maybe a BB issue - since I upgraded to OS 4.5, my BB connects flawlessly to the Parrot kit in my car.

So I'm happy again. :)

[ewh01]

I put a 3200 in my Titan. Got the wiring harness, couldn't be easier - plug n play! I love it! Now I don't have to worry about getting a ticket (NJ) and I can concentrate on driving while on the phone. I have (had) a BT Earpiece, but that got uncomfortable, when I did remember to take it out of the charger and/or turn it on.

Now, I get in my truck and within seconds, I have a connection between my phone and the Parrot. Sound quality is great, but it did take some adjusting the various levels of output and microphone volumes. Initially I had some echo issues, but they're all gone now that I have the volumes right.

My only complaint is the poor documentation and the bracket isn't the tightest.

[Redflea]

Glad to hear it...I especially like the fact that if I'm listening to music or a podcast on my BB when I get into the car, it switches to the car speakers when the Parrot connects.

One caution...the research on using a phone from the car indicates that hands/no-hands isn't really the key issue; it's the loss of "local" concentration that occurs when you're involved in a conversation w/someone remote. Not the same as a conversation w/someone in the car, and the likelihood of an accident really isn't reduced significantly from calling w/phone in hand. So be careful out there! :)