about a month ago i wrote an entry on fun with bluetooth at the acura dealership where i tried unsuccessfully to get HandsFreeLink to work, in retrospect partly due to lack of time, partly due to a usability flaw. now i've had ample time to play with HandsFreeLink (HFL) so i can report on it more completely.
HFL combined with the Acura TL Navigation system is one of the best uses of bluetooth i've come across. the following scenarios are supported and work as advertised on supported phones:
i tried the system with 3 bluetooth capable phones, the sony ericsson T610, the nokia n-gage, and the sony ericsson P900. acura provides instructions on the Nokia 3650, the Nokia 6310i, the Sony Ericsson T68i, and the Siemens S55/S56 - but i thought i'd give these others a try anyway. they say "You can use Acura HandsFreeLink with any Bluetooth®-enabled mobile phone that has a hands-free profile." anyway, here's how they fared:
Sony Ericsson T610
since this was a supported phone i expected it to work as advertised, and it did. pairing the phones is a little different than pairing any other device like a desktop, a headset, or another phone. it wasn't enough that the T610 be in discoverable mode. while using the HFL to initiate pariing, i also had to tell the T610 to look for devices. this was consistent on all the phones actually. this is not in the manual but on the website faq, but i figured it out anyway. the HFL display showed all the phone's vitals on the screen. after two days the HFL stopped working with the T610 even though it was still listed (you can get a list of paired phones via the voice recognition system) on both HFL and the T610. unpairing and repairing seemed to fix this but why did it lose the pairing? this is not surprising as it has happened with other bluetooth headsets.
nokia n-gage
the n-gage was not an explicity supported phone but pretty much has to be used with a headset if you want to use the phone so i thought it would be a good candidate. pairing was again a little unorthodox as i had to tell it to look for devices while the HFL was also looking for devices, but it worked. apparently the n-gage does not pass along it's battery status or caller id info because all that showed up was the antenna showing there was some reception. otherwise the n-gage worked fine with the HFL. you have to make sure to select the HFL as "authorized" to connect for the link to happen without intervention.
sony ericsson P900
although the P900 paired with HFL, the HFL could not initiate a connection, nor interoperate in any manner after the pairing. I also tried this with a P800 and got the same results. After doing a little reverse engineering, it appears that neither the P800 nor the P900 implement the "Handsfree" bluetooth profile, just the "Headset" bluetooth profile. they report this as "Voice Gateway" - the T610 has an additional "HF Voice Gateway" - which is what is needed by HFL. A sony ericsson support technician told me "bluetooth is a bit of minefield right now." indeed.
phone polygamy
here's where things get interesting. what happens if both you and your wife have a bluetooth phone and you get in the car? what is supposed to happen?
on the former, what happens is that the first phone HFL can connect with it does, and seems to ignore the other phones. if you want to use the second phone, you have to turn off bluetooth (or the power!) on the first phone. this "dance with the one that brung ya" mentality is pretty typical of bluetooth networking, so i'm not faulting honda here, but i would have like to see the following happen:
me: "call"
hfl: "which phone would you like to make a call with?"
me" "T610"
hfl: "connecting to T610"
all in all, the HFL is a killer app for bluetooth. because the proximity is controlled, and there aren't wi-fi or 2.4 mhz cordless phones typically in the car, there's not a lot of opportunity for interference.
this and a few other usability issues like pairing and lost pairings might cause a customer support headache for acura as i think it won't be easy for some of their customers to figure this stuff out. if american honda motors wants to hire me as a consultant, i'd be glad to help them out ;)
Posted by Steve at November 20, 2003 01:41 PM | TrackBack
Steve,
If you have multiple BT phones in the vehicle, you can simply switch to the next one by giving the "next phone" command, it will disconnect the current phone BT connection and switch to the next paired phone. Works pretty cool
rich
Posted by: Rich at November 26, 2003 09:03 PM
ah, very cool. i would have never figured that out, but very cool.
Posted by: steve at December 1, 2003 03:26 PM
The bluetooth HFL issues you raise have made me rethink a P800 purchase AND delayed my Acura TL purchase 'till i find the right phone,i.e.,
bluetooth, mp3, (fm nice), camera and or the right car.
Please forward to Honda with my name if you wish.
Posted by: Art Winston at January 7, 2004 03:33 PM
wow, that's a pretty powerful statement, Art. it's probably Sony Ericsson that needs to add this capability to their phone. the quest for the uber-phone continues.
the nokia 6600 or the n-gage (no camera) might fit your bill - don't expect much from any phone in the way of mp3 (not enough storage in any of these devices to make it practical)
Posted by: Steve at January 12, 2004 05:16 PM
it seems the current 6600 firmware doesn't totally work with the TL - it connects and pairs, and dials, but the handsfree doesn't get taken over by the TL, the call stays on the phone. i would hope they fix this in the next firmware release! at least it implements the right handsfree profile.
Posted by: Steve at January 23, 2004 08:19 AM
Hey steve whatsup... its awesome u really went into this... i just bought a TL and i thought my p800 would connect greatly to it... Damn was i wrong.
Now can i do anything with my p800 or with the car for this feature to work... maybe upgrade or download software for either one...
thanks buddy shout me an email in your sweet time..
Kunal
Posted by: Kunal at January 23, 2004 05:43 PM
Hey steve whatsup... its awesome u really went into this... i just bought a TL and i thought my p800 would connect greatly to it... Damn was i wrong.
Now can i do anything with my p800 or with the car for this feature to work... maybe upgrade or download software for either one...
thanks buddy shout me an email in your sweet time..
Kunal
Posted by: Kunal at January 23, 2004 05:43 PM
Hi Steve
Thanks for running this all to ground. Please keep us updated on changes. Any work on how well the Siemens S56 works with the HFL?
Keep up the great work
Alec
Posted by: Alec at January 27, 2004 02:01 PM
Any insight into getting a blackberry 7230 to be bluetooth enabled to work with the TL?
Posted by: Dan at February 4, 2004 04:40 PM
alec - no, i've never tried a seimens phone with the HFL -but again it's important to make sure it implements the "Handsfree" profile.
dan - unfortunately i don't know of any way to BT enable the RIM 7230. seems like they could do it with that USB port somehow, but as of now, i'm not aware of any 3rd party adaptors that make this work. would be cool if RIM got their act together and started putting bluetooth on their devices. i'd worry about battery drain, however.
Posted by: steve at February 4, 2004 04:49 PM
Does anyone know if the Motorola V600 will work with the Acua TL....
Posted by: Jeff at February 20, 2004 02:40 PM
I had the same problem with the Nokia 6600. Its very disappointing!
Posted by: Joe at March 4, 2004 09:01 PM
yeah i'm going to try to dig into this 6600 firmware thing with nokia....they've gotta fix these bugs.
Posted by: steve at March 4, 2004 09:03 PM
I have been successful with the T68i. My attempts with the 6600 have failed .It will link but the other party comes out of the phone , not the speaker. I didn't see any newer firmware available so I am returning the 6600.
BTW, I needed to update the firmware to get the t68i to work.
Posted by: Rich at March 20, 2004 09:03 AM
I have been successful with the T68i. My attempts with the 6600 have failed .It will link but the other party comes out of the phone , not the speaker. I didn't see any newer firmware available so I am returning the 6600.
BTW, I needed to update the firmware to get the t68i to work.
Posted by: Rich at March 20, 2004 09:03 AM
i am using the motoralla v600. i found i very earsy to pair and use. the only problem is that when i am in the car and just want to use my cell phone,and call out i dont hear the phone ringing on the line that i am calling. has anyone else expirenced this problem and any ideas on how to correct it
thanks
Posted by: hal at April 1, 2004 08:22 AM
I'm using the Moto V600 and had no problem paring the phone to the HFL. One problem I've discovered is that I cannot delete other phones that have been saved in HFL (not contacts, but actual phone names). HFL gets stuck in a loop and doesn't want to delete the name. Changing the name works fine. The issue has been bounced from Acura cust care to HFL cust care and now to Johnson Controls cust care . . . anyone else notice this problem?
In regards to not hearing the ring when calling a number on the V600, I have had the same problem but I'm not sure if it is a "feature" of the phone or with bluetooth. It seems to be happening only some of the time - I'll update what I discover over the next few days.
Happy driving & chatting . . .
Posted by: Troy at April 2, 2004 07:38 PM
Question to all the people that have paired Motorola V600 to HFL: When you are done with the pairing do you get all the info from the phone to the HFL screen? For instance I cannot see the battery meter. Do you know if this piece of info is trasmitted to HFL?
BTW I do hear the ring when calling a number on V600.
Posted by: ian at April 6, 2004 11:15 AM
the only phone i've seen that on is the Sony Ericsson T68i and the T610
Posted by: steve at April 6, 2004 11:31 AM
Recently bought a 2004 TL Navi and then bought two Moto V600 phones. The first one pairs flawlessly. When I pair the second phone, it deletes the first. I just cannot get both phones paired. However, when I have one phone paired and turn it off, it "reads" the other phone.
BTW the battery lights do not appear.
Posted by: Steve at April 9, 2004 09:39 PM
I just got a v600 and had no problems pairing it with my TL. The major problem I've had is with answering incoming calls. Most of the time when I answer an incoming call with the steering wheel, the call answer but only on the handset, not the HFL. Any ideas?
Posted by: Jeff at May 4, 2004 08:37 PM
I just got a v600 and had no problems pairing it with my TL. The major problem I've had is with answering incoming calls. Most of the time when I answer an incoming call with the steering wheel, the call answer but only on the handset, not the HFL. Any ideas?
Posted by: Jeff at May 4, 2004 08:38 PM
Can you connect TL and iPaq 2215 with BT? I would like to know if I can read the vital of the car in to my Pocket PC. Wouldn't it be cool?
Brian.
Posted by: Brian at May 5, 2004 03:01 AM
any problems with V600 not picking up a call i believe are problems with the V600 firmware. the exact same thing happens with the nokia 6600.
as far as having the TL connect with the iPaq - cool idea but as far as i know, the car doesn't advertise any of it's details via bluetooth, but it could! i am sure this stuff is not implemented.
see this entry for the profiles that the TL supports.
Posted by: steve at May 5, 2004 07:52 AM
I bought a new Acura TL with Navi and a Motorola V600 phone. I can make calls with the Handsfree link, but when I receive an incoming call, it rings in the car, but when I hit the talk button on the steering wheel, the call goes to the cell phone and not the handsfree system in the car. Acura tech support said to hit the talk button a second time and say "transfer" to bring the call back to the handsfree system in the car, but it takes about 15 seconds, and by then most callers hang up. Any ideas how to make incoming calls come into the handsfree system with just one press of the talk button like it is supposed to?
Posted by: Ron Aaron at May 7, 2004 01:23 AM
i guess what it comes down to is that manufacturers aren't testing their bluetooth phones with cars, just headsets.
let's hope they get this all right the in the second wave.
Posted by: steve at May 7, 2004 10:08 AM
I believe that another workaround for answering calls on the V600 is to leave the phone with the flip open.
Posted by: jop at May 23, 2004 01:23 PM
Acura with Moto V600. Same problem. When a call comes in, I hit the answer button on the steering wheel. It stops ringing but the caller can't hear me. I guess the phone isn't transferring the call to the bluetooth. Has anyone found a solution?
Posted by: SVD at May 24, 2004 11:04 AM
Me too with the Acura and V600. Once in a while
I can get it to answer, mostly not.
Could it have anything to do with the Auto Answer
settings in the Handsfee or Car Setting?
I did get it to transfer as Acura says, but that's kind of iffy too.
Posted by: SteveR at June 3, 2004 08:10 PM
I bought a TL w/navi 2 months ago and have yet to get a new phone. Which of the bluethooth phones works the best and allows for the use of all the features?
Thanks for the help
Posted by: PFG at June 9, 2004 01:08 PM
my tl is in the shop, one issue is the blue tooth with my v600. Cannot answer incoming call on the steering wheel. Also not able to enter additional digits or # * for use with Voice mail systems.
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