After chatting to Decron, who gave me some excellent advice, I have fitted a Parrot MKi9000 to the vRoomster. I had a Witson fitted, but when I got a TomTom 940 I decided to go with the TomTom and look for an iPhone friendly Bluetooth kit.

I like this as it's discreet, there is no display to it, but the iPhones is big enough for caller ID etc

Updated to firmware 1.4, it picks up the iPhone fine and the voice commands are on a par with the THB Bury unit's (speaking from experience), the voice recognition is great, no need to "train" it.

It takes about 30 minutes to fit one of these to a Roomster (or indeed a fabia 2) and is highly commendable, with it's Line in, USB and iPod / iPhone capability (using it with a 3g 16GB without issues).

A couple of pics of it all ......

PS, if you want one get in quick, CPW have them for £78, about £21 cheaper than anywhere else I found

How many different setups is this now? I praise your persaverance.

How many different setups is this now? I praise your persaverance.

To many mate, but I'm happy with this, the problem is the iPhone 3g and Apple changing the charging pin out so most 1st gen iPhone compatible kits just don't work, as in they will charge it and not play it, or play it and not charge it. The Parrot is the only thing that even comes close to the THB for ease of use and voice clarity, and actually works with an iPhone 3g, charging and music.

I do follow these setups.... I might and I stress the might go with one of these as it leaves the HU intact.

Good work fella, I too found the problem with the 3g pin setup. Will this take the audio (ipod) from the phone too?

re the tom tom, I've all but given up on the iphone 3g for gps work unless crawling about in a shopping centre looking for my car... it's dam near the centre of a black hole of uselessness.

I do follow these setups.... I might and I stress the might go with one of these as it leaves the HU intact.

Good work fella, I too found the problem with the 3g pin setup. Will this take the audio (ipod) from the phone too?

re the tom tom, I've all but given up on the iphone 3g for gps work unless crawling about in a shopping centre looking for my car... it's dam near the centre of a black hole of uselessness.

LOL, you are right about the navigation on the 3g or the lack of it Colin

This world perfectly with the 3g, you get a nag screen at first saying it's not designed for the 3g and do you want to switch over to flight mode, just click on no and it takes / makes calls fine and it plays the audio. It only has track next / previous track, pause, volume control but if you have a few playlists made up it's easy enough.

It uses it's own built in amp so oddly enough you don't actually have to have the oem headunit powered up, it controls it all via the unit's internal amp driving all the speakers. You can connect it with an iso slave lead, or it can plumb straight into the line in connectors in place of the "aux" socket.

It can have the remote mounted on the steering wheel, ferrari Manettino this works quite well but you can catch it when going lock to lock and all of a sudden be deafened by Rammstein (if you so desire) The remote is wireless and clips on / off as needed. I will stick the remote on the wheel tomorrow and post a piccy up, as it looks quite cool, in a geeky kind of way

How do you charge the remote? (Not something that is immediately obvious on the parrot site)

I deciding between this kit or an IO Play (not in a roomster) but leaning toward the Parrot at the CPW price.

The IO will only play through two speakers.

How do you charge the remote? (Not something that is immediately obvious on the parrot site)

I deciding between this kit or an IO Play (not in a roomster) but leaning toward the Parrot at the CPW price.

It uses a little CR2032 watch battery mate, I got an email from Parrot estimating it's life as between 18 months to 2 years.

If it's on a Piephone, the IO Play won't charge the 3G and as Decron say's it's amp only powers the front speakers, add to that, whilst it's well made the IO Play has 2 x control boxes to hide away and the Parrot only has the one.

The IO will only play through two speakers.

There's 2 though isn't there? The IO Talk only plays throught the front speakers but they claim the IO Play plays through all 4 speakers. I saw the IO Talk in Autoexpress winning the test where the Parrot 9000 came third but I know of Parrot so was leaning that way.

(btw my knowledge is limited to their own website so I'm happy to be corrected planning on connecting to N95 for phone and Sony NWA-806 for music)

Just had a word with my engineer. It's better over 2 speakers in some cars. It will run 4 speakers but it's not an ideal setup and the amp struggles (I thought it would only run 2 like the Motorola but he set me straight!). We have had some customers complain and we have had to switch their installs to 2 speakers. It's 60w overall so you split that up, whereas the Parrrot is quoted as 20w per channel

The Parrot one is a far better piece of kit IMHO and at that price.....:eek:

I was thinking of trying one of these Car iPod interface iPod your car iPod ready in my fabia with the connects2. Anyone tried one yet?

It uses a little CR2032 watch battery mate, I got an email from Parrot estimating it's life as between 18 months to 2 years.

If it's on a Piephone, the IO Play won't charge the 3G and as Decron say's it's amp only powers the front speakers, add to that, whilst it's well made the IO Play has 2 x control boxes to hide away and the Parrot only has the one.

Fluff, daft question but can you control the kit with an on/off or is it on all the time the ignition is on?

It's on/off with the ignition, but you don't have to listen to the ipod / mp3 player. It makes it's BT connection, then it starts the ipod connection via the feature connector and you just hit the stop button.

If you don't "dock" the ipod / mp3 player then it just establishes a regular BT connection

So I can recognise the Brodit Proclip, but who makes the iPhone 3G cradle?

That looks like the ideal solution for the missus' Roomster ... she's moaned like hell about me not sorting a permanent mount for her Garmin, so this setup would solve all the issues ... especially with the iPhone handy ... don't understand the 9200 repeating the display when the iPhone has a better display than them all!

So I can recognise the Brodit Proclip, but who makes the iPhone 3G cradle?

That looks like the ideal solution for the missus' Roomster ... she's moaned like hell about me not sorting a permanent mount for her Garmin, so this setup would solve all the issues ... especially with the iPhone handy ... don't understand the 9200 repeating the display when the iPhone has a better display than them all!

Brodit make it mate, it's the model with the pass through connector, which then allows the use of kit's like the parrot. Brodit part number is 915246 (3G) and 915240 for the 2G iPhone, it is felt covered to stop it scratching the iPhone body which is a nice touch.

I moved the remote to the steering wheel using the supplied strap, it's pretty much perfect now and Parrot seem to be on the ball with the firmware this time.

Excellent, looks like I might be spoiling her again then ... Brodit phone holder for Valentines Day huh ... ;-)

Thanks for the part numbers Fluff, will order those tonight!

BTW, regarding the Parrot MKi9000, does the ISO connector just plugin to the VAG Dance unit or is this a rewire job ... couldn't find any obvious "kits" yet.

Looks like the CPW offer is still on BTW, site is pants tho ...

BTW, regarding the Parrot MKi9000, does the ISO connector just plugin to the VAG Dance unit or is this a rewire job ... couldn't find any obvious "kits" yet.

Looks like the CPW offer is still on BTW, site is pants tho ...

I used an Autoleads ISO Slave lead. You can get them in Halfrauds for £14.99 but there are probably cheaper available. The Slave lead plugs into the dance with a normal quadlock, you then have the ISO leads piggy backing off the wiring harness and a male quadlock to plug the original Dance quadlock connector into.

There is plenty of space to drop the ISO plug's down to the lower left of the Dance in the dash and then if you pull back the transmission tunnel (held on with velcro) on the left side you get clear access to cable tie them / wrap them so there are no rattles.

The only other thing is to run the mute lead on the parrot harness to the mute wire on the dance (third connector on the left row of lower pins iirc) and you are ready to go. It's a really easy install, 30 minutes or so should see you right.

I have got some spare mute leads I made up using the small vag crimp if you want one posting out, I'm not back until the weekend though.

I used an Autoleads ISO Slave lead. You can get them in Halfrauds for £14.99 but there are probably cheaper available. The Slave lead plugs into the dance with a normal quadlock, you then have the ISO leads piggy backing off the wiring harness and a male quadlock to plug the original Dance quadlock connector into.

There is plenty of space to drop the ISO plug's down to the lower left of the Dance in the dash and then if you pull back the transmission tunnel (held on with velcro) on the left side you get clear access to cable tie them / wrap them so there are no rattles.

The only other thing is to run the mute lead on the parrot harness to the mute wire on the dance (third connector on the left row of lower pins iirc) and you are ready to go. It's a really easy install, 30 minutes or so should see you right.

I have got some spare mute leads I made up using the small vag crimp if you want one posting out, I'm not back until the weekend though.

Fantastic info ... cheers!

Hopefully will be able to hack about with this next weekend, I'm off on business for the next few days, but it gives me some time to get all the bits together!

Thanks again

I meant to post up these images before, I moved the remote control unit on the parrot to the steering wheel using the supplied mount. It does not impact on driving or vehicle control, you can adjust the volume, track select etc etc all without moving a hand from the wheel. The only minor niggle is that sometime when parking and spinning the wheel you can knock the middle button launching into music mode, not a problem for most, but the first track on my iPhone is Motorhead and Ace of Spades .... not very subtle

The only minor niggle is that

you posted the wrong link to the image?

:P

EDIT: Now that's unfair to sort it that quick!!

All that kit and your listening to Radio 2 :eek:

you posted the wrong link to the image?

:P

EDIT: Now that's unfair to sort it that quick!!

sorry

All that kit and your listening to Radio 2 :eek:

Easy now ...... Radio 2 in the morning, Rammstein in the afternoon. Got have my daily fix of Wogan's un-pc banter

What would I need to run this off my Octy II? I have a stream player and no aux port in the car.

Thanks