Could This Be The Best Hands Free Kit So Far?
Looks can be deceiving, and a first glance at the Parrot ck3000 Evolution Bluetooth hands free kit could have you suspicious of how good it really is in comparison to other, more bulky devices, but trust me, this little beauty packs many great features at an even better price.
For well under £100 you're getting an in car kit that pretty much fits the bill as far as a legal device, doing pretty much whatever you'll need, without being distracting. The above picture is the control panel that is mounted on your dashboard. A larger control box is hidden behind your car stereo, and a mic can be mounted on the front pillars for excellent, clear calls.
The Parrot ck3000 evolution routes incoming calls through your cars' speakers, muting anything you're listening to, making calls loud and clear. No additional wiring kits are needed if your car stereo has a standard ISO wiring loom. If it doesn't, adaptors can be ordered for about £20, depending on the type and model of car.
How does the Parrot ck3000 work? Well, once installed and after you have chosen the language and paired with your bluetooth phone, you're ready for use. If you receive a call, simply press the green button, or say "Phone". When finished just press the red button, or say "hang up". That's right, we're talking about true hands-free operation through voice recognition. It worked for me first time with no problems on my Nokia. Very nice.
Next up, making calls. You need to have voiceprints activated in your phone (or programmed into the Parrot ck3000 evolution) , then you simply say "Phone" then the name of the person you want to call. If they've got more than one number just add "home", "work", "mobile" etc.
Wait you say, I don't have a clue about voice prints or voice recognition and I'm worried I won't be able to use these features. Fear not! Parrot have a great user guide and help section, where they have an exhaustive list of phones and how to get the voice recognition working. The best way is to send each contact from your phone to the Parrot, which then asks you to say the name for future voice-activated use. Easy. The ck3000 evolution will remember about 150 different names, more than enough for most users.
For call quality the ck3000 uses all sorts of echo cancellation and background noise reduction to make your calls as clear as possible, and I had no problems at all with the unit I had to review. In fact I liked it so much I bought one for the wife to use in her car, and that's a recommendation!
Comments / Questions:
I am definitely not happy. I had it installed by Mitsubishi in my 2007 Pajero last September. From the beginning I have had an annoying echo effect. Most of the people I speak with the the system can't stand more than 3 minutes of the this annoying abuse. At first they said it weas because they did not have an ISO adapter to install it with and they did some patching and sewing. I brought them the ISO adapter myself after waiting for them for about six months. They installed a new kit with the ISO adapter and guess what? Same echo!!!!!! My parrot software version is 5.11c. If you have any suggestions let me know I am about to return it back and get any other brand. Bill. Ok, you need to test the unit with a different phone to make sure the Parrot / Microphone is the faulty part. If its still unacceptable, take it back. |
I'm trying to pair a nokia 6300 but the parrot is saying memory full. I don't have the phones that were previously paired to it so how can I delete the old paired phones??
Hold red and green buttons down together for a few seconds (10 I think) should clear the memory. |
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