image courtesy of www.digitaltrends.com
Both of my BMWs were made before integrated Bluetooth phone connectivity became the norm for new cars. That’s never been a big deal for me, since I much prefer to not take calls behind the wheel.
However, working in professional services means that occasionally a call can’t be avoided. I needed a hands-free option, especially since both my cars are manual transmission. It won’t become a regular habit, I just needed something to satisfy the unexpected client situation while also keeping me compliant with the various hands-free ordinances sprouting up in the Washington DC metro area.
As usual with anything BMW, there were a number of options to research. I wanted to avoid spending hundreds of dollars if possible, and a critical point was finding something portable so it worked for both my M5 and my M3. After consulting fellow owners on the forums and reading this PC Magazine review, I bought a Motorola Roadster 2 hands-free Bluetooth speaker.
This device clips to the visor and promises a lot of functionality. The basic Bluetooth phone to speaker transfer works on any smartphone, but there are additional functions for Android owners like me (running Android 4.0.4 on a Droid Razr Maxx). Most useful sounding was the voice controlled text messaging, using the Android MotoSpeak app.
In place
That works — but only to receive messages, not send them. Here’s my first hand, first weekend report on the Motorola Roadster 2:
- Speaker sound quality and volume — very good
- Synch process between Roadster and phone — excellent
- Auto on/off when I leave the car — working, and seems like a very useful function to conserve battery power
- Hands free texting – like I say above, incoming texts are read to me, which is pretty cool. The Roadster is not able to send texts by my voice command
- Voice dialing — very dicey. The Roadster 2 has a hard time making out contact names, I’ve had to speak the phone number most times
- FM transmitter for calls — working once I set radio in car to vacant frequency. Sounds OK, and people I’ve called say sound on their end OK as well
- FM transmitter for music — not working. Not a deal breaker for me since previous owner did nice iPod integration and that’s how I listen to music in the M5, but don’t know why Pandora or iHeartRadio aren’t working
It will be nice if I can figure out a couple of the above issues, but the bottom line is the Roadster 2 was only $100 at Best Buy. So as long as the basic phone to speaker functionality remains reliable, I’ve solved my issue for both cars. I hope this story proves useful for other owners, and I’ll update this review if I get the music streaming to work.
UPDATE 2/14 – Progress on both the text by voice command and streaming music fronts. I’ve been able to send texts by voice command, it’s not reliable but it works. Sometimes I get “network error” and other times the Roadster 2 doesn’t understand the words. For streaming via the FM transmitter, I’ve been able to make Pandora work through the car speakers. The sound is OK, not as good as radio, and the transitions between songs is slow.
Also, the real-world practicality is hampered by the difficulty of finding an open FM channel that stays open as you drive around. Something to keep in mind in case you’re looking for this functionality out of your Bluetooth device.
UPDATE 4/21/23 – If you have found this article stop reading – the best solution hands down is Bluebus.
This is very helpful. I’ve got a 88 M6 and a 2003 S55 AMG and both are without connections to the world. Like you, I avoid car calls, but some cannot be deferred. Have been getting by with a Plantronics earpiece, but the Roadster sounds good. Would be better if the text function worked with iPhones though. Thanks for the review