Up until recently, no one complained about the way iPhones sounded through my cars’ Bluetooth speakerphones, but after switching to an iPhone 6 Plus and a Toyota Prius, friends and family told me that ambient noise has been increasing to distracting levels during our phone calls. If it wasn’t for those complaints, I would never have thought to test an alternative such as TaoTronics’ TT-BR03 Bluetooth 4.0 Hands-Free Car Kit ($30, currently $25 on Amazon). Most cars these days include Bluetooth speakerphone and music streaming support, but this inexpensive accessory is here for cars that don’t — and for cars exhibiting weird audio-related bugs with iPhones. Judging from its 4.8/5-Star Amazon reviews across over 130 customers, plenty of people still need solutions like this for one of these reasons.
TT-BR03 combines a wired noise-cancelling microphone and three-button remote control with a car charger, using Bluetooth 4.0 and a 3.5mm audio plug to route your iPhone’s audio into a car’s speakers. If your car doesn’t have a 3.5mm aux-in port, you’re out of luck, because TT-BR03 doesn’t have a built-in speaker. But if you do have an aux port, it provides a very competent speakerphone and music streaming experience at a very low price.
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As the low price suggests, TT-BR03’s components are functional rather than fancy. The microphone and control puck is mounted with soft-padded sticky tape, and connects to a generic but dual-port USB car charger — one port for the puck, the other to recharge your iPhone at up to 2.1-Amp speeds (if you self-supply a charging cable). TaoTronics also includes a 19″ 3.5mm audio extension cable for cars that need it. Without the extension cable, I found that there was just enough wire to place the puck where it needed to be on my dashboard while connecting the unit to both my car’s aux-in audio port and an adjacent power outlet. When the mounting process was finished, everything looked OK; having cables running out of a central console to the dashboard isn’t attractive, but for a $30 solution with no need for professional installation, it’s acceptable.
TaoTronics’ control puck includes three buttons and a side-mounted power on/off switch. Holding a track back/minus button lets you skip back through music, while tapping it reduces the volume level; a track forward and plus button operates the same way with opposite effects. The circular call/music multifunction button can be held down to mute a call, refuse a call, or initiate pairing, tapped once to start or stop calls or music, and tapped twice to redial. It cannot be used to trigger Siri, however, which means that you’ll want to keep your iPhone plugged in to use “Hey Siri” automatic voice commands instead.
Functionally, TT-BR03 worked pretty much as expected. Initial pairing was simple, and thanks to Bluetooth 4, re-pairing is nearly instant after you turn on your car — faster than the Bluetooth system built into my Prius. While microphone placement is important to maximize sound quality, callers told me my chosen mounting location worked to produce far better results than my iPhone 6 Plus was normally getting with the car: far lower ambient noise and a much more intelligible (though slightly treble-heavy) rendition of my voice. On my side, TT-BR03’s peak volume level was lower than I would have preferred, requiring the car’s speakers to be turned up louder. And except for an occasional hiccup, as well as a reversal of the left and right stereo channels, music streaming worked just as well as with the car’s built-in Bluetooth hardware.
It’s been years since I last tested a Bluetooth car kit like this, and the two biggest differences I noticed were the improvements in Bluetooth 4 and the pricing. TT-BR03 demonstrates that it’s now possible to add an entirely competent speakerphone and streaming solution to any car with aux-in for a very low price, and thanks to Bluetooth 4, the speed and quality of wireless pairing may actually be better than what you’re accustomed to. So if you need to add wireless calling and music to your car, or find an alternative to a Bluetooth system that’s experiencing issues, you’ll find that TT-BR03 gets the job done without breaking the bank.
| Manufacturer: TaoTronics |
Price: $30/$25 |
Compatibility: iPhones, iPads*, Bluetooth iPods* |
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I don’t mean to derail, but this article spawned a notification on my Mac that said something like “Breaking Apple News.” What about this article is breaking, exactly?
I get those for every article on the site- I think its normal functionality.
I’m starting to realize that now. Makes sense.
So it seems another iOS bug affecting you. These days i see so many bugs and problems with iOS devices. Apple should focus on these or they will become the new Android. (If you don’t know, Android had full of bugs but nowadays it’s getting better with every new update.)
As he said, it’s on his Mac, and as was explained, it’s what this site sends out.
I see almost no bugs in IOS, it’s more stable than any computer I’ve ever had, but while my Android phones are fun to experiment with, and the underlying system has gotten better, are full of bugs and really buggy apps. My “I must be reached on and it must work,” phone is the iPhone. I was all Android for years, and some phones were better than others, (the Samsung Galaxy was by far the worse phone I’ve ever owned), but I really needed something I could puts apps on, but also worked.
So I guess my experience is really different than yours.
Don’t get me wrong, i’m a hardcore iPhone user too. I bought almost all of them. Now i’m happy with my iPhone 6. But, there are still some bugs in iOS 8. The main point of my argument was when Android gets better with each new update like Lollipop, iOS was getting worse like first public release of iOS 7 and iOS 8. Do you remember iOS 6 times? The stability has gone a little bit. So, for me, it’s still better than Android, if not much better, but i think Apple will take care of it with iOS 9. Btw, i still can’t believe how did they release the iOS 8.0.1 which broke the cellular capabilities and disabled the touch id functionality.
Also, when i said: an iOS bug is affecting you, i was mentioning the author, not ncookleon nor joelrose nick named friends. In the article, as you remember, author said that ambient noise has been increased to distracting levels. This look like an iOS bug.
It is a nice device, but no Siri in this one, there is another, with similar price, U$ 29, which have Siri compatibility.
hi krikaoli which one?
Hello, the Himbox.
“but after switching to an iPhone 6 Plus”
How did you get your hands on a 6 Plus prototype?
The 6 Plus has been out for 6 months….?
I bought it at an Apple Store?
The main problem with this unit is that it doesn’t support “multi-point” (having 2 phones connected to it at once). That pretty much makes it a no go for anyone with a spouse :-)
I just bought the Brightech BrightPlay Car HD and I really like it a lot. It’s only $20. Supports multi-point and Siri. It also supports AptX (high resolution Bluetooth audio) but Apple doesn’t support that yet so it might not mean much here (lots of Android phones do support it though… and maybe Apple will support it in the future).
There are TONS of these types of devices. I highly recommend that people shop around to find the one with the right mix of features for them!
The TaoTronics model actually does support pairing of two devices simultaneously, using (fast) Bluetooth 4, which it doesn’t look like the Brightech one includes?