Ipod car kit?

[d4l]

Anyways yesterday i got a car from my parents as an early birthday present. I want to get a car kit for my ipod because i dont really like any of the stations near me(no techno what so ever).

I'm leaning towards something like this:
GRIFFIN iTRIP FM TRANSMITTER & CAR CHARGER Ipod Auto NR - eBay (item 400000717767 end time Oct-05-08 18:30:00 PDT)

Just wondering if anyone has used this and how it works or if some one has a better thing(reasonably priced (20-30 USD) they could recommend.

 

[chevre]

If it's anything like the FM transmitter in my $500 GPS unit, your'e in for a disappointment. It sounds like a great idea, but for one, if you're near a major city it can be very hard to find open channels, and even if you do there will be lots of interference. And when you do squeeze into one that works ok, be prepared for crosstalk with other people doing the same thing .

Your best bet in my opinion: get yourself a nice car stereo. There are ones that have special iPod connectivity where you can even control the iPod through the stereo, or get one that has a front AUX in, and you can use that. This will get you much better sound quality.

 

[Point]

Actually it really all depends on where you live chevre. My friend let me borrow his and I can flip to pretty much any FM station and get a good reception from my iPod. It's this little junky thing that plugs into my cigarette lighter (which I use to light my cigarettes) and charges the iPod as it plays. Even then, they're great for the highway!

 

[Pojo]

What kind of radio does your car have, and what connections do you have? For me, I did have some cheap $10-$20 dollar thing that you can either use batteries or plug it into the 12V thing, and it just uses some radio thing...Well it worked for a while, and the quality actually wasn't bad, but then I bumped it the other day, and it just stopped working...So then a few days ago, I bought the kind that are like a fake cassette (yes my car has a cassette player), and all it has is a cable that plugs into the iPod headphone hole...And I'd say it works better, and I got it for like $18 at Target

 

[betagame]

If you don't care about sound quality, heres what you need:
cassette player
iHolder
Ipod
cassette adapter
sound in your car
Ipod charger

 

[Pojo]

If you don't care about sound quality, heres what you need:
cassette player
iHolder
Ipod
cassette adapter
sound in your car

My cassette adapter has great quality

 

[Fire2box]

My cassette adapter has great quality

same here. Also I got one of those little FM things by Griffin but mine does not charge my Ipod however it does work perfectly in areas where there's not a lot of stations. Anyways if you want the best quality buy a new car stereo that has a MP3 input jack on it, it does not need to say Ipod ready it just needs to be a headphone in jack so you can plug a male/male headphone cable into it.

 

[daria7483]

Yeah, actually the cassette adapter, if you have a cassette player, isn't a bad idea. I've tried the wireless transmitter things and always got quite a bit of interference, and I don't live in a large city. I can't stand for my music to be staticy at all, so that didn't fly for me. Now I have a thing that my friend hooked up for me that went into the back of the stereo, and hooks into the ipod where you charge it. It basically makes your car think it's another device like a CD player. But I don't know if I'd recommend that either. It costs like $150, and it occasionally has problems like it will just stop playing in the middle of a song and no longer recognize that the ipod is plugged into it. I've probably had way more near-misses trying to fix that thing while driving than most people ever do on a cell phone.

 

[Secret]

Yeah I am gonna have to go with the cassete adaptor , the qaulity is alright nothing amazing but its not bad at all. When I buy my parents car I am going to be putting in one of those big woofers so i can drive around like a jackass and piss people off with my loud overly bass'y muzak! But yeah if you have a techi friend just get them to instal a direct cable or use the cassete adaptor.

I actually use this transmitterRadioShack.com - Portable Music: Accessories: iPod accessories: Wireless FM Transmitter from radioshack its meant for IPods but I use it with my guitar so it can be wireless. The range on it is like about 10 FT (before I modded the antenna) Its a good little antenna and it can use FM or AM frequencies so your pretty much set for finding at least one good station. I highly recomend this product for you. Its also usefull for screwing with people radio stations, for instance I can change the classical staion that someone is playing to a death metal one, I did it once and massive lulz ensued.

 

[paddedhawk]

Just something to think about, but if your ipod is charging whenever your car is on the battery life is going to go downhill fast. it's bad for batteries to be charging when they are full.

 

[chevre]

Modern electronics are smart enough not to overcharge their batteries. If it has a full charge, it will simply stop charging the batteries.

 

[Point]

Just something to think about, but if your ipod is charging whenever your car is on the battery life is going to go downhill fast. it's bad for batteries to be charging when they are full.

Uh, do you have any science to back that up? Because I've found that to be completely untrue. I've heard it before from people. After the battery gets full it stops charging (which is why it says "charged" with a picture of a lock). And playing the iPod while it's charging doesn't hurt it either. I never did that with my old iPod and the battery life got less on its own.

 

[chevre]

It's true that if you use a "dumb" charger to charge a battery, that overcharing will damage it. But you will not find such a charger today, for the most part.

 

[Pojo]

I'm pretty sure that your iPod won't be overcharged...

 

[Trevor]

The name in your link sounded familiar and the picture even moreso, so I had to go and dig in my bag from my recent trip to see, and as it happens, I took the same model on my recent trip. The sound was okay, although it took a little time to find a suitable unused channel in New York City. Driving longer distances, it worked better where the channels were not so tightly packed, but then it would require occasional adjustment as stations changed (every 60-100 miles or so).

Overall, I found it to be a pretty good product and I was much happier with it than the cheaper one I bought previously. I was particularly pleased with the charger, which was not a feature of my older, cheaper unit.

 

[diapernh]

I have XM in my Taurus, the issue with the FM modulator is that it just sucks if you drive a bit. I drive 40 miles to work each day, so i was changing the station often.

I decided to get a PIE Adapter. XM Satellite Radio at MyRadioStore - All Things XM I got the one with the audio and power. so now my little Roady2 powers up and down when the car does, and I had enough slack to use the audio cable for other things, like hooking my PDA into the radio and playing my MP3's. It basically makes the radio think I have a CD changer in the trunk

Little tip about ford cars like the 02 Taurus, the actual radio is in the trunk.... the head unit is just a CD player and remote tuner controls.

 

[Spirit]

If you don't care about sound quality, heres what you need:
cassette player
iHolder
Ipod
cassette adapter
sound in your car
Ipod charger

Cassette adapter? Eww.

Honestly, you can get iPod or USB compatable heads for, what, cents nowadays.

 

[Altric]

My car only has a cassette player. I use an adaptor tape similar this one that I plug my Mp3 Player(s) or other audio device into and listen to it in my car that way. The quality is great. Actually, if I listen to the FM radio on my Mp3, it sounds clearer than the car's radio. So I can't really complain.

 

[Pojo]

My car only has a cassette player. I use an adaptor tape similar this one that I plug my Mp3 Player(s) or other audio device into and listen to it in my car that way. The quality is great. Actually, if I listen to the FM radio on my Mp3, it sounds clearer than the car's radio. So I can't really complain.

Yup, that's what mine looks like...Except the white on the cassette is orange

 

[andysetra]

Quality for FM broadcasters depends on where you live and how many stations there are, how strong they are, etc. Inherently an FM transmitter will never sound as good as a quality cassette adapter, but you can get pretty close. The reason being is the audio signal has to be modulated and broadcast using a (cheap) FM transmitter go through the whole demodulation process in your car's FM radio. Chances are it has circuitry to clean up the reception (engine noise, etc) but you lose alot of fidelity from that. A cassette adapter is as close as you can get to a direct link to your car's stereo. Yes, cassettes have a bad reputation for crappy sound quality, but that is from the worn magnetic tape inside them, but you wouldn't be listening to an actual cassette.

The reason FM transmitters are so prevalent is because, come one, what cars have a tape player nowadays? And you can't make a CD adapter - technology Gods forbid, what with lasers and that

Me, I went all out on mine. I have an Pioneer CD player that has an auxilary input (direct, uses a 3.5mm headphone jack). I also picked up an iPod adapter that plugs into the back of the CD player and runs to an ipod dock on my dash. It charges the ipod and let's me control it from the CD player controls

EDIT: Forgot to add, like others have said, your iPod won't overcharge your battery. You'll notice the icon in the corner change from a 'charging' icon to a 'charged' icon when it finishes.