Monster A-IP-FM-CH-PS Wireless FM Transmitter
by Monster Cable
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Monster A-IP-FM-CH-PS Wireless FM Transmitter
Customer Review: Great product...easy to use...sounds much better than expected
Summary: 5 Stars
Overall: This is a great product that is much better than I expected (based on some of the reviews I read here on Amazon). It is easy to install/use and sounds much better than a typical FM radio broadcast (close to CD quality in my two cars). It has some minor faults, but not enough to disqualify it for most users.
Pros:
1. Very simple to use. You plug it in and can immediately tune it to one of the three preset frequencies (88.1, 98.1, and 107.9) by clicking a single button. If those frequencies don't work, they are is relatively simple to change BUT NOT SIMPLE ENOUGH TO DO WHILE DRIVING--STOP THE CAR TO MANUALLY CHANGE THE PRESETS!
2. Little interference from FM stations. I am in Europe now where the FM frequency band is jam-packed. In fact, the FM band is divided into double the number of possible stations versus the US. Yes, I have some minor interference in Paris and driving across Germany, but usually changing one of the three presets does the trick. But in both my BMW Z-3 and Chrysler Town and Country, it takes a close-by, full-powered radio station to kick the iCarPlay off the freq. Usually a slightly less powerful signal on the frequency will just give slight interference that makes the iPod signal sound similar to an FM radio station just starting to go out of range, i.e. 95% of the music is there with a slight whispy sound at the high points.
3. Low profile power plug. Actually this was the deciding factor for me in choosing this product. The cigarette lighter in a BMW Z-3 is located very close to the gear shift. Any device which protrudes from the socket interferes with shifting. The iCarPlay power plug protrudes no more than about a half inch above the socket and fits both my cars in every power socket location (the Chrysler van has five) without interfering in any car operations.
4. Sounds good. In each of my two cars, the music sounds almost as good as a CD and better than FM radio broadcasts. OK, neither my Z-3 nor my Chrysler has a state-of-the art sound system. However, neither system is shabby; both are the best stock option systems available for each car. In both cars, the iPod through the iCarPlay has good stereo separation and little hiss (although there is some hiss noticeable at high volumes...sorry, it's an FM transmitter system not a direct connection). One caveat-the Z-3 convertable has enough other road noise to make any hiss disappear, so not a great example. But the Chrysler van is quiet at 80mph and no hiss was discernable by me.
Cons:
1. Red lights. There is likely NO car interior lighting that will match the bright fire engine red lighting on the iCarPlay. No, it does not come close to the standard orange car lighting in my Z-3 and certainly not to the pale blue of the Chrysler. It more closely resembles the red of the car's emergency blicker. As a former Air Force pilot, I also find this particular shade of red disconcerting since it also resembles the engine fire warning lights of modern aircraft.
2. Frequency buttons too close. For my large thumbs, the frequency buttons are a bit close. It is easy to hit one of the outer frequencies when trying to press the center button. Not a serious limitation, just a very slight annoyance.
3. SEE UPDATE BELOW.
BOTTOM LINE: easy to use, sounds great, low profile. If you can live with the red lights and slightly close buttons, it's a great product.
UPDATE (4 June 06) : Would probably downgrade now to three or four stars vice five (unfortunately AOL does not allow the number of stars to be changed). Reason: even though the audio still works fine, the digital readout has faded so much that I can only see it at night or in low light.
UPDATE (30 Jan 07): Mea Culpa, mea culpa!! The dimming of the display is a design feature that I inadvertently activated by pressing the wrong sequence of buttons. I was using it in the dim mode for six months when I came across a similar problem from another user (on another website). Turns out that you can set the display as bright or dim for day/night use. My bad...back to four/five stars...my display is now on full bright. Sorry Monster!
Customer Review: Good quality, can use with iPod in case, almost all stations available ...
Summary: 4 Stars
Let me reiterate something people keep missing here: This product (note the "Plus" in the title) DOES allow tuning to just about every station on the spectrum (I believe excepting the lowest frequency, 87.9 or something like that).
The BIG advantage here over the previous version (also available on Amazon for $10 less, and elsewhere for $20 less) is two-fold:
1. If you didn't have a station below 88.9 open, the previous product was unusable.
2. FM stations in the "mid range", from what I understand, have a better frequency response than in either the "low range" or the "upper range", which leads to a noticably better quality sound (I could hear the difference between a low-88 and 97.5 quite clearly, but a lot of other factors also come into play here such as what the other stations are broadcasting, etc).
Note that your satisfaction with this product will depend largely on the vehicle and sound system you are using it with. Some radios do a better job of "locking" onto a carrier wave that is only slightly stronger than the general broadcast wave. Some cars isolate the external antenna such that an internal radio transmitter has much less of an effect. For my purposes, I've used this product in both a Toyota Echo and in a GMC van; the GMC stock radio picks up the Monster transmission nearly across the entire dial, loud and clear; the Toyota's radio only picks up at one dial location (97.5) and even then will often pick up chirping around construction sites (which it also does with regular radio; like I said, I believe this has to do with not locking on to the carrier wave very well).
Finally, comparing this to other products. I started with a Griffin iTrip. That device was very nice, but had two fatal flaws:
1. It did not allow for easy changing of the radio station (and I absolutely hate having a bunch of encoded "songs" in my playlist just so I can change the iTrip frequency if necessary!)
2. It did not charge the device.
However, it had two points in its favor:
1. A very strong signal (I've heard charger-transmitters like the Monster one which yielded less transmission oomph).
2. Works well with my iPod in its protective case.
Now, a word on that latter.
I like my iPod. I like it's shiny back. I like it's pristine white front. I do not like scratches. More importantly, I do not like the thought of minor bumps causing the hard drive inside to crash.
As a result, I keep it in a protective case every moment that I can. I take the case off at night to dock it with my computer, but that's it.
The vast majority of car charger/FM transmitters require you to "dock" the iPod in their own little cradle. None of those cradles allows for a protective case, so far as I've been able to find. Many many nice FM transmitter solutions are completely unusable in my opinion because of this.
Moreover, I like to be able to hold my iPod when pressing its buttons etc. Any "cradle" system which locks its location to within three inches of the cigarette lighter (which Toyota in its infinite wisdom chose to place six inches above the floor on the passenger side) is also completely unusable.
Anyway, I wanted to get a transmitter that charged the iPod, allowed for easy, full-spectrum channel selection, and still both cut through the static in my Toyota AND didn't require a confining "cradle" to operate.
The Monster device here definitely meets my needs. As I said, it does well (actually moderately better than the iTrip) in my Toyota, allows me to place my iPod in a nice little bin next to my fingertips, and makes my commute a refreshing one.
One last note on this: I have noticed that the use of a cigarette lighter "splitter" so that you can plug both this and, say, a cell phone charger in at the same time, will tend to cause problems with the Monster transmitter and the iPod (causing my iPod to reboot). I think it says more about Toyota's anemic electrical system than the Monster device, but just wanted to throw that little tidbit out there.
Customer Review: Great on Long trips, poor in big cities
Summary: 3 Stars
Three months ago, after doing some reading in the web regarding this subject, I went to BestBuy looking for a system for my car. At that time I had narrowed down my options to either the Griffin iTrip FM transmitter for dockable iPods or the Moster Cable iCarPlay wireless FM iPod transmitter/charger but was not totally sure so I decided to ask for advice to a salesperson at the store (bad decision) and he recommended the Monster product.
He claimed he had one in his car and he loved it. He also highlighted the advantage of charging your iPod while you listen to your music.
About the same time, my son bought the Griffin product and he has been using it since then.
Well, I began using the Monster system for about 6 weeks and then switched with my son and began using his Griffin gadget and after gaining experience with both products I can say the following:
1) Because the Monster Cable system has only 8 pre-set FM stations you can use to send your signal to, you have to make sure that there is at least 1 free FM band in the city where you are using this product. If not, you are out of luck. Here in Indianapolis, after much work I found only one FM band that is not being used by a local station so I got lucky and my system works fine. The Griffin iTrip FM transmitter for dockable iPods has much more flexibility since it allows you to tune to any of over 100 FM stations in your FM dial.
2) Even if you find a "clean FM band" to use your Monster Cable FM iPod Transmitter/Charger, you will find that when you are riding your car using the system, you will hit some spots where you will pick-up considerable interference or "static". I have not yet lost my iPod signal when this happens but this situation is quite annoying. For the Griffin iTrip FM transmitter for dockable iPods this problem seems to be much less significant (but not totally absent as they claim in their manual) and this seems to be related to the fact that they use digital technology (versus analog technology which is used by competing products) to beam the signal to your FM radio and this apparently makes the quality of the signal better, stronger and cleaner.
3) The "Charge while you Play" feature is quite a plus for the Monster Cable product. The gadget does charge efficiently and very quickly and it keeps your iPod battery fully charged at all times. For long trips this is quite an advantage that the Griffin product does not have.
4) The price of the Monster Cable product is considerably more expensive than the Griffin iTrip gadget. At BestBuy, where both, my son and I bought these products, the Monster Cable iTrip product was $69.99 while the Griffin iTrip was $39.99.
5) Don't forget that another difference is that with the Monster Cable product you have a cable connected to your iPod all the time and this takes away flexibility and makes it very visible in your car. The Griffin product is wireless and thus there is no connection so you do not need to worry about hiding it when you park your car in oublic places.
In summary, these are two innovative products that allow you to listen to your own music in your own car in a practical and flexible manner. If you are mostly going to use this equipment in the city, while you comute to work and back to home and willnot make long car trips, save yourself some money and some headaches and get the Griffin iTrip FM transmitter for dockable iPods. On the other hand if keeping your iPod charged at all times is a must or if you make long, long trips on your car and want to listen to your iPod during these, consider the Moster Cable iCarPlay wireless FM iPod transmitter/charger.
Customer Review: Room for improvement
Summary: 3 Stars
Unlike the previous iCarPlay installment, which could only broadcast over one of 10 factory-set frequencies, this one lets you choose the exact frequency you want, a very useful feature in urban areas where the radio spectrum is crowded.
You can program the three most commonly used frequencies into presets, a nifty feature.
I have used the previous version for several months and recently upgraded to this model. Unfortunately, although I appreciate the convenience of open frequency selection, I think this new model is a step back in terms of quality and convenience.
The audio quality seems to be slightly worse, with more background noise and muffled high-end. Inexplicably, the unit suffers from microphonic effect: vibrations applied to the transmitter box, tapping for instance, can be distinctly heard through the speakers. Not a major problem, but it doesn't speak well for the design and manufacturing quality of this product.
The user interface of the previous version was very simple: one recessed button to toggle between the 10 available frequencies, end of story. This model has three lovely illuminated raised buttons, located on the transmitter unit which is situated somewhere in the middle of the cable. This unfortunate location means that should you ever pick up the iPod and move it around while attached to the iCarPlay, the box is likely to hit something (the center console, the shifter, your knee...) and one of the preset buttons will be pressed, switching the transmitting frequency. As a result your music will be replaced by loud static, a very unpleasant and disorienting experience. After the third time this happened to me, I programmed the same frequency onto all three presets, which of course defeats the purpose of having presets in the first place.
Finally, the three button user interface is very unintuitive. I could not figure it out without reading the manual, and I'm usually pretty good with these things.
Despite these numerous shortcomings, this product shines in one area: convenience. You don't need to install anything, just plug and go. Only one cable, one cigarette lighter adapter, one iPod connector: this is a simple device, easy to unplug, take on a trip, move from car to rental car. It performs adequately. I would have given it four stars if it weren't for its poorly designed user interface, easy-to-knock buttons and microphonic effect. The next model will surely address these issues. Until then, I recommend it, but with reservations.
Customer Review: Monster Cable Works
Summary: 5 Stars
Anyone who owns an Apple iPod realizes the importance of being able to listen to your collection of songs anytime, anywhere. It is for this reason that I researched a mobile device for my unit. Originally, I was determined to buy an iTrip due to the compatibility of the system. Well, upon further investigation, I discovered that for a little more I could get the Monster Cable rather than the iTrip.
The two are capable of the same thing; playing I-Pod tunes through a car radio receiver. The iTrip simply plugs into the top of the iPod and the music comes through the car speakers. Unfortunately, its simplicity makes up for its clarity.
There is much more static with this system, due to the fact that the reception is not as strong. On the other hand, the Monster Cable gives the option of eight different stations, one that is sure to be suitable for the area. By simply changing the setting on the deck to match the radio station, the music comes through without any static and very good clarity.
Another major difference in comparing the two units is their portability. The iTrip, although cordless, can not be placed too far from its base. That can be a challenge when driving since the movement of the car can cause it to fall if not properly secured. The Monster has a cord which holds the iPod in place and allows a stronger reception resulting in better sound.
Finally, the battery life is a very important issue when deciding on which unit to purchase. The iTrip drains the battery life of the iPod twice as fast as it normally would last. Therefore, long trips can be challenging for this device. However, the Monster Cable is designed to actually charge the iPod as long as it is plugged in, regardless of whether or not it is playing music. It is a great feature since the battery is virtually always being charged to its capacity.Finally, the battery life is a very important issue when It is obvious that the Monster Cable is a far better choice to take your I-Pod with you in the car. Even though it may cost more, the portability, convenience, and especially the quality of sound are definitely worth it