I jumped into the Honda Insight EX last week for a trip from LA to Palm Spring, thinking I'd have time to catch up on a few phone calls on the two-hour-plus freeway drive. Before taking off I hit the Bluetooth HandsFree Link/Voice Command button on the bottom-left quadrant of the steering wheel, also thinking that pairing my iPhone 3GS would be a snap.
But it wasn't. And I'm familiar with the HFL system and know its quirks since I compared the vehicle's tech against a Prius for an Edmunds.com feature story. The system kept looking for a previously paired phone, and I got trapped in a loop until I realized I needed to delete a previously paired phone before I could pair mine.
Before you start bitching that this is a minor car journalist gripe -- and you'd be partially correct, since if you drive the car on a daily basis this probably wouldn't happen -- I have to point out that one of the pitfalls of the HFL system is that it only allows pairing a phone via the Voice Command system, and not using the touchscreen. If I could have seen that the system's phone capacity was full I could have saved myself a lot of frustration. Otherwise there's no way to know.
So HandsFree Link in the Honda Insight didn't pass my litmus test on how easy it is to pair a phone with a Bluetooth system, which is to ask: Would my mom be able to use this system?
Or your mama.
Doug Newcomb, Senior Editor, Technology, Edmunds.com
adavis2493 says:
07:41 PM, 05/ 6/10
I don't know if BMW has changed it since, but when I had my old BMW X3, the Bluetooth could pair up with any phone that had Bluetooth, but it would only download the phonebook of only a handful of phones. In order for it to work, I was stuck with a RAZR for a few years....
foxtrot685 says:
05:02 AM, 05/ 7/10
"Before you start bitching that this is a minor car journalist gripe..."
Woah, Doug!
jram says:
08:03 PM, 05/ 7/10
I've paired three phones to my insight without ever having to delete a single one. Perhaps there is a max limit and yours has too many phones paired to it already. But either way, i do agree i would prefer a touch screen pairing system rather than voice control.
mikept03 says:
06:53 PM, 05/ 8/10
I agree it's not the easiest to pair and setup, but I'm fairly techy and was able to figure it out no problems without reading the manual. My biggest gripe is when you receive a call it just shows the phone # on the screen instead of the person's name, even if they're in the phonebook.