My dealer for the Mobridge, Cartronics, is Gone With The Wind . They went out of business so unfortunately ALL of their posts in this thread have been deleted, making the reading difficult to understand. So let me cut to the chase and give my Review of Mobridge (update 3/6/2016):

1. Bluetooth phone function: A perfect 10 for voice quality with my Android Samsung Epic, Samsung S3, and now IPhone 6 Plus. Crystal clear voice reception, crystal clear voice transmission. The mic is best placed towards the top of the A pillar, at junction of A pillar with roof. Do NOT put it in the steering wheel column (OEM position). One complaint Address book is clunky - frequent phone numbers should be stored as: aaa-CirclePorsche so that it appears first. Bottom line: Exceptional voice quality (OEM like), address book clunky but ok with work-around.

2. Ipod function: Works perfect except for one complaint: if you turn up the volume to really loud level, and I mean really loud, there is a faint beeping noise about once every second. If you are at near max volume on street driving (and IMHO you really shouldn't be because you want to hear Emergency Vehicles' siren, to prevent head on collisions and such terrible things) you will only hear this noise at Stop sign, when car is not rolling. On freeway cruising and when car is moving at speed, you will not hear it because road noise overwhelms the beep. If you listen to rock and roll music, you don't hear this beep as much. Surprisingly, at first I was upset because of this flaw, but... over time I have found this beep is less annoying than expected (Primarily, it's because you only hear it when car is not rolling and volume turned way, way up, which I don't do.) However I would probably still recommend Dension over MoBridge because of this problem, but keep in mind some Dension owners have reported other, different problems as wall. Sigh - none of these things are perfect.
Once every few months I still get an error message about not being able to find CD Changer, but extremely rarely so and error message easily clicked away. Bottom line: Not perfect because of faint beep, sound quality otherwise exceptional, functionally acceptable and definitely better than nothing.

3. Bluetooth Music Streaming From Phone: Sorry I have not tested this because the audio quality of streaming is so bad secondary to the compressed bit rate, vs. FM stereo, or CD, or Ipod connection, etc. (I am quite a nutty audiophile and cannot take the lower sound quality. )



Below is screen displaying "London Calling," first screen shows how you could play througth Playlist, or Album, or Artist, etc. Third shot shows phone number, which has continued to function flawlessly with OEM like voice quality, with both Samsung Epic 4G and Samsung Galaxy SIII.
















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A common problem with after-market bluetooth/ipod integration units seems to be that person on other end of phone could not hear the Porsche driver/caller.
Mobridge customers don't seem to have problem with this? I am thinking about getting one from Cartronics and am looking for actual users' reports please.

1. Do you have any problem with people on other end not able to hear you?

2. Cartronics.com where I plan to purchase the Mobridge recommends that the mic be near the rearview mirror. Is that where yours is? Anyone has it in the steering column where I think OEM mic is, and how is it there?

3. Where do you put your ipod? Center arm rest or glove compartment? Pluses/minuses of either position?

4. Installation fee?
Thanks.

 

I installed the Mobridge in my wife's Cayenne turbo back in 2008. Worked fine no issues with audio dropping at all. Mic was in the driver's A pillar, and iPod was in the center console. The Mobridge user interface is a tad frustrating though.

 

I have one and I've had some issues with it... installed it in passenger footwell behind the glovebox, tapped power going to the PCM unit and I hear a faint glitchy sounding beep every other second in my speakers.

I think tapping power somewhere else might fix this but I never got to troubleshooting it further. It could also be a symptom of the fact that I haven't got the CD changer actually turned off by yet with PIWIS (supposed to have that disabled in the system since the mobridge replaces it). Overall sound quality is also not as good as it is direct from music in the CD player.

My bluetooth mic doesn't work well either -- it might sound OK one minute then unintelligible after that. Have tried putting mic in a few different places.

I tried emailing mobridge directly but they only support their resellers.

The problem hasn't been annoying enough to make me return it but I lost the initiative/time to work on it any further.

Posted about it here last year:

http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=467743

 

We also suggest the mic near the dome lamp for most applications using the Dension, AND the Dension offers adjustable mic sensitivity and audio level options, all user controlled.

Email me for a special offer, Cannga.

eric@bumperplugs.com

 

Thanks Eric. Yes of course if I decide to go ahead w/ Dension you'll be the first name I think of. These after-market units seem to have problems here and there, bothersome enough that onwers are not happy - that's why I've waited this long.

With Dension's latest, do people on other end have problems hearing (the Porsche car caller)? I seem to recall reading something to the effect that if you call someone from your car, you can't hear the ring or the first "hello" on the other end (please correct me as needed)?

 

Intelligibility on other end seems to be the biggest problem w/ these kits, isn't it? Phone use is the main reason for my getting the kit, so this doesn't sound very good.

That faint sounding beep would probably drives me nuts. Have you tried to ask cartronics, a sponsor of this forum?

 

You are correct, I bought it from autotoys.com and not you guys.

The kit I got at least looks like the one in the mobridge instructions on mobridge-ipod.co.uk.

I looked at the set of instructions I was sent as well as everything else I could possibly find with Google about a year ago. Installation was pretty straightforward. I saw in one example a Cayman had the unit installed under the boot and others with it installed behind the glovebox which is the route I took.

Looping in the MOST cables at the mobridge itself was easy, getting the bypass setup at the CD changer was a little tricky but not a huge deal. I've tried moving around the mobridge unit in the footwell and it didn't seem to change the static. I believe I tried outright disconnecting the AUX cable too thinking that was the issue to no avail. I get the same exact noise whether I'm getting audio from AUX or my iphone and even using remote bluetooth audio streaming.

A guy just posted on renntech with the same issue so I'm hoping someone chimes in there - my bet is I need to change the power tap but I haven't found any solid information on another safe and supported alternative. If that doesn't do the trick then I guess I ordered one of the mobridges that wasn't created equal

 

That's exactly what I did... I was hoping that maybe there was an alternative.

Ok, enough thread derailing - sorry, op! It sounds like I'm an example of a bad apple and you learned to be sure you're getting your unit from the right reseller

 

djben, you are not derailing anything. Actual users' reports is the precise title of this thread. I find your problem and cartronics's explanation both helpful.

It *IS* interesting the beep seems so precisely described and similar in users who reported it, like the one below. And that in one of the cases mObridge people were involved and couldn't solve the problem? You would think a once per second beep is a systemic problem and not power supply/cable routing problem (this causes a hum, as in ground loop hum in my audiophile system), but maybe MOST system is completely different? I have no idea.

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http://www.renntech.org/forums/topic...ugh-challenge/
I have a 2005 Cayenne S with a PCM 2.1. I recently had a mobridge iPod and Bluetooth unit installed into the car and I'm having an issue with some kind of system noise when listening to the iPod. The audio shop that did the installation and mobridge themselves haven't been able to fix it, so I'm wondering whether someone else knows of this and can help. Here's the full details on the problem:

- Hiss with a regular ticking noise at approx 1 second intervals.
- The hissing is amplified more in between tracks, in very quiet parts of tracks or all the time when playing audio books (basically when there's little other data / audio to amplify). So basically as a song ends, the hiss/clicking will fade up for a few seconds and then fade out again as the other song comes in. Or its there all the time when listening to audio books, its pretty annoying.

- A rep from mobridge was in town and they actually had a look at my car. They said that some of the components on the fiber optic loop might be running at slightly different clock speeds or slightly out of sync, which is causing the "system noise" which the mobridge unit is amplifying. Not convinced on this clock speed / sync reasoning personally, seems a bit like they're making excuses to not put any more time/effort into the problem.
- The mobridge guy tried replacing the unit, and the ipod cable, both didn't help. We also downgraded and upgraded the firmware and software with no luck on each version.
- I noticed a slight change in the type and pattern of the noise after the re-install, suggesting that the placement or positioning/bunching of the cables might have something to do with it...?

 

bump - that's my thread on renntech!

So I'm going to take it back to the shop that did the installation and try different power sources (side fuse box), and also adding a power filter. I'll keep you guys up to date on what happens, it won't be before the end of the month though unfortunately.

Cartonrics - Great that you've got so much experience with the units. What do you think of my situation given mObridge themselves were not able to fix it. They changed the unit, changed the cable, etc, all with no success. I wouldn't have thought that they'd be using "less equal" units or not the proper cables... Also, wouldn't use of an improper cable introduce a constant hiss/noise rather than something periodic?

Best,
Paul

 

Looking forward to hearing the results of the fuse box change and the CD changer coding

 

No noise, I just tested it with the car off and running. It streams over bluetooth with no problems, and actually as soon as I set the audio source to A2DP the noise stops (i.e. I don't have to start playing a song for it to stop).

I did notice some other interesting things:

- The audio source setting was on aux (as opposed to iPod). I don't have an aux cable plugged in btw, just the iPod cable. When I set audio source to iPod, then navigate away into the playlists, and come back to the settings menu, its back on Aux. The iPod plays under both options, and the noise is present under both.

- The noise can be really clearly heard by going into the settings menu under audio source iPod or Aux. I can turn the volume up and fill my car with it if I want. There's no music playing / there's no draw from the iPod at this stage so it also makes me think that its not the iPod itself.

Any thoughts? What did you mean by the ground loop?

 

Wow, if that's what it is then that's an easy fix! Just plug a cable into it, even if there's nothing on the other end? Crazy! If the aux is picking up noise, it seems strange that it would appear in the iPod channel, but hey I'll def give it a go!

I don't think its the positioning, because they originally had it installed under the passenger seat and then they moved it to behind the dash (trying to fix the problem). Both locations had noise.

Before I got my unit installed, I actually called mobridge and asked them where would be the best place to go / who was the best installer in my area, so I did take it somewhere reputable (actually, supposedly the best place according to mobridge themselves). Unfortunately I didn't know about you guys, it might be worth telling mobridge to include you in their recommendations as you clearly seem to have your stuff down!

I'll call Scott and speak to him, and I'll post all results and photos once I've got everything done. Thanks, will be in touch!

 

I do not think it will be a matter of just plugging any old AUX cable in (I have the one that came with my unit in already). I think there is probably a special "plug" that can be specially made where you solder a resistor to the back of a male 3.5mm jack to basically 'terminate' it (there might be a better term to use for this)....

I am wondering if plugging in a good shielded 3.5mm cable though would get you close enough to what I've described.

I get my car back from the dealer today and will be playing with it. I'm also going to see if I can get a tech to spend 15 minutes coding off the CD changer, making sure we put the mobridge into bypass mode first so as to not interfere with PIWIS then ensuring the tech moves all the devices up a notch in the list:

http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforum...otchyas-2.html

 

CT is dead on - there are some '******' out there who have tossed this high-level stuff on the street in some cases dirt cheap. Porsche (and Audi, and MB, and BMW, and other) owners have bought it to save a dime, then found they can't get any assistance on setup, installation, troubleshooting, etc.

We've been working with the Dension line since it was intro'd many years ago. We've sold other products, some good, some not so good, but we've always stood behind the products and offered top tier support. Luckily for us, our relationship with the Dension folks is directly with their engineering and development team, so we have much more knowledge about the product, the installation, the troubleshooting and setup.

Anyone buying any of these products owes it to themselves to have a pro do this, or at least get someone they know with some expertise to help with the setup, and they will enjoy it for years to come. Otherwise they may chase their tail, have negative experiences and be disappointed. Our detailed information we send with our products goes far beyond the usual package insert data, and many customers are able to install on their own. Just beware of the source when you buy this stuff, and buy from a reputable place that has history and will support you down the road.

And we too get the calls - from folks who mistakenly went the cheap route from one place or another and cannot get a call or email returned - so we know exactly what that is all about.

Carry on....