• by Montgomery Miller
•  April 10th, 2018

Hands-Free is the Only Way to Communicate on the Road

Your vehicle is a remarkable example of technology and engineering. It’s also a potential weapon that may weigh 4,000 lbs. or more. Used properly, it’s an amazing transportation tool, getting you from home to school to work with ease and grace, unless of course you commute into the city on I35 during rush hour. The cell phone is also an amazing tool for communicating with loved ones and work or accessing a universe of information.

With graduation, Memorial Day and summer road trips around the corner, having a handle on your hands-free communications options could help insure a safe and accident-free driving experience for you and your family.

Lexus, Tesla, Acura, and most of the luxury vehicle line up, all offer hands-free communications systems as standard equipment. Some of these on-board systems are quite user friendly, while others require some degree of instruction in order to make use of the features that may be available to you.

The Lexus Bluetooth system adds the convenience of managing your compatible device's entire music library including content from websites without your handling your cell phone.

Of course, the Lexus system features all the usual options like hands-free calling, incoming calls ring through audio system, transfer address book to vehicle, incoming caller ID displayed, etc.
   
Pairing, however, requires a careful review of the pairing instructions before getting connected.

The Tesla Quick Connection Phone Dock lets you avoid messing with clumsy charging cables. With your eyes on the road, you can retrieve and holster your phone easily without distraction since the Phone Dock is in a fixed location. It’s a clean solution to blending your device with the original console design. Pairing is a quick process. Just go to the Bluetooth screen on the Tesla display and select 'Add New Device'. Be sure Bluetooth is turned on in your phone’s settings.

The Acura Navigation System has a very straightforward pairing process: Press SETTINGS button, then select “Phone Settings; Select “Bluetooth Device List; Select “Add Bluetooth Device; your phone should be in Discovery Mode, and Acura’s HandsFreeLink will search for your phone; Select your phone when it appears.

Noise interference can be a challenge with all of the built-in Bluetooth systems depending on road conditions and whether there’s a window open creating wind noise. One good solution is a Bluetooth ear piece, and there are many to choose from.

I’ve tried several and settled on the Plantronics Voyager Edge. Pairing is simple, noise reduction is excellent, and the 6-hour battery life is more than sufficient for my needs. I like the fact that I can be on a call and exit the vehicle without any interruption in the conversation. It’s well worth the $130 retail price.

In a recent TechRadar article [https://www.techradar.com/news/the-best-bluetooth-headsets] the top Bluetooth headsets included: Jabra Motion, Plantronics Voyager 5200, Plantronics Voyager Edge, Jabra Stealth, Sennheiser Presence UC, Jabra Steel, Plantronics M55, and Jabra Wave.

Whatever system you end up using, please use it exclusively to avoid distracted driving. According to a 2016 report by the NHSTA, in 2016 alone, 3,450 people were killed. 391,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving distracted drivers in 2015.

The technology is here and it’s readily available. Even if some of it requires a little homework, it’s well worth the effort to insure you and your family’s safety as well as the safety of all with whom you share the road.