Seidio G4500M Car Kit In Review
If you spend a lot of time in your automobile either for personal or business reasons you may want to take a look at the Seidio G4500M Car Kit as your primary means of charging and hands free communication. As someone who is always in search of the latest and greatest in Treo accessories, I found this unit outstanding in many respects, but a bit of a disappointment in others.
The G4500M boasts a sturdy housing which will keep your Treo in an upright position. This also allows you to adjust the unit to whatever angle best suits your viewing pleasure via the 360 degree clip attachment. The unit comes with two methods of mounting: via window suction cup or vent clips. Either choice works very well and will give you the desired adjustability to have that perfect angle as you view your Treo. I personally found this mount very appealing while using my bluetooth GPS navigation.
One of the best features of this unit is the fact it will charge your Treo while in your automobile. Those of us who use Bluetooth devices can really appreciate this feature. Bluetooth definitely drains the battery very quickly, and having the ability to charge my Treo 700p makes using the G4500M a dream. For those users who use a wired GPS system the good folks at Seidio didn’t forget you either. The unit comes equipped with a RJ11 jack so you can plug your receiver in and be on your merry way.
As a hands free communication device I felt the G4500M fell a bit short. The unit comes with its own built in speaker and microphone that attaches to the jack on the side. The microphone does a good job picking up your conversation, but the problem lies in the lack of volume produced from the speaker. This makes it very difficult to hear conversations on your end. If the speaker had a bit more output this would make this car kit the total package. One upside to this disappointment is the ability to attach a FM transmitter to the unit to allow for play through your car stereo speakers. Using this method definitely makes the hands free experience an improved journey. The downside is that the FM transmitter would be a separate purchase adding to the cost of the car kit.
Overall I have been pleased with the G4500M. Charging the Treo and having a sturdy cradle to view my Treo while using my GPS has definitely made using this car kit worthwhile. If your primary reason for purchasing a cradle such as this is to use the hands free communication features, I would look elsewhere unless you’re planning on using it with an added FM transmitter. You can purchase the G4500M in the mytreo.net/store for $97.95 or receive additional discounts with your mytreo.net club discount.
Pros:
1. Sturdy design with mounting options.
2. Charges your Treo while driving.
3. Allows for use with optional wired GPS.
4. Allows for use with an optional FM transmitter.
Cons:
1. Weak built-in speaker output.
Related Links
Seidio’s Wireless FM Transmitter kit
Sprint or Verizon Treo 700p
Join mytreo.net’s Discount Club
Filed under: Software reviews
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Personally, I have the Seidio kit that’s the same as above, but has the GPS antenna built-in. That means you can use your bluetooth for a headset instead of using it to connect your bluetooth gps antenna, and you don’t have to have another cord to charge your antenna. Plus, people don’t know it has a gps antenna in it, so the odds of someone breaking into your car to take the antenna that’s sitting on your dash goes down. Great device.
Personally, I have the Seidio kit that’s the same as above, but has the GPS antenna built-in. That means you can use your bluetooth for a headset instead of using it to connect your bluetooth gps antenna, and you don’t have to have another cord to charge your antenna. Plus, people don’t know it has a gps antenna in it, so the odds of someone breaking into your car to take the antenna that’s sitting on your dash goes down. Great device.
I agree with the review the the Seidio kit–I’ve had one for a few months now, but I would like to emphasize the negative of a weak built-in speaker. I found the speaker to be useless when driving at highway speeds (thus more road noise to compete with the speaker). Furthermore, certain voice freqeuncies (i.e., certain peoples voices) are very distorted as well. After exploring FM wireless kits, I decided there were too many problems with them. So I did a bit of “surgery” on the car kit–I cut the wires to the built-in speaker (yes that voided the warranty) and soldered wires to those wires and ran them outside the unit to an external, unamplified speaker. This worked–the primary problem with the unit was the crappy small speaker and not the power of the built in amplifier. As far as the distorted voices, that is still there but better and I attribute that to the amp in the kit having a very narrow range of frequencies that it can amplify.
Would I buy it again? I would definately look around for other solutions first, but the overall package had very little good competition when I bought it.
Compared to other hands free car kits I’ve owned in the past, the Seidio is more feature rich but of much lower audio quality (build quality is good) and more expensive. For the price I would like to see better audio quality and less features.
This is very disappointing. I was seriously considering purchasing two of these kits, one for each of our cars (since my wife and I both have Treos).
I’ve owned three different Bluetooth “solutions” (two car kits and a headset) but haven’t been happy with any of them. Half the time I lose the call while I’m trying to figure out why the audio isn’t coming through the headset and the caller gives up waiting for me to figure out they’re talking to my Treo rather than the headset.
Why is it so hard for someone to make a car kit that actually has decent audible output in a car? Besides charging the Treo (which can otherwise be done with a $10 cable that I never use since my Treo spends the night in a charging cradle on the kitchen counter), the WHOLE POINT of a car kit is hands-free audio. I don’t WANT a headset, I want to be able to talk hands free, and HEAR the person on the other end of the phone.
The really frustrating part is that 15 years ago, I owned two different Motorola flip-phone car kits, and two different Nokia car kits. They all worked flawlessly (changing automatically to a “car” profile, connecting to an external antenna, etc. — reminiscent of the old Apple PowerBook Duo and Dock). They came with a separate speaker and microphone, and they were LOUD. Sure, it was expensive to replace them with each new phone, but it was worth it. Since then I’m sure manufacturers thought Bluetooth would just “solve everything”. I can tell you that it doesn’t.
Actually, I’d happily consider replacing the stereo in each car if someone would design one that works as a hands-free car kit (with the Treo, please) AND has an interface to my iPod. After all, I suspect the stereo (in conjunction with my car’s speakers) would be able to make the incoming audio from the call loud enough.
Parrot’s 5100 Rhythm n Blue is close, but lacks an iPod interface. Alpine is getting close, but I believe you still have to choose between the iPod and a Bluetooth adapter. Don’t make me choose.
Sigh. Can this really be so hard?
Hi,
you can also try the 4100M, a slightly less expensive option without the speaker and with strereo out. I have an auxiliary line-in on my car stereo and I can listen to MP3s from ym Treo (in stereo), Sat Nav announcements and phone calls all through my car stereo.
I agree with the above postings that the speaker output is disappointing. Sometimes it doesn’t work at all and I have to rely on the Treo’s speaker to hear anything. Also, if you live in a hot climate be careful….the glue will melt from the speaker housing and drip onto your dash. It’s really messy. This is of course in Las Vegas summer heat. Eventhough it uses the advanced chipset, I still find that it takes much longer to get connected to satellites than other devices.