Review Jabra Freeway Speakerphone

Are you a distracted driver? Most states have outlawed texting and driving and many are looking at banning all hand held devices in order to reduce accidents. I have been using my Jabra earpiece for several months but was excited to be offered a Jabra Freeway Speakerphone to try.  I couldn’t wait for it to arrive.

As soon as the mailman dropped off the box I was on it! I found the setup to be super simple. Just turn it on and it starts talking you through the pairing mode. I was able to simply connect any of my devices (I tried about 5 of them!)

When you first open the unit, the directions state to charge it for two hours, however, I installed it in the car right away and it had a solid charge. After getting it all set up in the car, I started playing with the other buttons. Clicking on “voice” brought the unit to life with a “Say a command.” I tried a couple of the usual send text, call so and so..all worked smoothly! I pressed the “voice” button again thinking I was turning it off and the unit read off the menu options. I like this option because I can never remember just the right sequence of words to get my phone to do what I want!

Of course about this time my phone starts ringing. I heard it ring and then the Freeway unit announced the caller. I indicated “answer” and the call was promptly connected. The quality was excellent. I could carry on the conversation without any issues with connections. In fact, I think the quality was better on the Jabra Freeway than it would have been on my cell phone!

Playing music is another wonderful feature. I was able to listen to my tunes while driving around. When a call came in, the music paused and resumed when the call ended. The voice command mode makes things like “Redial” or “Make a call” or “Send a text” so easy to do. What impressed me the most with this unit was that it understood me! I don’t think I have an accent – but electronic devices have always given me a hard time.

The only option that I was unable to get to work like I thought it should was the “FM” button, which is supposed to be used to find a blank spot on the FM dial in order to broadcast your calls to your car stereo system. This is a cool feature, but we live in an area that has so many local radio stations that I found I was having to change the setting every few miles. So while the setup was easy, and searching for a new frequency was a simple as tapping on the “FM” button again, I found that I was having to do that too much for my comfort. I am looking forward to trying this again when we are traveling on a trip. I am thinking highway reception might be better. That said, when I could pick up a local frequency, the unit worked great.

I have been using the Freeway as a music player and I love it! I have found that the music player uses the battery more than “talk time” and I simply counter this by plugging in the unit when driving around. I would suggest unplugging it when you are parked somewhere as to not draw attention to the unit on your visor.  Being able to charge the unit while driving is great, since it can be done through the included car power port plug.  I also like that you can connect two devices to the unit. This is handy when both my husband and I are traveling together.

 

Other odds and ends

• There’s a nice little red LED light hidden behind the speaker mesh that lights up when charging.

• Bluetooth profiles include A2DP 1.2 (stereo), AVRCP 1.0, HFP 1.5, PBAP

• Operating range is listed at up to 10 meters.

• Talk time is listed at 14 hours, standby time at 20 days. Charging time is listed at 2 hours.

• The default PIN is 0000. (We didn’t need it connecting to our Galaxy Nexus.

• You can connect to two devices.

My recommendation?  I love it. I like being able to climb in the car and turn the unit on to hear, “Power On. Connected”. From there I can tap a button and say “Play” to start listening to my music. The one thing that was hard for me to remember was to flip the unit off when leaving the car. It says, “Power Off”  to confirm. I have to turn the unit off because the reception area is so strong it picks up my calls from in the house! Like I said, this was the hardest thing for me to remember, so now I have a post it note reminding me to unplug the charger and turn off the unit. One major bonus I found by accident was when I forgot to turn off the unit and it picked up a call while I was in the house. I went to the garage to complete the call and grabbed the unit off the visor. I was able to walk back inside with it and finish loading the dishwaher!

The only other issue I had was when a call could come in and the visor was in the down position. While I could hear the caller, they stated they were unable to understand me. This was easily corrected by flipping up the visor, but could have been an issue in the bright sunlight.

Because this unit is an electronic piece of equipment, the manual recommends that it not be exposed to excessive temperatures. Make sure to remove the unit as you would your cell phone, laptop or other devices when not in use.

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