TrulyObscure

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We’re nearing the end of our tour de force of ultimate road tripping accessories, but never fear, we still have a couple goodies up our sleeve for you. Hopefully you’ve been inspired in some way, whether it’s to get out and ride a bike, or to have another drink because hey, you’re on vacation, with the security of knowing if you’re okay to drive. We hope you’ve got plans to enjoy your spring break to the fullest. Earlier we looked at a signal booster, which requires you to utilize a hands-free method of using your phone. Never ones to leave you hanging for too long, today we’ve got the ultimate hands-free solution for you!

Soundgate’s IO Play is an elegant solution for utilizing your iPhone (or Zune, Blackberry or any other bluetooth media player) to its max. In a nutshell this is an after-market audio controller that allows your PDA to connect to your stereo system via bluetooth. This allows you to make hands-free calls, and stream music through your car speakers. When you order one you’ll be asked the make of your car and the harness that gets shipped to you will be specific to your car, making installation is as simple as possible. Now, anytime it’s necessary to remove a car stereo to install something, there’s a certain amount of skill and knowledge required, and if you have a good handle on those you’ll probably do fine installing this yourself. There’s no shame in going to a professional in order to have everything hooked up properly.

The IO Play will auto-connect and store up to five different devices for you. We tested ours out with two different iPhones and a Blackberry, and didn’t have any trouble connecting with any of the different devices. Both of the iPhones used are equipped with OS 3.1, so we were able to stream music over bluetooth, if you’re using an older OS you’ll need to use the available dongle. The beautiful part of the IO Play isn’t just that you can stream music from your phone to your car, but that you can seamlessly switch from your car stereo to your MP3s, to a phone call with the press of a button. You can even keep your GPS hooked up, and it will not interfere with the functionality of the IO Play. However you will lose voice commands from your GPS while you’re on a call.

The unit head is not intrusive, and has only four buttons to deal with. The controls are smooth, and for the most part function quite well. There were a few times when we were trying to switch from a call to the MP3 that we had a little trouble getting the skip forward function to work right. For the most part it seemed to be fairly isolated, and could have been due to the fact that one of our writers abuses her phone, but we’re not pointing fingers or looking to lay blame here. The sound quality was perfectly acceptable, though those people who have premium audio systems need to be aware that the IO Play does have it’s own amp, which is comparable to a factory stereo, and that’s the performance you’ll get while you’re using the IO to stream music or to make calls. Your own system amp will still be the primary amp for functions like using the radio, CD player, or hardwired MP3 player.

The IO Play has an MSRP of $279.95, but is available directly from Sound Gate or online from retailers like Amazon for under $200.

As part of our week-long series on transportation gear, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention auto safety. Using that cell phone (with signal thanks to your booster) is dangerous enough, but 40000+ people a year die in automobile accidents, and some of those fatalities are caused by drunk driving....
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Yesterday, we took a look at a neat cell phone signal booster to kick off our week featuring products that make life better while traveling. For many of us, our primary means of getting around is a car. But in the Bay Area and many other cities, biking is a...
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Spring break is just around the corner! Join us this week as we look at all sorts of fun and useful gadgets that will make it easier than ever to hit the road for a much deserved respite from wintry doldrums, from cell phone accessories to auto maintenance tools and...
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I have the sounds of J.S. Bach filling the air right now, and canʻt help but wonder at the many different ways there are to listen to music. Think about it, we have everything from scratchy transistor radios all the way through the most complex audio systems technology affords us....
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Acne still continues to ruin childhoods, damage teenage self-esteem, and hurt plenty of adult images. Medical treatments continue to have trouble dealing with it, and some of the more common ones (such as Accutane) have side effects that can be serious. Natural treatments would be great, and diet seems to...
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LCD photo frames are pretty common these days. We’ve seen our share- including the excellent Kaleido R7- but often find the idea better in theory than practice. Between battery life or annoying cords, poor resolution or distracting effects, many of them just won’t make it into regular use regardless of...
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We have some interesting scanners on hand- some for business cards, others for receipts, even bar code scanners. But two of our favorites are still the Fujitsu models we’ve tested previously- the best all-around models we’ve tried, either portable or stationary. We’re happy to report that they continue to raise the...
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The past 12 months have been particularly bad as far as colds and flu go. Nearly everyone we know has dealt with some sort of illness, and it seems that everyone was worse this year than previous years. Most people have a vested interest at this point in infection control...
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If you’re reading this, chances are that you have a fair bit of digital content- movies, pictures, music- stored on your computer, and enjoy web video as well. You probably also have a TV that you use as your primary screen for watching films and television, but may not have...
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The Myine Abbee is a commercial-free music system, recording your favorite radio stations and automatically filtering out the annoying DJ talk and commercials. It’s kind of like a TiVO for your radio, with the same automatic advantages. We’ve been interested in this product since we heard it was a 2010...
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