mrHandsfree
from Novus Systems Limited

We needed a hands free kit for a new car but we did not want a little screen on the dashboard and no way of holding the phone. The nice chaps at Novus Systems Limited offered us three of their hands free kits to try and we thought we do a review on them in return.

We were given a Blue Smart, Blue Compact and a Carkit Genius. The first two are the sort where you have either a small controller or a screen mounted in a convenient position and best installed by a professional, the last one is a holder with a difference that could be easily installed by a competent person.

The Blue Smart and the Blue Compact come in three types of kit. Plug and Play, Pro and Pro Music.

The Plug and Play system is quite simple, everything you need is in the box to do your own fitting, you need buy nothing else to fit this system, the only downside is you end up with wires everywhere and you have to use the cigarette lighter socket as power. Good idea if you need a car kit fast and cant find and installer in time to do the job. There is a hard-wire loon in the box for a later date when you find an installer or feel a bit brave.

The Pro version is based on the ISO lead system so you have to remove your radio and disconnect the wires to it and fit this kit in between the wiring loom and radio. The advantage is that all the wires are hidden and your car speakers act as the sound output to the phone when you are making or taking a call. Much neater and may require a professional fitter to do the job.

The Pro Music is rather cool, again this is an ISO lead system as above but has an extra box on the phone loom. This box feeds in your music from your MP3 player to your radio via an FM modulator via a audio lead you feed into some place like your center consol or glove box. Another lead offers charging/power to your MP3 player. This is quite cool and it does not cost much more to have this feature.

Blue Smart

The Blue Smart is a simple unit, dead easy to fit almost anywhere around the driver area. We loved its simplicity with its small but easy to use controller. Using the controller was easy, as you moved the dial you got voice alerts as to what menu setting you had entered, pressing the dial takes you deeper into the menu. If your phone supports it, you can voice dial a contact and you can also have ten easy reach speed dial numbers. I comes with a three year warranty.

Audio quality was very good , the unit uses DSP to process the sound and stop those annoying echo's you get on some systems. The person we spoke to said we sounded great, very clear.

We fitted the ISO Music cable option. This gives you the ability to connect a MP3 player via a FM modulator to the radio. The Audio sounded good and was easy to use. In use you press a small switch on the audio cable, we fitted this in the centre consol along with the charging cable for the MP3 player that is supplied with the kit, you then press the preset button on the radio you have tuned to the FM modulator and you here the music.

If the phone ring it mutes the radio and plays the telephone conversation through the cars front speakers.

Overall a great simple hands free unit. Having the option for an MP3 player input was cool.

Blue Compact

We then tried the Blue Compact, its all the same for wiring as the Blue Smart but this time it has a piano black credit card size screen to give you information on, such as the callers name or number and various settings. You can change the screen colour to match you car illumination display which is nice. Fitting was easy with the supplied mounting. We just flush fitted it to the dashboard. Once again this unit has a three year warranty.

Again this unit has DSP to process the sound and stop those annoying echo's and mutes the radio automatically. Sound quality is very good both ways in the conversation. We had the ISO music cable in use and as reported when a call comes in the music is muted.

Overall a better unit for making calls as it will load up your phone book either via bluetooth or through its sim card reader, this makes it easy to find who you want to call and also shows you who is calling. Its easy to use the menu and it is also software updatable as and when they issue new software for new phones.

CarKit Genius

We then tried the last unit the Bluetooth CarKir Genius, this is a cradle based system and straight away we took a liking to it. Because it held the phone it was much easier to use the phone and dial, its built in speaker faced you and gave very clear audio. It has a remote microphone as well.

Fitting is dead easy, it comes with all the parts needed. A simple but strong mounting bracket that has sticky pads to fit it to the dashboard and because its flexible it fits almost anywhere. The bracket has the cigarette power lead on it and the microphone socket. Powering the unit is either by the pre-installed cigarette lighter cable or via the supplied hard wire kit. The hardwire kit has the advantage of a radio mute option and it wont take up the cigarette lighter socket.

The cradle then just clips onto the mounting bracket , its easy on of as well so you can remove it for theft prevention.

The phone is held between some nice soft rubber fins in the adjustable part of the cradle. There are three button on the base, volume up, volume down and pair/unpair.

Two blue light tell you you are in a call.

Overall we loved this unit, it make making calls easy and held the phone security and safe.

The end result was we kept the Blue Smart as we wanted the music and the Carkit Genius.

Why, well we have two phones one is always used for incoming calls the other for calls both ways. We paired the incoming phone to the Blue Smart so we had hands free for incoming calls and we used the main phone on the CarKit Genius as it was much easier to use for making calls. OTT maybe, but it worked for us.

Either way the Novus mrHandsfree products are great value for money and do a smashing job and come highly recommended.

You will have to call Novus for your local supplier information - 0845 6590959 or www.novusgps.com