I'm looking into replacing my OEM iPod integration with the DICE unit because I want the display options and more usability than the OEM offers. I was originally looking into the DICE Silverline Pro but then I saw the MediaBridge which includes bluetooth for less than $100 more. But I can't find any information on the MediaBridge pertaining to Mini Coopers. I also don't see any information on the bluetooth aspect of the MediaBridge and if it even uses the stock MFSW controls.

Here is a link to the unit I'm talking about:
http://www.europeanautosource.com/pr...oducts_id=3552

Does anybody use this or have any experience with it?

The bluetooth is just a bonus for me, I know NewMiniStuff sells great bluetooth kits but I can't see spending $300+ on just a bluetooth unit right now.

This is also for a 2006 H/K radio.

Thanks!

 

Funny - yesterday I did the research to buy something to integrate Sirius into the '05 Cooper S (with H/K) that I just bought. None of the solutions looked very good until I came across the MediaBridge on the BMW forums. I searched on the MINI forums and couldn't find any mention of it. Seems like a killer product to me, and appears to be head and shoulders above the other options. I ordered one with the BlueTooth option and they shipped it within hours. Should be here by the end of the week. I'll post up my thoughts when I get it.

 

Great! I can't wait to hear how it turns out. I'm really interested in how the bluetooth works. It's hard to tell if it works with the steering wheel controls or not. Everything is very vague. Good luck with it!

 

I did some searching on that before I bought it. They don't seem to answer it specifically, but from what I can tell the steering wheel controls should be able to answer and end a call. In the limited manual available here (http://diceelectronics.com/product-support) it says:

So, the left and right radio buttons on the wheel should handle that. I am curious if it will be possible to initiate VoiceControl on an iPhone. I'm not sure if holding the send button would bring it up from BlueTooth or not. That would be the ultimate hands-free setup.

 

I just checked with my bluetooth headset and iPhone 4 and if you hold down the send button on the headset it does in fact initiate VoiceControl. Apparently this was added with iOS 3.1. So, theoretically it should work the same way with the steering wheel buttons and the MediaBridge. I'll let you know when I get mine installed.

 

Yeah, it seems a little weird. I don't know why they wouldn't use the existing phone controls on the steering wheel in the same way the Parrot EVO seems to. It would be great if there was in fact some way to initiate a call using the steering wheel. I would hate to have to mess around with the phone to make a call. I have a Moto Droid so I'm not sure if the voice control will work differently for me.

I sent an email to Tom at EAS asking a few specific questions about the bluetooth so we'll see what he says.

 

But the MINI's don't have existing phone controls on the steering wheel. Just radio controls for Volume + and - and track/station left, right. VoiceControl is an iPhone feature, but I would assume that most modern smart phones would have something similar. How it works should be dictated by your phone, assuming that the MediaBridge pays attention to the steering wheel controls while in BlueTooth mode, which it appears that it does.

 

I guess we must have different steering wheels, mine has two buttons for the phone: one has a picture of a phone and the other is R/T or something like that (the two buttons next to the volume/track controls in the picture below). These are used for the OEM bluetooth but can be used by other systems. NewMiniStuff has a few Parrot kits that integrate into these, but he's based out of the UK so everything is more expensive because of the dollar conversion and shipping. That's why I'm hoping the DICE unit works well.

 

Ahh, I didn't know that there was a factory BlueTooth option. Interesting. I'm not sure how the MediaBridge will see those buttons. The Left/Right buttons should still do the same thing though.

 

The one thing I'm still not clear on (which I've emailed asking) is how to place a call without touching the phone. You mentioned that maybe holding down the "send" button could initialize the voice control on the phone, but keep in mind the "send" button is actually the next track button. I'm under the impression that the next track button functions solely as the next track button until there is an incoming call. Do you see what I'm saying? That's why I think there is an advantage to using the native Mini phone controls. But it seems as though this unit is unable to use those buttons. I guess you can report on that when you do the install.

 

Ahh - yes, that's true. Before making a call you'll be in the Sirius or iPod mode or whatever, not BlueTooth. Interesting.

 

The new iOS 4.1 supposedly allows bluetooth systems to control the "iPod" on the phone. I'm sure the mediabridge doesn't have this option, but does it at least let us stream audio from the phone? I'd like to be able to abandon cords altogether.

 

JWA, were you able to get the unit installed this weekend? Can you let me know how it's working out for you? I'm still trying to decide if I want to go with this unit or not. Thanks.

 

It's still in transit. I think it's supposed to be here on Wednesday, but that could have been some other parts. I should be working on it this week sometime though - I'll post up as soon as I get it and then when I put it into the car.

 

Okay, sounds good. Thanks for the update.

 

Ok, I have an update. I hooked up the MediaBridge this evening and have both good news and bad news. The good news is that the installation is extremely easy. The main cable plugs into the back of the radio, and the radio harness plugs into a receptacle on the cable. A smaller cable then connects over to the unit itself and you're all set. The radio recognized the MediaBridge immediately and the sound quality from all of the sources is excellent.

I mounted the unit to the back side of the knee bolster underneath the steering wheel, as it is in the perfect location for the cables over to the radio, easy to open up if I need to change any connections, and convenient to run the ipod and aux cables from into the center console area.

The mic that comes with the unit (if you get BlueTooth) has some very nice mounts. I put the mic behind the grill for the factory mic in the headliner, next to the sunroof controls. Actually, I swapped their sides, so that the mic was closer to me. I thought that this process may be difficult, but it literally took five minutes to get access back there, mount the mic, and run the wire behind the a-pillar cover down to the unit. Due to the issue explained below, I haven't actually paired to it yet.

Now for the bad: I have an '05, 12/2004 build. I didn't read the fine print close enough to see that only '06 radios will display the text from the unit. It does speak the names of everything as you go, but you get no text from the unit. This is a major problem for Sirius, which is my main reason for getting this, as you can't see the channel that you're on. I guess that theoretically you could use it this way, but it isn't very good. Thus, I'm on to search for a stock '06 radio...

The instructions for the MediaBridge seem to be a bit short and lacking in detail, but that may be because I'm flying blind with no text. I'll update when I get an '06 radio.

 

Oh man, that really sucks. I knew that only 05 and 06 radios did the text but I wouldn't have guessed that a radio not built in 05 wouldn't work.

Have you still not tried out the bluetooth functions? I would think that they would still work even if you can't see any text, I actually don't even know that the phone would show text on the unit in an 06. Would it?

I'm still kind of torn between this unit and just getting a Parrot from NewMiniStuff.

Good luck on your hunt and thanks for the report.

 

Actually even later -- the newer radio started from around 3/2005 builds. Used radios come up regularly on eBay. You just have to watch and wait for them.

 

I had a minute today while I was sitting in the car, so I tried pairing my iPhone to the BlueTooth from the MediaBridge. The iphone saw it and paired immediately, and a test call sounded clear on both ends. When a call came in while in another mode it dropped out as expected and switched to the call's audio. It was actually quite nice. I didn't play with initiating a call while in various modes, but I will soon. It's all a bit weird without having any display.

 

It's weird not having any display because of your radio or weird not having any display like a nav-equipped car would have? I just put a nav unit in my wife's CR-V and it's nice that the bluetooth shows who's calling on the display. But I think I could manage looking at my phone in the Mini if that's what I needed to do.

 

It's just weird not really knowing what the unit is doing. It's actually very nice if you use the phone to place the calls. But you're kind of flying blind when switching modes and changing settings on the MediaBridge with an older radio. It does speak the modes, the number of the call, name of the song, etc. But that's a bit weird to me and I'd prefer to have it shown on the screen and turn off that text stuff.

 

Actually, yeah I could see how that could be annoying. I don't care for the spoken information like that either. So if you were to have a newer stereo that was text enabled would you recommend this thing? Are the bluetooth controls easy enough to use even though they are using the track control buttons? I really wish they could use the stock bluetooth controls but not too big of a deal I guess.

 

Yeah, I'd recommend it. If you just want it for BlueTooth, iPod/iPhone, and Aux inputs and want to use the steering wheel controls to adjust volume, jump between tracks, and send/end calls while using the phone to control the rest and as a display, then it is pretty great no matter what radio you have. It's one connection and a nice small box that just plain works.

I would say that you need the '06 radio to use it for Sirius though, as without any channel display you never really know where you're at.

 

Hey guys. After using the MediaBridge for a while now, I can report that it has been working great. The Bluetooth is very nice, and the Sirius and iPhone connections work perfectly. There was a bug in the last firmware release which broke the ability to save presets, but they fixed that fairly quickly.

I should also note that the release notes indicate that the DO support the phone buttons in cars which have them. My car didn't have the phone kit, so I've never tried them, but it would be nice to be able to initiate VoiceControl mode on the iPhone without switching to Bluetooth mode first.

 

Installed in my 2005 MCS using the CD changer connection, which was easy, although I just ran the wires under the back seat and then underneath the floor mats and put the mediabridge in the little tray behind and below the radio. My build date was July 2005, and even though they say it has to be Sept 2005 or later, the text still shows up on mine.

Importantly, the buttons on the steering wheel in the picture shown previously do work, and you can use the one with the picture of a telephone on it to initiate Voice Control on the iPhone 4 by holding it down for a couple of seconds and then say things like "call Terri mobile" or "play album Abby Road". I've been leaving the mediabridge set to bluetooth and leaving my iPhone in my pocket and this works reasonably well, except for Voice Control having a hard time understanding me for things like albums and artists.

My main complaint is that when I mounted the bluetooth microphone in the headliner in place of the factory bluetooth mic (factory bluetooth stopped working with iPhone 4), people couldn't hear me over the road noise. I tried to mount it with foam rubber to insulate it from direct contact with the car, but that seemed to just make it worse if anything. The only way it would work for me is to leave it hanging out of the headliner about an inch, which of course looks like crap and still doesn't sound that good. Some of my difficulties with Voice Command may be due to this. Also, if a call comes in, but I'm listening to the radio, first I have to notice that my phone is vibrating, then I have to press the Mode button until it's on the mediabridge and then press the button to answer the phone (on the steering wheel or radio).

The other thing is, if I connect my iPhone to the USB, it doesn't allow me to control it with the iPhone - you have to control it with the radio/steering wheel buttons, and trying to select what you want to play this way is extremely cumbersome. With an iPod, if the Hold switch is on Hold when you connect it, you control it with the radio - otherwise, you control it with the iPod. But there's no Hold switch on an iPhone.

All in all, it's a kind of compromise solution, but it's the best thing I was able to find to get iPod/iPhone connectivity and bluetooth.