Guys,

I wanted to connect my iPod onto my radio/cd player "Boost" in my 04/2006 Mini Cooper. I purchased a FM transmitter from Kensington (Pico model). It works fine as long as I point my iPod towards the radio.

When a bit too far away, transmittion gets messy and I often switch it off or hold my iPod next to the radio which is not very practical.

If only I could fix my iPod onto something that could be located near my radio, that would be great. The closer, the better.

Could you advise me something ?

 

You can use one of these...

http://www.newministuff.com/new/shop...uctshow&id=266

It mounts right next to the radio and then add one of these...

http://www.newministuff.com/new/shop...uctshow&id=120

However, a better connection than the FM transmitters is the Icelink Plus or a DICE. Both of these use a direct connection into the radio so you would have no reception issues.

 

www.minidomore.com is introducing a panel that mounts to the back of the speedo, onto which you can mount iPods, phones, old sandwiches, whatever.

 

Ditch the FM transmitters and go directly to DICE:

DICE iPod Integration Kit for MINI Cooper/Cooper S
http://www.europeanautosource.com/pr...roducts_id=314

You'll be much happier in the long run.

 

Or the OEM Auxillary Input. With a Belkin auto adapter, you can charge it as well. Other than having to turn the ipod off when you leave the vehicle, it's great.

 

That is what I would recomend. The FM transmitter wll drain your batery rapidly, while if you just ise the Aux, you will only drain power at the rate you would with headphones. It would charge if you got the car charger, but I wouldn;t recomend this because every time you turn the car on and off you power cycle the iPod and damage the battery in the long run...

If youre looking for a mount, panavise makes a great bracket.

 

Theres a really good article in last months MC2 mini mag about how to install the Ipod using the Mini auxillary input. Seems very simple to install, ecept i have the H/K stereo and i cant get my fingers back there to plug it in! ;-(

 

If you can't get back there, just pop the radio out of its housing and plug it in that way....

 

I had the Pico for a few days (not in my MINI but in my company vehicle) and had the same problem, couldn't get it resolved so I took it back and got Kensington's FM transmitter that plugs into the D/C power socket (also charges the Ipod) and had much better results. The wire from the power socket to the Ipod connector acts as the antenna, when the reception gets spotty I can move it around to alleviate. Also the Pico seemed to really drain the battery fast. One thing that really helped reception was to remove the vehicle's antenna (on my company car anyways) and be sure to use the lowest frequency available on the transmitter.

 

EricRowland...my Belkin Auto kit puts the ipod in pause when I shut the car off....then after a while (long while) the ipod then shuts itself off, so i never worry about having to turn the ipod off...mine is an ipod-mini

 

My Belkin does the same (30gb ipod with video and my wife's ipod mini), however in her Scion tC we have a Belkin routed through an iJet remote (the only one with a dock connector passthrough) and somehow that iJet is stopping the Belkin cable from pausing the iPod when turning the engine off. Very annoying....but getting back on topic, the DICE certainly seems to be the way to go, I just need to find $150

 

The website has no info on this that I can see...any idea when it's coming out?