Home > Consumer Reviews > Scosche FM-MOD02 FM Modulator for iPod, Satellite Radio or Portable Music Player

This, I believe, is absolutely the best way to play your Ipod or MP3 player through your factory radio. I have tried using a wireless FM transmitter and a cassette adapter and neither one of those worked well. With the wireless FM transmitter, it was difficult to find an open station to operate it static free while the cassette adapter deteriorated the sound quality so much it seems that everything is muffled. This wired FM Modulator works great. No loss of sound quality while maintaining static free operation. The downside of this kit is the relatively difficult installation process. If you have had experience of replacing a radio in your car, then this should be a piece of cake otherwise it may be best to have it installed by a pro. Over the years I have installed about a dozen or so car radios and this one still took me about 2 hours to install as I literally have to remove the factory radio to access the antenna connector. Finding a switched battery positive lead and ground is probably the next difficult part. Once those are accessed, the rest is fairly easy. The good thing is, after you get it working, its all worth it as this thing works flawlessly. One more thing, this unit uses the old style antenna connectors. Since most new cars now use a locking proprietary connector you will most likely need a set of antenna adapters to complete the installation.

UPDATE: After using this product for a few months, I noticed a slight and constant hum when the volume is turned down. This is only noticeable when the vehicle is idling or moving at a very low speed. Once you get going, most of the other noises in the car drowns out this hum. Just wanted to point this out to make sure I did not mislead any one. I would not change my rating because of this issue as it still performs to its intended purpose.

Got this cause I do not have an Aux jack on the factory stereo in my truck and wanted to listen to my MP3 player while driving. I had a cd changer installed at one time, but it malfunctioned well outside of warranty coverage so I just ripped it out and used the radio for a while.

The fact that the cd changer worked off a modulator as well made installing the Scosche very easy. I just cut the wires used to the cd changer modulator and removed it, then spliced the wires from the Scosche to them.

The unit works great and sound quality over all is pretty good. There is however a quiet humming sound that increases with the radio volume. It is not to noticeable except during quiet moments in songs, but you know it is there.

Did a little research online and it seems that this may be due to the ground. I'll go back in some weekend and attempt to ground it to the chassis instead of the wiring harness. But for now it is bearable and I am happy to have my music with me on the road.

Also, the double sided tape that holds the toggle switch and plug is not exactly super glue. It did not last long under the Texas sun. I ended up just mounting it behind the stereo in the dash and running a cable out from there. Does not really matter that i can't reach the toggle switch cause it is wired to the switched power line anyway.

I purchased the schosche FM-Mod02 FM Modulator to play audiobooks through my car radio with my Sansa Fuze. I had two problems with the modulator. First, The volume level was decreased by the modulator so that even with full volume on my Fuze my quieter Audio Books were hard to hear and I had to turn the volume on my radio way up. Second, I could not charge my fuze while listening because of a serious ground loop problem, as soon as I plugged power in all you would hear is a buzz. I ended up buying the Peripheral PLD10 10X RCA Signal Booster and installing it as well to get the volume level back up and get ground loop isolation. With the volume set correctly on the signal booster my mp3 player at 75% volume has higher volume than my normal radio stations. The ground loop problem completely went away and I can charge my player and listen to it at the same time with absolutely no sound loss. I absolutely love the modulator with the configuration I now have but it would have been nice if it had its own ground loop isolation and had a better volume output.

First, I want to emphasize that this came with absolutely NO INSTRUCTIONS. I realize that every car will have different panels and wiring to deal with, but some basic, general instructions would have been nice. I had to about an hour digging up install instructions for similar modulators and other car audio devices to figure out what I was supposed to do. A simple print out, or even instructions at the manufacturer's website, would have saved me a lot of time. That said, the product works well when installed. The audio quality is definitely better than that of an FM transmitter. If your car doesn't have have an MP3 jack, this devices gives you the most bang for the buck.

The modulator comes in two segments: One is a box that doesn't need to be accessed (although it does have a wired fuse close to it), so it can be placed out of site in a vacant cavity; the other is a combination switch and aux port that needs to be mounted where you can hit the switch and plug in a device. The hard part is finding a 12V line to tap into with the red wire and a ground line for the black. You may need to strip some of your stereo's wiring and splice into it. You then need to unplug the antenna cable from your head unit, move it to the female socket on your modulator's wire, and then plug in the modulator to the head unit's now free antenna jack. Now you just need to connect the switch to the modulator: pop the red and white stereo cables into the appropriate sockets and plug the switch's white power plug into the modulators white power harness.

Audio quality was generally good. I did notice some very high pitched humming, but this went away when I turned the stereo system down (to the levels I normally use it) and upped the source volume.

The FM-MOD02 is a great solution to adding external/auxiliary input to a stereo system where other options are either expensive or complicated. Installation was simple but instructions would have been a big plus. If you are experienced with cars and car stereo installation it shouldn't be a problem but if you are not it might be problematic. Operation of the unit, once installed, is simple. Sound is good though not as good as auxiliary input built into a stereo. Best results seem to be achieved by turning volume low on the stereo and using the input device (ipod or other) volume control.