Home > Consumer Reviews > GEAR4 BluEye - Bluetooth iPod Connection Device - With FM Radio - Black

This is a really useful piece of kit.

This is essentially a remote control with bluetooth - the bluetooth enables the connecting of your phone (must be have bluetooth obviously) to your ipod. Not sure how far back the compatibility goes but I've got a 3rd Gen click wheel iPod (not colour) and it works fine.

When you have a call coming in it shows up on your ipod display and you hear your ring-tone through your headphones (or if on silent it simply goes quiet) - you can then press play on your remote to answer the call listening through your headphones. I have no idea where the microphone is, I assume it's in the remote, but even when that is as far from my face as the lead allows, people still seem to be able to hear me fine.

Key thing I like is that I can put my phone and ipod away in secure inside pockets or even my phone/ipod in a bag, because I can control both with my Blueye remote.

On top of that it is a really good quality remote control, much better than the cheap as chips one I had bought on-line earlier this year.

The only thing I would say is that if any of you have tried voice-dialing you'll know that it 'aint all that good, so it is the same story when trying to do it through this, although that's down to the phone's software not the Blueye.

Great little device. I bought it at Hong Kong airport the other day. I like the features and the feel of the product. I've come across some problems. Using the clip makes me sometimes accidentally touch the buttons. The volume is not in synchronization with the iPod nano volume control. If I've listened thru my nano directly with low volume setting and then plug in the BluEye and move my earphones there, the volume is ofter very loud. These are little things and don't annoy too much after I have learnt to live with them.
The most annoying thing is the constant ticking or tapping sound in the background of my right earbud when I hook the earphones in the BluEye. If I listen to low volume sounds this clicking noise comes through clearly enough to disturb listening. With louder music it disappears in the background. I have Koss Sparkplugs. I tried to get advice on this problem from the www.myblu.biz website adverised in the user manual. However, this site seems to be still in test mode without much content. After googling I found the mavizen.com page where I logged my compaint again.
But even with this little disturbing noise, I still like the product and can recommend it to others who - like myself - sometimes miss their calls due to music playing or do not want to fumble with the controls of the iPod stored in a pocket. The radio also works quite well as does the Bluethooth connection.

When i first saw this piece of kit it had me drooling. A remote control, FM radio tuner and bluetooth connection with your mobile allowing caller id on your iPod, voice dialling and much less fumbling around your pockets. All this works with great efficiency and all in all it is a great bundle of capabilities. However, the bluetooth is over efficient and while its connected to your phone it won't allow you to mess around with your phone ie. text or access menu features without constantly pausing the iPod - i suppose it just can't distinguish between general playing around and an attempt to make or receive calls. Maybe this won't bother you as much as it did me. One other minor gripe is the ability to 'use your own earphones'. I took this to be an option to either use your own or perhaps utilise an included set of earphones with the kit. There is no included earphones and unfortunately coupled with the standard iPod earphones, you have almost 1 metre of cable. You must either gather up the iPod phones cable and somehow keep it gathered thus allowing your remote to clip to your lapel or simply allow the cable to lie free and keep the remote in your pocket with the iPod which i think is defeating the purpose. Of course there's one more option - buy another set of earphones with a roughly 20 cm long cable. Good luck with that.

This product is an absolutely brilliant idea, and I was looking forward to trying it out. It's a real shame that the actual product doesn't live up to the idea.

Initially I had to do a firmware upgrade to get it to work properly with my iPod classic. Once done, the radio worked much better, although everytime you change station it disconnects & reconnects to update the display. Not perfect, but it works. Reception is good too, even when i was sitting in the office.
As for the phone connection, this is the best part. It works very well and it was no problem before or after the firmware change. Stops the music, gives you a tone to indicate a call. One button press and you're talking.

My biggest problem was with the sound quality. I bought good quality earphones for use with my iPod cos I use it a lot, and I love my music. The styles vary but anything that's bass heavy or "noisy" (rock, metal, louder classical pieces) is distorted and frankly unlistenable.

For this reason, using this remote would ruin my listening experience which would quickly become annoying, and it's being returned an hour after I got it.

Great idea, not quite a great product.

I've only been using my Blueye for a day or so, but so far it's been good. First of all, it's a remote and it lets you control your iPod whilst you have the player hidden away. Like the iPod it has a button lock slider to stop accidental button pushes. You can of course lock the iPod and leave the Blueye remote unlocked. The buttons available are simple: Pause/Play, Skip forward and backward, Volume up and down.

I have tried the FM receiver, and reception seemed OK given that I was indoors surrounded by computers. How practical it is on the move, however, I don't know. The FM tuner is basic and there is not RDS so manual re-tuning may be necessary if you are on the move (such as on a train).

I have managed to pair my Orange SPV M600 PDA/Phone with the Blueye. I followed the instructions and it worked first time. Incoming call quality is fantastic and better than any other BlueTooth device I have. I can't vouch for the outgoing sound quality, but I have had no complaints from people I have so far called.

Making calls using the Blueye, or controlling calls after dialling out from the phone works as advertised but I did find the instructions a little confusing, and I'll need to try more things out.

The only real complaint I would have with this device is the clip on the remote. Trying to clip the thing onto my jacket means accidentally hitting the buttons on the remote and the clip does not grip that well.

The build quality seems good, in fact better than I expected. It's also possible to update the firmware on the Blueye as it becomes available, which is good news. Overall, not a bad little device, if perhaps a little expensive for what it is.