sama

Is this a good product? Has anybody used this product on your RX.

The website says you can listen to your IPOD or MP3 player in your car stereo on the following FM frequencies:
88.1, 88.3, 88.5, 88.7, 94.1, 94.3, 94.5, 94.7, 100.1, 100.3, 100.5, 100.7, 106.1, 106.3, 106.5, 106.7MHz

PORT AUTHORITY2 MP3 TO FM CAR AND STEREO ADAPTER


** Use with your Apple® iPod™, Rio™, Archos™, Audiorave™, Bantam™, Benq™, Boomgear™, Cali™, Carbon™, CD Cyclone™, Chiba™, Creative Labs™, Cyclone™, Digital™, Digitalway™, Ego™, Forge™, Go Video™, Grundig™, i2go™, IFP™, Insignia™, Iriver™, Irock™, Joybee™, Jukebox™, JVC™, K-Byte™, Karma™, Lexar™, Lyra™, Madwaves™, Mpio™, Muvo™, Napster™, Nike™, Nitrus™, Nomad™, Olympus™, Panasonic™, Philips™, Pogo™, RCA®, Rhomba™, Samsung™, Sandisk™, Scandisk™, Slimx™, Sony®, Sport™, TDK®, Tunecast™, Virgin®, Yepp™ or Zen™ -- any MP3 player with a 3.5mm connection (a standard headphone output jack)!

AM1

iTrader: (6)

i dont like using those fm transmitter things since the audio quality never sounds that good.

userdmx

I cant tstand the quality either; i have an alpine in my 4runnner and I'm going to put one of those vias or dice aux hook up boxes in my wifes rx 330

Gibster

Most FM transmitters are fine for the ease of use. On longer trips I find I have to change the channel as I move between towns. One channel might be unused in one town but used in another. I mostly use it now in my hotel room. I've gone back to using a cassette adapter to connect my MP3 player in my cars.

biff44

I use an Itrip.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...082277-2440856

It is good, in that it charges the Ipod as well as sending the audio to the FM receiver, and it has a fuse built in to the cigarette lighter adapter so it is not a fire hazzard. It also has the bonus that I can pick up the ipod and put it directly in front of my face to select a tune (I am blind as a bat), which a lot of other methods do not let you do.

Of course, the sound quality truly bites compared to a direct wire connection, but I did not get around to adding an aux input (an expensive endeavor) yet.

anulex

All Fm Transmitters suck. Tried a bunch of them. However, I dont drive my RX all that much. I dont know if the RX330 has a tape deck. But the tape adater is ugly but it sounds nearly as good in RX300 as an aux direct input.

NeverSatisfied

I use a cassette adapter which I think works well with my iPod. It looks horrible seeing "tape" on the stereo display and the cord sticking out of the deck, but, you gotta do what you gotta do, since there is no aux jack!

jfelbab

I use the iTrip and have for two years now. I travel from Milwaukee to Cape Coral FL and back twice a year using this device. I only need to change the channel around Nashville. The audio quality is fine especially in a moving vehicle, even the Lexus. The iTrip allows for choosing your channel from all available channels. I'd steer clear of a unit that only has a subset of channel choices.

As I mentioned, I only need to change the channel around Nashville. It performs fine through Milwaukee, Chicago, Chattanooga, Atlanta, and all other cities along the I75 corridor.

LophatRX

So I have heard this debate and have been using an FM transmitter with my XM and actually switched to the cassette adapter, and I use the same adapter for my Ipod. It may be that the quality of the cassette adapter has something to do with it. And I recently switched from an FM adapter to a Direct Input on my BMW and there was a total sound quality difference. I don't totally like the idea of those wires hanging out of the deck but I do think the sound quality is really good with the cassette adapter I am using in my RX.

triplecore

What kind of cassette adapater do you have? Mine is really muddy sounding.

ecount00

the after market, direct ipod link kits are a bit pricy, a project to install but get the best quality sound by far IMO. the transmitter removes the need to install a kit but i find the quality ok not great. have used a few different transmitters and couldn't tell the difference. itrip is as good as any i tried. what matters is have a clear channel on the fm band to get a good static free signal. you've gotten different opinions on that here already. it depends on where you live and how far and wide you drive. for us, we would often have to change the frequency of the transmitter when we drove as little as an hour in any given direction and was a pain.

biff44

It all depends on how picky an audiofile you are. All FM transmitters have limited frequency range. They cuttoff before 14 KHz (since there is a stereo pilot tone at 19 KHz that the receiver has to reject). Also, the receiver mucks with the audio frequency flatness (emphasis/de-emphasis), which does no good to the audio quality unless they are perfectly matched.

They have severely limited dynamic range (will distort on loud passages)--which the FM transmitter designers solve by starving the audio to the modulator. That yields a poor signal to noise ratio.

And, of course, as you drive around you will find distant stations (or guys in the car next to you) getting picked up sporadically, which is annoying.

Finally, it is an analog, rather than digital, signal transmitted. So you took the sound quality compression hit when you made the mp3 recording. Now you screw it up again by converting it to an analog signal long before it hits the audio amplifier in the receiver. It is a double whammy to intermodulation, noise, etc.

But, you really can not beat the practicality of it. You get into any car, plug it into the cigarette lighter, and away you go. Considering the road noise, poor speaker quality, and dreadful acoustics in a car--many would not notice the difference.

jfelbab

Advertised Frequency Range of the Griffin product I use is 50 Hz to 15 KHz. Not great by any audio standards but I'd point out that unless the car is parked in a quiet garage, and not running, your vehicle's acoustics won't let you hear much beyond this range anyway. Even if you keep the sunroof and the windows closed there is still substantial wind and road noise and the AC fans are very detrimental to critical audio enjoyment.

Quite frankly, the FM transmitter solution is pretty decent for the price. The question you need to answer is "Can you really hear much difference when the car is in motion?" I could not. My RX is just way to darn noisy. I seriously doubt that the speakers used in the RX can product anything below 50 Hz anyway. I did buy the ML audio package but it has no sub. The fans, wind noise tire noise and road noise just erases any real audio quality while the car is in motion.

Perhaps the LS is a quieter animal but the RX is rather disappointing in it's lack of quietness, IMO. My old Toyota Solara was much quieter. My Lexus dealer's response is "...but it's a truck." I tell them I want to buy a quieter truck then. If they don't make one maybe I should look around at other SUV manufacturers. Granted, the newer 08 RX is somewhat quieter than my 04 but still not what I expect from a Lexus.

biff44

I can, but like you say, some can't. The difference is somewhat like the difference between a cd in your changer, or listening to a strong FM radio station. The low end is missing and muddled on the FM station. The "punch" of drum beats, etc, will be missing. If you have a subwoofer, you will really notice the difference.

spunderdog

Sure would have been nice if Lexus had thought a bit more about how their vehicles would be used today and put a simple AUX in on the dashboard or even on the back of the radio. Would have saved a lot of us a lot of time and money for just what I would call a common courtesy.