Belkin Tunecast ii

So you need tunes in your car or at the cottage from you iPod? What's the easiest solution? The Belkin Tunecast ii. From the accessory GIANT Belkin comes this simple to use iPod FM transmitter for all the models with a headphone jack…which by coincidence is all of them.

For those that may not be familiar with how an FM transmitter works we'll give a brief overview. The unit plugs into the music device in our case an iPod, and outputs the music over an FM band that your radio can pick. Generally used for in car purposes, you will set your radio to the same FM band that the unit is transmitting on and voila, you have tunes playing through your car stereo via your FM radio.

Now of course the Belkin tunecast ii does suffer from one of the same setbacks as other FM modulators. You're limiting the sound quality to that of FM radio.. not the end of the world for those of us that just want music, but for you audiophiles, this may be a let down.

Now what about the Belkin Tunecast for features? One of the nicest features I think about this unit is that it runs on it's own batteries. Now some of you may be saying. Booooo we want one power supply. Some of the other FM units use the iPod's power to run them. The fall down here is that the iPod battery is strong but is costly and not easy to replace. It's probably best to keep the drain on your iPod just to your iPod.

Secondly the Belkin FM unit runs on all FM channels between 88.1MHz-107.9MHz. This means no pre-sets, so you can find the channel that works best for you in your area; and if you happen to be in a busy metropolis there are 4 memory FM frequencies that you can save even when the unit shuts down.

As I mentioned the Tunecast does run on batteries, 2 AAA's to be exact, these aren't the most expensive, but Belkin was thinking. There's an auto on/off feature that it automatically comes on when it senses audio, and shuts off after 60 continuous seconds of no audio. So no chance of having it turn on what it's in the glove box and killing the batteries. Remember the old personal CD players, putting them in the gym bag only to find out the batteries are dead when you need it because it's been playing for 2 days straight in your bag. Overall the Belkin Tunecast ii, is a good option for car iPod play. The company is an accessory giant, and this unit will work with other portable electronics as well. (i.e. PDA, laptop, PC, other MP3 players). It's probably one of the more generic FM transmitters that work with the iPod, but I think this is a plus. Check out the Belkin Tunecast ii below.

 
Belkin Tunecast ii

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