[Motorola Droid RAZR] Ohmster:
Casper my good buddy!

I saw your post but have been having such major problems with my own phone, this is the first opportunity I have to get back to you on this.

Yeah you should update. 09/14 is reported to be a good build. I am on it myself and I made it all the way through the night on charge and the next day, it is still rocking and rolling. No issues to speak of, other than the issues I have with my own phone.

I have such serious and deeply rooted problems with my phone, the only real option I have to fix it is to do a total wipe of the entire phone, including formatting the internal SDCard. My stock rom is toast, my cm11 rom is toast, and even a clean install of cm11 on a freshly created rom slot will not fix the stock rom and my "non-existent" storage space issues. I have been rooting for a long, long time and then began romming with cm10. But I only recently learned what to do and what NOT do do with roms, i.e.: Don't junk it up with apps I don't need, never use, or rarely use! I have constantly installed everything and everything that I need, want, looks cool, or just want to see what it does. Thus I have almost 250 apps in each of my two roms, stock and cm11. The roms are ruined, yes you can uninstall stuff but apps leave behind folders and other bits of debris when removed and this is cumulative. It piles up and will kill you. Not to mention that cm11 has undergone many, many major changes and one cannot just OTA forever. You have to "go clean" every now and then with a rom in the making to rid the system of things that no longer exist or that have changed drastically. I have hardly never done this. So both roms are destroyed beyond repair. Stock rom is from Matt's Utility and cannot be "Flashed". It comes as a script that installs over a USB cable and I do not believe it would work with Safe Strap. I would probably have to delete/erase everything on the phone to do this and then install Safe Strap and move on to cm11. Only this time, no crapping up the system with hundreds of apps, modules, and tweaks. Keep them clean and mean. Oh well, I will deal with it.

The Bluetooth receiver

I do have a solution for you if you do not have an auxiliary jack on your car audio system. Stay tuned...

Yeah, this is an excellent idea. No more dealing with terrible headphone jacks that by now, are worn out. Nothing but noise, static, speakers cutting in and out, etc. I did purchase one from Amazon for $12 dollars and I was amazed at the quality of the music and how easy it was to use. Once paired to the phone, as long as Bluetooth is turned on, all I do is get in the car, speak "Okay Google" and give a command such as "play music Ace of Bass" and my car speakers would answer with "Playing Ace of Bass" and the music would play. Same thing for Pandora or anything like that.

What I did not realize or read in the fine print was that this is a media only Bluetooth receiver. I did not know this when I purchased it and while listening to music, I once again used Google Now to command the phone to call my friend. To my total surprise, the phone voice I could not hear, barely. It was coming out of the phone, NOT the car audio system! Reading the package and instructions, as well as the product description on Amazon clearly stated this is for media only. Bummer. I need one that will bring ALL phone audio to the car stereo, not just the music.

So, I went and used Google for the best cellphone Bluetooth receiver for car stereo and hands free phone operation. I found the best one on Amazon for $30, not bad if it will do all I want. This one will not only send all phone audio to the speakers including phone calls, but if you do not use Google Now voice, you can use the voice dialer by pressing the button that comes with it to activate the voice dialer. Now you can either say "Okay Google" and speak your command to make a call, or you can tap the button to bring up the Google Voice Dialer and simply speak out who to call. Neat!

The Devices

This is the Media Only Bluetooth receiver, will NOT do phone calls over the car speakers. - $12.99

This is the Full Android and iPhone/Tablet audio Bluetooth receiver, including touch button for use with Voice Dialer. - $31.96

I called Amazon the day after I got the reciever and explained there was no problem with it, it performs exactly as it is described. But that I failed to read the fine print about "Media Only" and needed a full audio receiver that I could use for "hands free" phone in the car. I would like a refund and I would then buy the one I found and needed instead. The man was very nice about it. He emailed me a pre-paid UPS shipping label for the return package. I bought a nice bubble wrap inside paper mailing envelope at Walgreens for $1.49, put the receiver, power cord, and instruction leaflet back in the original box, attached the shipping label on the shipping envelope, put the device in the shipping envelope, and dropped it off at the local UPS store for return delivery. I did already order the right Bluetooth receiver and it is on it's way! :laugh:

If possible, I keep my online purchases like this to Amazon because they really exist and have an address, they really have customer service people who you can talk to on the phone, and, they are very nice and will almost always return your money, exchange your product, and even refund your money right away from scumbag third party vendors that rip you off. I have gotten refunds form Amazon a few times, always easy to do, always very polite, and always very fast.

A very handy device you can buy and I used to use in my last car to listen to my mp3 player through the car stereo is a 3.5mm In-car FM Transmitter Radio Adapter. They are inexpensive, transmit the phone audio to the car radio by FM transmission. You tune the ratio to an unused station, tune the device to that frequency, and the audio from the phone, player, tablet, whatever will come out the car speakers, clear and crisp. The bad part is that these fairly inexpensive devices such as this one all use a headphone jack to get the audio out of the phone. And the whole problem is that the headphone jacks in our several year old phones is almost always totally worn out.

If you replace your car radio with one that has an AUX jack, all the better. If you replace your car radio with one that has a Bluetooth receiver in it, you have it made in the shade. Otherwise, you would need some sort of Bluetooth to FM radio receiver/transmitter. I never looked for one but such a device may exist for sale.

Well well well, what do you know, the exact, perfect product that will get crisp clean audio out of your phone via Bluetooth and deliver it clean, clear, and static free to your car stereo by FM radio transmission does exist and guess where I found it? Yep, that's right. Amazon.

MPOW Streambot Y Wireless Bluetooth FM Transmitter Radio Adapter Car Kit with Hands-Free Calling and Music Control - Price:	$36.99 & FREE Shipping.

As far as Amazon not shipping to Africa, as long as it is realistically possible to mail or ship a package to Cape Town Africa, the shipping cost is reasonable, and your product is 100% insured, you can get any person in the US to receive the package for you and then ship it to you in Cape Town. You got friends in the US? We are your friends, if no one else would do it for you, I would,

providing

that it is not going to cause problems, come with an unacceptable level of risk, or would cost

me

money to do so.

One thing I should explain about RF transmitters. AM radio was the first radio system developed to deliver audio to the public and has a very reaching range. I believe that US President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave his infamous Fireside Chats to the public starting in 1933 on the only existing radio we had, AM radio.

But AM or "Amplitude Modulation" radio has a serious drawback compared to what we now use, FM or "Frequency Modulated" radio. AM has a very poor sound quality and is very susceptible to noise and interference. FM radio is less susceptible to noise and interference, plus it has a superior sound quality suitable for High Fidelity Stereo transmission. So, if you think that using an FM radio transmitter to get your phone sound into the car stereo would result in poor quality or results, you are mistaken. You would get very good sound quality. If you really care, read AM v.s FM radio here.

I think that is about it my friend. I have been using every excuse in the book to avoid tearing my phone to the bone and building it back up, but I really must get on with it. Hope this answers your questions and helps you somewhat.

Take care my friend! Go for a relaxing elephant ride or something and send pictures, will ya? :laugh: