Why Isn't Hands-Free in Cars Hassle-FreeAutomakers rely on Bluetooth so drivers can use their mobile phones in their cars. But drivers can't always rely on Bluetooth, and this technology for connecting portable devices to vehicles can be a source of frustration rather than a panacea.

Incompatibility between Bluetooth systems and mobile phones is common, causing not just pairing problems but also lack of access to all the electronic features now available on both the phone and the car. And it all starts with a single problem facing automakers: They can't keep cars current with consumer electronics technology.

This is not a new problem with a new technology. Edmunds wrote about the same issues two years ago in "Bluetooth Blues." And while Bluetooth is now nearly ubiquitous in new vehicles across all segments, hands-free is still far from hassle-free.

"Bluetooth is among the top five features that people are looking for," says Thilo Koslowski, an analyst with Gartner, a market research firm. "So this is a big issue for the car industry."

Behind the Tech Curve
Bluetooth could be the poster child for technology from the automakers that has persistently been behind the tech curve. Bluetooth "profiles" and other technology are locked down in the hardware of new cars during the long engineering phase that precedes production. And since people change phones about every 18 months on average, it's not surprising that phones and cars can't get along. "You have two industries that are not moving at the same speed," explains Christian Coly, vice president of sales and marketing for Parrot North America, which supplies Bluetooth technology to OEMs as well as to the aftermarket.

New Bluetooth profiles are added to the latest phones, and the profiles can vary among phones and even among various carriers. "You've got a lot of different Bluetooth profiles, and then you've got different versions of those profiles," says Mark Boyadjis, a senior analyst with iSuppli, a market research firm. "That's the biggest issue."

Other variables make the situation even more complicated. Phones constantly receive software and firmware updates. And a phone on one wireless carrier could work fine in one particular car, while the same phone on a different wireless carrier might not. "There are just so many variables, even amongst the same phone operating system," says Henry Craner, a product planning manager at Hyundai. "We try to test them all but still you run into variances between individual phones. For example, I have a Droid and my wife has a Droid," he added. "Mine works great, but hers doesn't."

Boyadjis recently had a similar experience in a 2011 Volvo S60. "I paired my Droid Incredible with the car, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to transfer my address book," he says. "I read the manual over and over, and it just didn't work. And Volvo says on its Web site that it's fully compatible. Then another colleague of mine tried with an iPhone and it worked perfectly."