Back in 2006 I tested and reviewed the Parrot Hands-free speakerphone and now I have had chance to review the latest version, the Parrot MINIKIT Chic.
The MINIKIT Chic was just as easy to pair as the old MINIKIT and also charges via mini-USB. The MINIKIT Chic has a nice design on it however they also do the MINIKIT Slim which is just plain black.
The Parrot MINIKIT Chic
The Parrot MINIKIT Chic requires only three buttons to operate it. There are two rectangular buttons to make and end the call plus the round button in the middle that serves as a menu button and volume control. As there is no screen on this MINIKIT the menus are accessed by voice prompt which allows you to change things like the language setting, volume settings and Bluetooth pairing. In practice I don’t think you’ll need to use the menus at all.
The MINIKIT Chic is designed to be clipped onto the sun visor and sits there very neatly. It is slimmer than the old version and this one can only be fitted on the sun visor whereas the old one had rubber feet so it could be sat on a dashboard if you wanted.
So what do I think of the Parrot MINIKIT Chic?
I’m very pleased with it actually. There is an improvement in both the design and quality. The Bluetooth pairing was very easy and quick and the device seems to hold the pairing whereas the old one sometimes lost it and need to be re-paired. Making a call from the car was good as all of the vehicle noise was cancelled out so the person I called could hear me clearly. The loudspeaker uses NXT technology and is certainly loud and clear enough with the volume being very easy to adjust.
Parrot MINIKIT Chic back view
With the device being slimmer it looks even better and is totally unobtrusive and looks quite stylish too!
Parrot MINIKIT Chic side view
The other thing that has really impressed me about the MINIKIT Chic is the ability to synchronize your phonebook onto the device. This means you can make calls using voice recognition and takes away the need to actually flick through your phone contacts to find someone’s number when you need to call them. The other great thing about this is when you have an incoming call it tells you the name of the person calling!
The battery life is just as good as the old version although I am not sure what the standby battery life is meant to be but I have yet to charge it after a couple of weeks of it being in my car!
CONCLUSION
I really like the Parrot MINIKIT Chic, it’s an improvement on the old one which got a lot of use from me! The slim design makes it very hard to spot from outside of the car and being a Bluetooth device means it has no cables permanently attached.
Parrot MINIKIT Chic Specification:
•Interface:
– 3 buttons, including 1 rotary button
– 2 LEDs: green LED and red LED
•Telephony:
– Green button: answer, call a contact from the phonebook, start voice recognition, confirm, dual call, private mode
– Red button: hang up, switch on/off, exit the menus, cancel
– Rotary button: access the menus, adjust the volume, send DTMF signals
•Audio:
– Full duplex
– Built-in omnidirectional microphone
– Audio output via the vibrating panel
– Advanced Parrot NR3 noise reduction
– AEC-2 echo cancellation
– Voice menus for all menus
– Multi-speaker voice recognition
– Text To Speech: speech synthesis of the names in the phonebook
– Voiceprints: up to 150 per phone
•General:
– Number of contacts: 1 000 per phone / total of 2 500
•Language:
– one language per version
•Pairing:
– up to five devices
•Battery:
– lithium-ion, maximum charging time of 4 hours
– Battery life: over 15 hours talk time / over 20 days on standby
•Automatic connection by pairing order
•Bluetooth:
– Bluetooth v2.0 + EDR
– Profiles supported: HFP (Hands Free Profile) / OPP (Object Push Profile) / PBAP (Phone Book Access Profile)
– Other profiles: SyncML, Synchro AT, Synchro Nokia
– Range: 10 metres
– Pairing: by PIN code (1 2 3 4)
– Updates via USB port
•Processor:
– Parrot P5+ @ 208 MHz
– Flash = 256 Mbits
– RAM = 64Mbits
•Dimensions and weight:
– Length: 110 mm / 4.33 in
– Width: 60 mm / 2.36 in
– Thickness: 29 mm / 1.14 in
– Weight: 83 g / 2.93 oz
For more information and where to buy, please visit the Parrot website.
Review by: Tracy
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