Small sleek and very unassuming, this little bluetooth gadget from Sony does it’s job perfectly with very little fuss. And strangely enough for a Sony product, it’s really not that expensive either.
Introduction
The sony mbr-100 is one of those useful little unassuming gadgets that you didn’t know you needed until you got one. In fact not only did you not know you needed one you probably didn’t know they existed. It doesn’t look much really. It’s just a small oval shaped piece of plastic with a 3.5″ stereo socket at one end and a standard sony ericsson charging socket at the other. One one side is a single unlabelled button and on the other side the normal sony ericsson branding.
So lets get on to the actual function of this gadget shall we? The sole function of this device is to receive a bluetooth audio stream and convert it to an analogue stereo output. It connects to a bluetooth device via the a2dp profile for stereo streaming which is supported by most of today’s portable devices, including mobile phones, pdas and laptops/netbooks.
At first the device doesn’t sound all that great and many people will be asking ‘but why’ so maybe it’ll be helpful for me to go through a few useful applications. I personally use mine in the car, with the mbr-100 connected to the auxiliary input of my car stereo I can stream the audio from my ipaq 214 pda to the stereo for music, video and sat nav audio. This gives me the advantage of cleaner sound because I’m no longer using the very poor ipaq 3.5″ socket output and I also reduce the amount of wires hanging from my dashboard. This would be especially good in a car like the Skoda Octavia which has a hidden auxiliary input (in the centre console).
Packaging and Contents
I got my receiver from a seller on ebay and I think it may have been a catalogue return or a refurbished product as it came in a white cardboard box with a photocopied or home printed instruction leaflet. I did get it cheap though and it has work just brilliantly so I didn’t complain. The downside though is that I can’t comment on the true retail packaging or instructions. I’ll give Sony the benefit of the doubt though and assume it’s all of great quality, please leave a comment if you know otherwise.
Closer Look
On the top side of the Sony MBR-100 you’ll find the Sony Ericsson branding on top of a gloss black finish and it all looks pretty smart really, especially that this is a device that you probably have hidden away for most of the time.
The unassuming top with simply logo and brand name
When you turn the device over you’ll find a contrasting matt black finish and all the obligatory information like ‘Made in China’, the bluetooth trademark logo, model number and radio communications regulatory information. Alongside this information at one end you also find a single unmarked button which is used for all functions and at the other end a single LED which is used for relaying all possible status information.
The underside of the Sony MBR-100
On one end of the MBR-100 is the 3.5″ stereo socket for connecting to your speakers, stereo line in or amplifier. Not much to be said about this connection, just plug it in. Being a Sony product you can be reassured that the quality of components is high and that includes this socket.
The 3.5″ audio socket at the end of the Sony MBR-100
On the other end of the MBR-100 is the charging socket for connecting to a standard Sony Ericsson charger which could be an in car charger or a home mains charger. The charging circuit is also compatible with 5V USB charging, useful for charging from your laptop or a device like the freeloader solar charger. There’s no details on the size of the battery inside but I can tell you that it will run in standby mode for a couple of days and in play mode for several hours, which seems a decent length of time for what is quite a small device.
The charging socket at the end of the Sony MBR-100
One note on the charging, the instruction leaflet stated that it was not possible to charge the device and continue to use it at the same time. This would limit the device somewhat especially in car as you’d need to have periods of non-use in order to charge it. However, in practice I’ve been able to charge and use the device simultaneously without any problems at all.
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2 Responses
When you receive a call during music playback, can you answer and use the phone’s microphone but the headphones or speakers you have plugged in like speakerphone?
Great review, thanks.
Posted on May 28th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Don’t know I’m afraid. That situation hasn’t occurred for me yet. I mostly use it with my pda rather than a phone.
Posted on May 28th, 2010 at 8:26 pm
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