jzacuto

Does anyone know any trick to getting the Verizon BlackBerry Storm 9530 to work with AcuraLink? It attempts connection but takes forever before I finally just give up. It never seems to connect.

Maybe there are specific APN settings?

CPR

For the time being;FORGET IT! I have the TMobile 8320 Curve, & the Bluetooth website claims it's in the "testing" phase; which means, by the time they get around to testing your phone, you'll have a new one. lol It's bizarre, that a PDA, with internet, email, & texting ability, can't sync with Acuralink. Then again, the Technology/Nav Bluetooth link in the '09 TL, is inferior to my '05TL. Sometimes, simplicity is best.

thurley42

that's weird....my 8330 Curve worked the first time I got in my TL?

CPR

You misunderstood; my BlackBerry works fine for Bluetooth, but it does not link to Acuralink. Maybe it has something to do with TMobile as opposed to Verizon.

jzacuto

I can't complain about the BlueTooth. Other than the learning curve of the HFL after using the one in my 06 for 3 years and moving to the 09, it works great. And the BT Audio is amazingly clear and easy to use. The dealer said it was crap, but I disagree!

My complaint really is the AcuraLink feature. If it's a Verizon issue that's fine and I can't complain, but if it's an Acura issue, they need to fix it or provide a work-around.

bmode

There are a bunch of threads from few months ago that covered this issue, discussing tethering from AT&T and other mobile phone providers, check them out. Bottom line? Acura messed up when they changed from 3G Alpine systems to 4G Pioneer system as they left out the best elements of the 3G, which is why most of us felt safe getting another TL. While I loved my 05' 3G TL and despite this Acuralink not working, the 4G is superior with sound and media adaptiveness. I have no regrets, but rather hopes that Acura will make some adjustments, QUICK!

Oh, I also had a Curve in the 05' TL, it always lost bluetooth connectivity, it drove me nuts! Thanks to iPhone, those days are over.

jzacuto

Grrrrr, careful! I work for BlackBerry!

jimk

I'm new to all this . . . just got a Blackberry Storm 9530 that does not seem to want to pair with my Bluetooth. The TL keeps reporting that I entered the wrong PIN number. Any thoughts or suggestions. Thanks

jimk

As I said, new to all this . . . Blackberry challenged. Kept playing with it & got it paired. One small step . . .

Stash

I had no problems with my Storm and Verizon connecting to Acuralink. Very easy. It did take a long time the first time and I made sure I wasn't in the garage and outside where I got a good signal.

evantec

The advice below is based on my personal experience with a 3G TL, a BlackBerry Storm and a Sanyo SCP-8400 phone. I have also played with other Bluetooth devices and dealt with the hassles of pairing. The good news is, once you get it right, you generally don't need to do it again.

Normally, when pairing 2 Bluetooth "devices" (for example, your BlackBerry and your car's HFL), you need to set a 4-digit code (for instance "1234") for each of them. During the pairing process, you enter the PIN into each of them, and then they communicate to be sure they are talking to each other (and not your neighbor's phone or car).

Possible problems include:

(1) BlackBerries have a "PIN" which is an 8 digit Hex code (like 321ABCE8) which is NOT used for Bluetooth pairing. Don't even try to enter this sort of thing into the Acura's HFL. The PIN must bluetooth devices use is only 4 digits long. Incidentally, for really simple devices like headsets without any buttons, the PIN is often 0000.

(2) To protect your phone and HFL from pairing up with anyone's phone (or worse, to reduce the chance of a hacker pairing with your stuff without your permission), Bluetooth devices can only pair with new devices when they are in "Discoverable" mode. On the car, when you go into Phone Setup and say to Add New Phone, you're telling the car to become discoverable. On the BlackBerry, under Setup - Bluetooth, you need to change the Discoverable setting from OFF to something like On-for-2-minutes. The good news is, this generally prevents other devices from screwing up your pairing session. The bad news is, if your devices aren't discoverable, they'll never pair. (For security, a Blackberry is usually NOT discoverable until you make it discoverable.) More bad news is, some really low-end products like $10 audio adapters (see later) may always be in "pairing mode".

(3) When pairing, one of the devices wants to be the "searcher", the other wants to be "found". On the BlackBerry, there is a choice for "Search" (to find new devices) and a choice for "Listen" (to be found by a device who is searching). I don't remember which one to use, but you need to use the correct one!

(4) Since the BlackBerry is a multitasking device, if you are busy surfing the web, listening to music, or a huge email is coming in at the same moment you are pairing, the phone's CPU might be too busy to pair correctly.

(5) You want to do this whole process somewhere away from any other Bluetooth devices which might interfere with it. If you already have a bluetooth headset paired to the phone, turn it off before you begin, and look at the phone's list of bluetooth devices to be sure none are in use (the blue LED on the phone should not be blinking if you have not yet paired it with the car!)

By away, I mean, find an EMPTY parking lot, and be about 100 or 150 feet away from anything else. Or find a wooded street away from cars and houses. Bluetooth can go for 30 feet. If you try this in front of your house, and you or your neighbors have BT phones, they might interfere a little.

(6) That last comment (5) means that if you have a garage in your house, and your old Bluetooth phone is already paired to the car, you might have the situation that you turn on the ignition and the car tries to reconnect with the old Bluetooth phone, even though it's not in the car. This is only a problem if the old phone is actually on. (So if Junior still uses it to play BrickBreaker, tell him to take a break for awhile!) If the old phone is off, don't worry. The car is able to know about multiple phones, it just can't connect to more than one at a time for calling purposes.

(6) As a "convenience", after successful pairing the car will remain connected via bluetooth for a minute or two AFTER you turn off the ignition, so you can remain on a call. That could be very confusing if you think you can just turn the car off and be disconnected from the Bluetooth.

(7) For the blackberry storm only, it has no software or hardware reset yet. So you may need to do a battery-pull if the phone gets hung during the process!

(8) Bluetooth has different "profiles" which support different functions.

The 4G TL supports Bluetooth audio -- it is possible that the phone is pairing for audio-streaming purposes but not phone purposes. This profile is called something like A2DP, and it lets you send stereo music out of the phone and into the car.

You may need to tell the HFL or the BlackBerry that you are pairing for the Handsfree profile. You also should set the BlackBerry so that the HFL is considered "Trusted" -- you don't want to phone to ask you to if you need to trust the HFL every time you make a call! You probably also want it to support a profile like OBEX, which lets the car send a phone number (from the NAVI system) to the phone, so you don't need to dial it yourself.

(9) A few months after my BB Storm was paired to my 3G TL, I tried ALSO pairing it to a bluetooth audio adapter I bought for $10 for use in the car. Big mistake! The car actually forget its connection to the phone, and I needed to pair it again. Since the phone remembered the TL, I needed to delete the settings in the phone, and it was a real pain. For awhile, it seemed like nothing wanted to communicate with anything else. After a battery-pull or two, I was able to finally get things paired OK, and things are alright. Needless to say, that $10 device is NOT used in the car!

(10) The good news is, unlike HomeLink, at least you don't need to get up on a ladder to reach a garage door opener!

Good luck!

bmode

Thank god for the iPhone, jeez what a mess.

jzacuto

Just an update...

I took advantage of the free 30-day trial tethering plan with Verizon and the Storm connected to Acuralink in seconds! Turns out that was probably the culprit.

In fact, if you try to use the Storm without a tethering plan and connect it to your computer, all web pages take you to a Verizon page that asks you to subscribe to a tethering plan. That block was probably what was keeping my Storm from fully connecting.

J.A.S.

Stupid question, but what is the difference between using the Storm on BlueTooth and using it on AcuraLink? The salesman paired my Storm on the BlueTooth very quickly and it's been working fine.

Stash

I don't think that is it as I don't have tethering and didn't have any problems.

jzacuto

Pairing it with HandsFreeLink via Bluetooth gives you the ability to make and take calls over the TL's audio system and give you integrated voice-activated functions using the TL's navigation system.

AcuraLink is a little more: It's an integrated system whereby the TL actually uses the Bluetooth link to communicate information like diagnostics, appointment reminders and messages to and from Acura's AcuraLink server.

Not having it doesn't affect the user experience, but if it's something the car is supposed to do, it'd be nice if it actually did it for all TL users in a consistent way. I needed to add the tethering plan to my Storm, another user didn't. *Shrug*

jzacuto

Oh REALLY? Can you share your TL and Storm's settings? (Settings for AcuraLink, settings on the Storm like APN, etc.)

AcuraLink is nice, but it's certainly not worth the $30 a month tethering plan from Verizon. Not at ALL!

atcrosby

The Acuralink and the Verizon 9530 issue definitely requires the tethering service which is additional dollars in the Verizon world. I had the problem of Acuralink not being to connect to the servers and called around until I got a tech who knew what the issue was.

I called Verizon, had it activated and AcuraLink is working without a problem.

Different wireless vendors (AT&T, TMobile, etc. ) bundle this feature differently for their phones. There really is no rhyme nor reason why tethering is included in the dataplan for one phone and not in the other.

One word of caution though, find out the cost before activating it. Sometimes the cost just isn't worth the additional features you get.

jzacuto

Agreed! For $30 a month, I can call in and make my appointments.

PS - I've found that most CDMA providers require a tethering plan whereas GSM providers sometimes let tethering happen without adding it to the plan, but if they catch you, they'll tack on the charge when they find out.