ShuOne

I was really excited to get this, and immediately ran out to the car to hook it up. Much to my dismay, it wouldn't power on! I verified that the power adapter was supplying power, which it was. I tried a few more things and couldn't get it to work.After being disappointed for a couple of hours, I decided to play with it one more time before boxing it up to return. I plugged it in at my desk and started wiggling the wires in different places. After a few seconds of this, I found that the half-broken spot in the wire was right next to the junction between the power and audio wires. If I held it in the right position, it powered on and worked great.I didn't want to deal with the return/reorder process, so I just kept it. Hopefully it doesn't get a hard bump that will disconnect the wire inside the sheath again.On the plus side, the unit sounds great and the microphone works well.The downside, apart from the questionable longevity, is that it's not super fast to respond. When paired with my iPhone 5s, the forward/back buttons take a second or two to trigger the action on the device. It's also not nearly as easy as I'd hoped to activate Siri -- having to double-press and hold for some time, then wait a second or two for my (really fast) phone to get the command makes the voice interaction hit-and-miss.I think a much better design would be to have the voice activation done by a long-press on the button, and the pairing function (which is almost never needed after initial setup) assigned to something more obscure, like a double-press-and-hold or a 10 second press, etc.EDIT: a single long-press does indeed activate Siri. No double press required. Just don't go past 5 seconds or so or you'll get pairing mode.UPDATE 4/27/14The nice customer service folks at Himbox contacted me and promptly sent me a new unit. The replacement was problem free and works well.Not only does the unit work well, but their customer service is some of the best I have ever seen. Prompt, courteous, and helpful. Don't hesitate to contact them with any problems!

I really liked this thing. The call quality was decent, and it let me listen to the audio books on my phone over the car speakers. It connected automatically which was nice but the buttons never worked. I wouldnt have used them much anyway.The wires are really thin and flimsy too, but I figured it would be ok because it wasnt moving that much like headphones would. It did what it was supposed to do. About 2 months ago (I had been using it for about 2-3 months) I wanted to use the charger for my phone and my wifes phone, because there are 2 USB ports. Why not right? When I unplugged it however, the USB's metal plug part stayed in the charger and the ruberized housing with the wires came off. I wasnt pulling hard or at an angle, I know how to unplug something from a USB port. I was very suprised and sad. And that was the end of my Himbox. :( I wish I could upload a picture. So, sadly I cant recomend this.

****UPDATE 9/19/14 (Increasing my rating to 4 stars)The good folks at Hisgadget contacted me based on my review. I was surprised. The sent me a replacement unit free of charge due to the issues I was having. Very impressed. Rare to find a company that stands behind it's products like this anymore.The replacement fixed 2 out of the three issues. The mic sensitivity issue is fixed. Callers have no trouble hearing me now. (Must have gotten a bad unit before). Also it doesn't seem to hijack my calls when I'm outside of the car anymore. However, I'm still having trouble getting it to pair with my Galaxy S4. Most of the time I still have to power-cycle the Himbox. Not sure, maybe the problem is with my phone? I try to press the button, I try to hold down the button, the unit says "pairing" but nothing happens. As soon as I unplug, then plug it right back in it works immediately "your device is now connected". I also pair my phone with a headset at work, as well as a portable speaker at home. I wonder if that could cause any of these problems?Nonetheless, it's a GREAT sounding unit for both music and phone calls. Plus a solid company who stands-behind their product. Hard to go wrong.***OriginalOn the one hand the himbox, once connected works really well for playing music over your car speakers. Great sound quality. I've actually had people compliment me on my stock stereo/speakers while playing music through the himbox. Where it falls short are two areas:1. pairing - I consistently have to unplug it and re-plug it in to get it to pair with my Galaxy S4. It's strange because I live in a duplex and park in a carport, so my car is always parked very close to me. When I'm in the house and try to answer a phone call, half the time the Himbox hijacks the call and I can't hear anything until I turn off 'headset' on the phone. But when I get into my car and hit 'play' on the music player, the song is played through my phone speaker. I have to power-cycle the himbox before it will link with my phone. It pairs for phone audio when I DON'T want it to, but never for media audio when I want it to. Maybe I'm doing something wrong?2. mic - it's cool to have the phone functionality, but I cannot find a place to put it where the mic picks-up my voice without having to yell. What I end up doing is taking the little hockey-puck thing off the magnet and holding it in my hand while I talk (kudos to them for this cool magnet design that allows me to do that). Unfortunately, this makes it no longer hands-free. I tried positioning the thing all over my dash, in various places but unfortunately the people on the other end have trouble hearing me.Other than those two issues I'm quite satisfied with it. The music sounds great and the ability to start/stop songs and skip ahead etc. is too cool.