silverstreak

Just bought a 2000 E55 from out-of-state with the integrated voice activated phone, and was disappointed to be told by both of the cellular companies in my area that they will not activate an account on an analog phone;everything's digital only. When I bought the vehicle, I had been told that the 2000's had a digital phone, but now I learn from my local MBz dealer that this didn't start until late 2000...
Is there a reasonably priced solution, or a retrofit? It's a little consternating that a state of the art two year old car has an obsolete $2000 option.

benzy230

I would take it back and have them install a later model version. It shouldn't be all that hard to do it when you think about all the other companies that do it as well!

Mach430

I bought my CLK used with the timeport phone installed. Problem was it was Verizon and I already had a contract with AT&T. Dealer switched it for me, no questions asked. If yours gives you a hard time, call customer service and gripe.

silverstreak

this was a startac phone...today found out from the parts dept at another dealer that there were 17 (count 'em) handsets for model year 2000, each with its own part number...so I was able to get a phone that AT&T would transfer an existing account to. Luckily I had one; apparently AT&T really doesn't like the bandwidth it uses and would have refused a new account on it.

So now I just need to work out a refund on the original handset that came with the car, which is one of the CDMA models. MBz doesn't put the part number on the handset, tho...

Mach430

The Part# should be on the box it came in.

silverstreak

dealer agreed to take back the phone that doesn't work in my area , and refund $500 ($575 list). All is well! Now I just have to read the books to figure out the voice activation.