You don't have to suffer with the computer through all that talking. Just press the call/pick up call button on the steering wheel. As soon as the computer starts to talk, press it again, it will beep, then say "Call". As soon as it starts to talk again, press the same button again, it will beep, then say the name of the person you're calling the same way it is stored in your phone (your phonebook needs to paired up with the car prior to doing all this). After you say the name, the computer will repeat it. As soon as it starts blabbing the options again, press that button, it will beep, then say "dial". That's how I do it when I'm too lazy to reach for the phone or in the process of doing some spirited driving.

 

With the 2009 my iPhone phonebook doesn't pair up with the car -- I had to enter names and voicetags manually. But anyway, they must have changed it for the 2010, because with my 2009 there is no way to cut off the prompt to give your next command. I've heard that recommendation before and I tried that -- it didn't work. I tried pressing the enter button, the voice button, whatever. I still have to listen to the entire prompt before I can give the next command.

Edit: Just saw TinsleyC said close to the same thing for the '09. Do you guys who press the button twice have it in Basic or alternate command mode? Maybe if I switch back to basic mode this will work better. Anyway I'll try again tomorrow.

 

I have an 09 with no navi. I just press the phone icon on the steering wheel and press it to skip the voice prompts. I don't listen to the whole prompt as I know what is going to be asked next. I tried adding phonebook via bluetooth but that was not successful. I don't have the iphone. I have an envy2 with verizon wireless. One feature I wish they would add in future is the ability to deactivate bluetooth with the flip of a switch. At the moment the only way of doing it is to go through phone settings and disabling bluetooth or going through setup screen in car menu. Sometimes I need some privacy and don't want all of my passengers hearing my phone conversations. I know some of you will say don't answer the phone call and let it go to voicemail , but even then all of the passengers are aware that a phone call is being received and not being answered.

 

^ was flipping thru the manual, looks like theres a way to do a transfer where it shuts off the BT in the car and passes the call to just your phone

 

it's VERY simple to do...when you pick up on the bluetooth, just touch/click "USE HANDSET" and it takes it off the car and puts it on your phone...

 

So I played around with it today, and at least with my car, which is an '09 with Nav & premium, my original point stands.

There is **no way** to stop the voice prompt, whether on basic or alternate command mode. If I press the voice button during a prompt, all that does is pause the prompt. It won't accept any commands while it's paused. When I press voice again it just starts the command over. None of the other buttons have any effect (except the back button to cancel completely).

I can't just say "call debbie mobile" as someone else said. If I say "Call" it just gives me a list of previous calls. If I say "phonebook" I have to wait for a non-cancellable prompt before I can say "Debbie Mobile" then another prompt and say "dial".


+1 for that ^^ . There should be a use handset button on your console screen.

 

lol there is...not a physical button but on the touch screen there is an option when you're on the phone that says "Use Handset"


that's what I was talking about originally...you can do the same thing on your phone but for me it's easier to use the nav screen

 

Oh, wait a sec. I'm talking about the voice activated dialing via the voice button, not push-button dialing from the phone button. I'm not sure if you have the same thing without the nav package.

 

Looks like they "improved" this for 2010. Now you only have to press the call button four or five times to make a call instead of plaodding through the prompts. Someone wake me up when they figure out how to do it with one button press and no waiting--the ONLY approach that should be acceptable. If you can't figure that out straight away, then use help or read the manual or set your system to extended voice prompts.

 

I have 09 sedan without Nav and I can confirm that it works like this:

press the call button on the wheel
press it again when it starts talking
say "Call John Mobile"
it asks for confirmation
say "yes"
it dials

If you have only one type of number programmed for a contact (only office for ex), then you just have to say "Call John", then it asks "Call John Office?" and you say "yes".

Looks like there is a difference in the options if you have Nav installed.

Also, I have not found a way to switch to another line if you are on the phone while another call is coming in. Any ideas?

 

when you say call button, is that the phone button or the voice button on the wheel? I don't know if it is different for non-navi g's...when someone else calls there is an option that says "switch call" that lets you change lines

 

I think so. The nav also has additional voice-activated options, like to control the navigation, radio, climate, and whatever. So I suppose it's just a different voice-activated software package altogether.


I was looking through the manual after reading this and I think the confusion here is the non-nav system has a combined "phone call/voice dial" button. Whereas the nav has those buttons separated.


Someone was asking how to switch to the handset during a call. I know for mine, there's a "use handset" button. But if you don't have that, apparently the non-nav systems can hit the call/voice button in the middle of a call and say "transfer call" to switch to the cellphone instead of bluetooth for privacy.

Another mid-call voice command you can say is something like "Dial one two three" to enter some touch tone options if you need to navigate through an automated call system or something. I could have used that info today when I just ended a call early so I didn't have to dig the phone out of my pocket to dial numbers. Found it on page 4-76 of the manual. I should look through this thing more often .

But I don't know if any of the above tips work with the "improved" voice recognition system that came with the nav package. I'll have to do some more experimenting tomorrow.

 

did some poking around this weekend... its just an incredibly poorly designed system. my friend has an 06 TL, and all you need to say is "Call John" after pressing the phone button. All he needed to do was record his own voicetags (who knew a japanese designed/american made car would have trouble recognizing foreign names lol)

on the G, since i dont have navi, i dont have full voice recognition operation. once my phone was paired up, the BT system read the names, but i needed to add my own voice tags to the names i dial the most. that was a long PITA process - after accessing phonebook, saying "next" to go thru an 80 person phonebook was slow so i switched to manual control. this was slightly faster, but still took some time, since after each time you record a voicetag, it exits out to the radio instead of back to the phonebook or the entry you were working on. so you have to start all the way from the beginning to get to the next name you want to dial.
as good as the recognition software is, some things it just had trouble with - recording grandpa resulted in a message saying "sounds too much like phonebook". its not like i have an accent or anything. oh, and for some reason, the car doesnt recognize short names - i tried to record Nick, and it kept saying "unrecognized command"... weird.

 

Ok, yeah I guess there are more differences in the non-nav and nav than I had originally thought. Sorry for causing any confusion for you non-nav guys!!

 

So those of us who paid extra for NAV get a ridiculously pedantic phone dialing system as a consequence. I'm really happy!