gdavis

Tonight I was calling my local dealer about an appointment from my car while driving using bluetooth to activate the call through the car's audio system. The call connected beautifully, but then I realized that I needed to 'dial' additional numbers after being connected to the dealer's automated call answering system.

I needed to be able to 'press 5 for BMW service', etc and could not figure out how to do this once connected in an active call. I tried using the puck to select a number, but it wouldn't dial it into the call.

Does anyone know how to do this?

thanks.

beewang

Doesn't your phone have a keypad??!! (Duh!!)

beewang

gdavis

The whole point of using bluetooth is to be able to keep the phone in a briefcase or pocket closed and handsfree. The ability to activate it through the car is the power of the system. Not to go back and use the phone's keypad. That defeats the whole purpose of the bluetooth. The system was developed for locations that have laws against using the handset while driving and BT makes that work perfectly.

beewang

Says who??!!

Bah.. in anyevent, I disagree w/ you. The whole point of BlueTooth is to have a uniform standard for close proximity wireless communication (think bluetooth computer keyboad, mouse and wireless headset.

But to answer your question. No!! There is no way you can do what you asked w/ any of the car currently on market.

cheers,

beewang

gdavis

The reason that many car companies have integrated BT into cars is specifically to provide safe and legal handsfree systems for using cell phones while driving. BT is used for a variety of purposes and in cars, it is for this purpose.

SFLA99

Actually,

Im my 2005 X5, I just use the numbers on the stereo to dial, not sure about how idrive works, but in my X5 it works like a charm

Cheers!

gdavis

hey sfla99, congratulations on joining! iDrive uses a screen to select the numbers, and I thought it would work that way too, but it seems like it doesn't after the call is activated. I'm glad someone who has used BT understands the dynamics and has some pointers on it.

SFLA99

Yea my parents have a 745i they recived from the dealer about 6 months ago with the whole new system, its an ubelievable car, maybe ill take my phone into their 7 and see if I can figure it out. btw I am using a SonyEricsson T637 with my X5 since that is one of the rare few phones that fall under fully compatible.

Cheers and thanks for welcoming me

jkava

gdavis,

I think this has been explained previously, but when a BT call is connected, push the i-drive contoller knob down when in the phone screen and it will give you the option of bringing up a keypad in i-drive. You then scoll over the number you need to dial and press the controller which generates the "tone" for that number. This works OK but it's a bit tedious because if you need to dial several numbers, like when accessing a voice mail system, it is difficult to do quickly within the i-drive menu. It's possible, but not very convenient.

Hope that help answer your question.

gdavis

hey, thanks for this input. I tried this, but it seemed not to work. Maybe I didn't give it enough time. I'll try this again....

thanks!