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There are only four buttons and an LCD display on the device, and operation could hardly be simpler. Pressing M and then the up and down arrows lets you move between frequencies in increments of 0.1MHz. Once you find one that seems free of any station, you simply press M again and it is stored in one of five memory presets. You repeat the process again to fill up each preset. If you then use match the presets on your car radio to the same frequencies, switching between them becomes a quick two button job. The hardest part is actually finding suitable area of the FM frequency that isn’t too crowded, particularly if you in an area with lots of local or pirate ratio stations. You turn if off by pressing the power switch or just pulling it out.

In testing, the device pretty much did what it said on the tin. I tuned, I preset, I listened. However, there’s no getting away from the fact that you’re broadcasting over FM. Pause your music and you can hear all the hiss and static in the background. My own car radio is an Alpine 9850Ri, which has a direct connection to the iPod, and lets you control it form the head-unit. Sound quality on this is excellent and I played the same music on both for comparison. As expected, the output from the Moosik device sounded comparatively narrow and muffled even aside from the background hiss, which isn’t ideal on what is likely to be already compressed music from the iPod.

Of course, it’s actually not a fair comparison. The Moosik is a quick, simple, plug and play solution that doesn’t involve replacing your stereo, or any cables. It is quick and fuss free. As far as FM transmitters go, it’s as good as you could hope one to be. If you’re in the market for one this is the one to get. It doesn’t get an award though as someone who cares about sound quality I simply can’t recommend that anyone use an FM transmitter at all. If you have to though, get this one.

Verdict

FM transmitters are now legal in the UK and if you want a quick, fuss free way of hearing you iPod music in the car the Moosik CK3000-HD does a great job, though inevitably sound quality will never match that of an actual wired connection.

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