New Sena 20s Bluetooth Intercom with FM tuner

Well!! where to start?? It eventually arrived and of course I took it into the kitchen to unpack and unwrap it, the packaging was very poor allowing it to rattle around in the box with just a single piece of bubble wrap to stop it, so not impressed, and expecting the units to be damaged, luckily however they were not, on removing the contents from the box all I had was a chocolate box layer affair with the actual units in the blow moulded tray, and all the gubbins, such as wires, sticky pads, microphones and spongy bits in 2 compartments underneath.

After opening the box and identifying each part, I took the two usb cables and plugged the head sets into the power point on my computer, a very LONG 2'5 hours later they were charged.

Right, having messed around for ages trying to remove my Autocom stuff from different helmets, I started to get the Sena stuff together, on my full face Arai I went for the wire no boom option, this was an easy option as threading the wires through the helmet lining was a doddle, and the supplied velcro was easy to fit in front of the mouth piece,
having established the 2 grub screws that hold the unit to the helmet did not need the extra rubber packing provided, I then set about positioning the unit so I can reach it without having to bend my arm back to much and so the microphone is the right distance away, not a problem when using the wire mic, but could be if using the boom mic's, once positioned and tightened down put the liner back in and made sure everything was comfortable, it also took the edge of the fixing bracket away from where my ear rubbed when taking the helmet off or putting it on.

Anyway, sitting down and getting overwhelmed by the instruction book!! might I make a suggestion, take just one thing /page at a time, there's no rush and a "steady away" attitude will get more done in the long run, right turning on, easy as pie just press and hold the jog and phone buttons together.

I'm not going through every item, yeah thank fek fer that I hear you all cheer!! but just going back and doing every step as it says in the book, literally word for word seems to solve most of the problems, such as failing to recognise things ETC, also once you've say, matched your phone, and want to pair something else, I made sure the product I had just paired was turned off, and didn't interfere with the new item I want to pair, I've a long way to go, matching more than one unit, and changing channels on the radio without cancelling everything else for one, As I said steady away and refer to the instructions and things shouldn't go far wrong!!

I'm really happy with how clear and LOUD the head sets are, a real step up from Autocom in my opinion, good luck with your fitting and sorting out of the different programmes!!

After struggling with an Autocom unit Ive finally decided to get with the times and ordered a Sena 20S Dual pack.

At £411 it isn't cheap, but what is these days??

I hope it lives up to the hype (it looks very good) and works better than my old setup (or just works!).

First Impressions

Firstly, there's a lot of stuff in the box. I went for the Dual set. It has 2 helmet clamps, with a choice of the fitted boom mic (flip front and oopenface helmets) or 2 choices of wired mic. There's a variety of options on the helmet clamp, with spacers and sticky pads. There's 2 micro USB cables, 2x 2.5mm-3.5mm sound cables (for plugging MP3 into the helmet clamp), 8 microphone socks, speaker pads to move the speakers closer to your ear, depending on helmet type, 2 micro USB car chargers, sticky pads or various shapes and sizes, and a pretty decent instruction manual. Enough choices to mount to most helmets, I would say.

First off I charged up the units, whilst this was going on I fitted the clamps to both mine and Mrs Berins helmets - these are both Shoei Neotec. Fitting took a few minutes with the normal clamp mechanism. These helmets have speaker recesses, which helps get the speakers in the right place. Both fitted, and the units look OK on the helmets, doesn't foul the flip or the drop down visor.

Then, as Robbo did, I sat down with my iPhone 5s, my Zumo 590, and my iPod classic to work out how to pair everything up. The manual gives a number of suggested scenario's, depending what you want to do. I wanted to pair the iPhone with the 590, then pair the 590 with the 20s, then pair a bluetooth equipped iPod with the 20s. The intention here is to use the 590 to manage the phone, and the music on the iPod, with the iPod as secondary music source, to save the phone battery if needed. In this scenario, the mobile is paired to the Zumo, then the Zumo to the Sena, then the iPod to the Sena. This worked, but the media function from the iPhone didn't work.
The Sena supports different types of mobile phone pairing, called 2nd mobile pairing. I think (but it's not clear) that you can have 1 mobile phone pairing and 1 second mobile pairing, but some scenarios show 3 pairings (1 mobile phone, 1 GPS (which also uses mobile phone pairing) and 1 other system such as the inbuilt systems on touring BMW's. If you want to add more bluetooth devices, you can pair to the Sena SR10 bluetooth hub.
The jog dial didn't work with the bluetooth enabled iPod, I guess the transmitter doesn't support A2DP, but volume does work. If you pair the iPhone direct with 20s, you can voice dial using Siri. There are also some voice commands available with the 20s, which you activate by tapping the body of the unit twice or saying "hello Sena. You can plug ear-bud speakers into the clamp too.

Anyway, I haven't quite decided how to run this yet, still experimenting. The pairing procedure is pretty easy and the units in the box come pre-paired.

On the road, sound is good, music very high quality and loud enough to be used with ear-plugs in, which is a big leap forward - most of the time I have had to use some kind of volume booster previously. Intercom was good, you can choose whether or not to have side tone (I do) and you can also switch on some kind of external mic which cuts all the other sources and lets you listen to what's going on outside. Intercom range was line of sight to about 500m, but it was a pretty built up area. The jog dial is quite easy to use (I used an SMH10 before, so I was used to it), but best of all was clarity and music quality.

All in all, pretty good. We're off on a trip soon, and the bug bear of wireless devices is always battery life, so we'll see how we get on.

The battery life "shouldn't" be a problem as they provide 2 on bike chargers "the cigarette lighter type", that are long enough to charge the unit whilst wearing it, given of course you have the correct charging port under the seat, and as a matter of interest the unit ends are the same as a samsung mobile phone!! which as a samsung user makes things good for me as I have charging options already available!!

Well, yes, but that means your cabling yourself to the bike, which isn't exactly wireless, and the uUSB ports are quite fragile and not waterproof when something is plugged.

ianrobbo1 said:

The battery life "shouldn't" be a problem as they provide 2 on bike chargers "the cigarette lighter type", that are long enough to charge the unit whilst wearing it, given of course you have the correct charging port under the seat, and as a matter of interest the unit ends are the same as a samsung mobile phone!! which as a samsung user makes things good for me as I have charging options already available!!

Click to expand...

Berin said:

Then, as Robbo did, I sat down with my iPhone 5s, my Zumo 590, and my iPod classic to work out how to pair everything up. The manual gives a number of suggested scenario's, depending what you want to do. I wanted to pair the iPhone with the 590, then pair the 590 with the 20s, then pair a bluetooth equipped iPod with the 20s. The intention here is to use the 590 to manage the phone, and the music on the iPod, with the iPod as secondary music source, to save the phone battery if needed. In this scenario, the mobile is paired to the Zumo, then the Zumo to the Sena, then the iPod to the Sena. This worked, but the media function from the iPhone didn't work.

Click to expand...

Just to confirm, I wanted to do this:

1) iphone 5s>Zumo 590
2) Zumo 590> sena 20s

This will connect the phone in phone mode and allow use of the garmin smartphone app, but you can't play music from the phone. I guess it's a bug - the bluetooth profile on the Zumo says it's connected to a media player, and selecting source shows this is the iPhone 5s. If you click fast forward on the Zumo it moves the track on, but no sound from the headset.

So plan B, bluetooth the iPhone to the Sena as a phone, a2dp supported, then pair the Zumo to the Sena as 2nd phone (hands free profile)

Yes I concur, but it "should" prove to be an option, and doesn't restrict you to charging the units from a static position, obviously you wouldn't do !!! erm!! hang on, obviously "MOST" people wouldn't try charging it like that in a downpour, and they may last better than the older less reliable stuff, this is also obviously something we'll all have to find out about as we go on!!

Bit more field testing today. The ear bud option doesn't work very well - picks up interference. But the speakers supplied actually sound better than my Ultimate Ears in ear monitor, so won't be using the in ear option. It works well with an iPod plugged in via the jack socket, but it's not very loud. Ran it through a Filo amp and it's fine, with a Scosche remote on the bars I can change tracks too.

I just checked the specs, the 20s claims standby of 10days, 13 hours talk time. We'll see what that translates to in real life

http://www.amazon.co.uk/PortaPow-Crystal-4-2A-Universal-Charger/dp/B00J12L9OY/ref=dp_ob_title_ce

is a handy thing for charging Sena's, phones, tablets at the same time without using every socket in the room..

gerarddwatts said:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/PortaPow-Crystal-4-2A-Universal-Charger/dp/B00J12L9OY/ref=dp_ob_title_ce

is a handy thing for charging Sena's, phones, tablets at the same time without using every socket in the room..

Click to expand...

thanks for that - a very handy thing! I've just fitted a Givi tank bag to my 1190 which has a pass through port at front to run power into (not as good as the one I did on my old touratech tank bag, but there we are) so hopefully I'l be able to charge phones and stuff on the go.

Where did you get the tankbag pass through thingy? I used previously the one popeye used to do, but appears to no longer do....or I cant find them....no reply to pm....

I've not really had time to play about with my Sena 20S's since they arrived and were installed. Heading to the Pyrenees next Sunday and was wondering if it's possible to have both headsets listening to the same phone? Or, is it better to host the music on the Nav5 as opposed to my Android phone? New to this bike coms thing, so any tips/pointers would be useful as I've too much to get done to sit around and do all the homework and research myself before leaving.

I just emailed intobikes regarding availability, their response was - due in any day. Could anyone recommend a good vendor who they have had the product from?

I bought direct from Sena Eu webshop

I also bought from Sena Europe, not the cheapest, but should there be ANY problems, back it'll go straight to them without any "problems" regarding supplier Warranty ETC,

Many thanks for you recommendations, I will order from Sena Europe

Hello everyone!
I'm a new user. I apologize, but the first thing I write here is a request...
Does one of you, lucky 20S owners, have the patience to do a test for me?
I can't personally try out a unit before buying. I've read the manual but a couple of things are not clear to me.
My doubts concern some Audio Multitasking behaviors. Not even the Sena support is able to answer me...

My configuration will be as follows:

• Smartphone, for phone calls and stereo music (paired to the 20S as main phone with media)
• Gps, only for mono navigation instructions (paired to the 20S as multipoint, like a second phone)
• Intercom with the pillion

I think these are the main possible situations:

Could someone try what happens in each of these cases (with Audio Multitasking active)?
Sorry for being a bit geek... Thank you!

Table attached - couldn't work out how to insert a table in the message

minute83 said:

Hello everyone!
I'm a new user. I apologize, but the first thing I write here is a request...
Does one of you, lucky 20S owners, have the patience to do a test for me?
I can't personally try out a unit before buying. I've read the manual but a couple of things are not clear to me.
My doubts concern some Audio Multitasking behaviors. Not even the Sena support is able to answer me...

My configuration will be as follows:

• Smartphone, for phone calls and stereo music (paired to the 20S as main phone with media)
• Gps, only for mono navigation instructions (paired to the 20S as multipoint, like a second phone)
• Intercom with the pillion

I think these are the main possible situations:

	Actual State	Event	Behavior (my understanding)
1	Listening to music (A2DP or FM radio)	An intercom conversation is started	Music should be lowered (not interrupted) while talking with the pillion
2	Listening to music (A2DP or FM radio)	The Gps speaks	???
3	Listening to Gps voice instruction	An intercom conversation is started	Gps voice should be lowered (not interrupted) while talking with the pillion
4	Doing an intercom conversation	The Gps speaks	Gps voice should be heard with reduced volume, while talking with the pillion
5	Doing an intercom conversation with music in background	The Gps speaks	???
6	Making a phone call	The Gps speaks	???

Could someone try what happens in each of these cases (with Audio Multitasking active)?
Sorry for being a bit geek... Thank you!

Click to expand...

Berin said:

Table attached - couldn't work out how to insert a table in the message

Click to expand...

Thank you so much! Don't worry about the table, I've read your file.
It seems to work like the SMH10... Are you sure that you have enabled the audio multitasking?
Otherwise I don't understand what are the benefits of this new feature...

Could you tell me how did you pair your devices?
Thanks!

Here's the settings.

Just done a firmware update, that might make a difference. Also, some of the issue may be the GPS (Zumo 590). I can't find a way of turing off voice guidance. If I mute voice from the 590, it still interrupts music, but with silence.

minute83 said:

Thank you so much! Don't worry about the table, I've read your file.
It seems to work like the SMH10... Are you sure that you have enabled the audio multitasking?
Otherwise I don't understand what are the benefits of this new feature...

Could you tell me how did you pair your devices?
Thanks!

Click to expand...