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SENA 30K or CARDO Packtalk Slim

28K views 156 replies 17 participants last post by  CHIA 
#1 ·
Been a long time since I have posted here but was wondering what everyone's thoughts on these two units would be? Pro's, con's to both etc. I have always just used earbuds for music and never used any comms when on my bike. I am planning on doing a few group rides this summer so I was wondering what everyone else is using. I have heard the Cardo Slim is the way to go as the price is the same give or take $10. I am leaning towards the Cardo just wanted peoples input.

Thanks

SliderZ33
 
#2 ·
swapped from Sena to Cardo and will never use another sena unit again. Cardo is way fucking superior. That said, these things do not play well together. If you friends that you will connect with have Cardo, then go Cardo. If your friends are on Sena, get them to switch to Cardo.
 
#16 ·
If you want to pair using "universal" communications, someone has to give up the "phone" connection. that means that you cannot have your phone paired to either a Sena or a Cardo, as the universal communications uses a phone connection as universal. One of the units emulates a phone BT connection and you connect that way.

So think about that...

you bought a unit so you can have phone/music/maps in your ears. bonus is that you can talk to other riders. want to talk to someone on a different system? No problem, give up phone calls/music/maps and you can talk to them. What is the range of BT to a phone? Well, typically a phone is a BT class 2 device. You get 10M or 33'. How many bikes do you know that maintain a 33' distance when riding? Yeah, I'd go on a limb and call that "just doesn't work", but hey, if you had someone on the back seat, then it will work just fine between the 2 different units.

Sena communications with more than 2 units are subject to the following:
Noisy microphones
popcorn/sizzling/popping sounds at random intervals in most peoples headsets (again, never with just 2 people, but increase to 3 or more and this happens)
poor distance in BC's/Washington's/Orgeon's/California's terrain. Cardo is better, but still nowhere near as advertised.
drop out of distance and have trouble reconnecting to the group. This is even more apparent when you go beyond 4 riders in the group. the 20s are supposed to handle up to 8 riders. Good luck with that.

Other Sena issues:
not waterproof. I've had "rain fade" on the 20s and on the 10 as well. Luckily, I've not fried a unit in the rain, but have friends who did. No warranty service from Sena either.

Look, bottom line is that you need to keep in a group with the same units. When you finally get tired of shit not working on a Sena, then switch to Cardo and wonder why you didn't do it earlier. If you are just a single rider and will likely not connect to others, then any unit will work just fine. I found my Sena 20s to be fantastic with just me and music, or when paired to another 20s user (just 2 of us), the communications were great. Very HD quality and little to no noise. Again, go beyond just 2 people and the communications were shite. Pair a 10 and a 20 together...still shit, even with 2, but bearable. With the Cardo units, in the beginning we would ask "Is anyone still there?" because there was just complete silence, no mic noise, nothing. Then someone would say "yup still here" and we'd all go off on a tangent about how quiet these units are, etc.
 
#7 ·
^^

this is something that continues to perplex me in regards to these fancy comm systems..
if you dont ride with anybody, there's not much actual comms. going on is there?

Said argument is also another reason to go with the integrated system designed around my C4 Schuberth
We do find sometimes its just two of us but when i'm alone i dont want to have to deal with
'other solutions' being the speakers / mic and all wiring is already in place from the factory in my helmet.

if i'm riding alone, there's nobody to pair up with.. i'll just run my required media through the integrated setup and call it a day.
 
#10 ·
Well I think I am going to order the Cardo Packtalk Slim Duo. That way I can have one in both my helmets. I just keep hearing all these issues with the SENA like volume cutting out, poor battery life, faulty systems in general. The Cardo has rave reviews and seems to have the better quality and the big factor is that it is actually water proof not water resistant like the SENA. The only thing is that supposedly Cardo has paired with JBL and those usits wont be available till May so I will wait till then and see what comes out I guess.
 
#9 ·
interesting to hear of the problems with the 30k..

just did a little more research and it appears the SC2 Schuberth comm's units may not be available till end of year, early next.

i guess the whole 'pre-order' process did not have an actual delivery date early on, though some pages bragged about spring of this year. :(

i'll have to see how things go, i still want to stay away from an external system due to the internal visor and its adjuster's position on left side of lid.
 
#13 · (Edited)
just chatting up with 1 of 3 or 4 friends who run SENA.

it seems her only gripe is with battery life (s10), one of our riding buddies finds the mic makes his voice sound like
he's riding in a tin-can.. I just got confirmation my best friend is running the next model up, the 20S. I will discuss
this with him. Some gripes i've heard of in the past are with pairing but both admit its a user error more than anything.

*just got off the phone with him, yes he's got the 20S SENA and is perfectly happy with it..
afaik it does what he wants which is to communicate with others in our group when riding,
mostly due to the added safety factor. He confirmed battery life is just fine. :D

looks like i'm sticking with plans to get the SC2 Schuberth dedicated system when it does come out. Talk Time of 14 hours.
 
#14 ·
I'll echo SnoDragon's comments.....the new Cardo Packtalk with mesh is much better than the old BT Sena units.

It does not take much googling to find out that Sena's late to the game attempt at mesh with the 30K has been troublesome.

I'd used Sena for 10yrs and ridden tens of thousands of kms using them with riding buds, great units overall, but like all tech,
there comes a time to upgrade and the Cardo units proved the leaders in the next gen units.

This all said, the above relates specifically to my experience pairing with a group and riding with others. If you are a solo rider
and only want unit for basic phone/music, I would suggest saving your $$ and getting a more basic Sena.

If you are the last to get on board with a comm unit and your typical riding buds all have Sena with no appetite to change,
get Sena.

I use mine with groups and paired to my radar detector for in-ear notifications, works great for both and the new mesh tech
they offer is worlds better than BT in every way......seamless reconnect while riding if connection lost (100% automatic) and
once you pair with your riding buds, assuming you don't change people often, auto connect with them each time as well.

If you're a long time Sena user, like any new tech, small learning curve, but I think 5 of us upgraded from Sena to Cardo last
season and we're all starting to get the hang of it.

I did not get the smaller Slim model, bought typical Packtalk, now Bold......I wanted all the buttons and scroll wheel.
 
#17 ·
If you are the last to get on board with a comm unit and your typical riding buds all have Sena with no appetite to change,
get Sena.
.

i'm the last of my group to get an actual comm' unit.. most of the time it will be just me and one other rider communicating
and even more often will be just me with my media devices like gps etc as its pissing me off the GPS goes into this
weird zoom function and then i miss the turns ahead.. sucks not having audio feedback.

i hear all the concerns regarding mic placement, that makes sense.

i'm bypassing any issues which may affect units while raining, as its an integrated unit for me.

i'm sure there will be a learning curve and more than one firmware upgrade involved once it comes in :thumbup

but yeah, i dont see others in my group picking up a Cardo any time soon.. not a chance
 
#15 ·
I have used Sena SMH10 with a Sena BT Hub (SM10)
for more than a decade

Works perfectly with my detector into my headset,
GPS for tunes, etc

Clarity is generally more a function of microphone
placement, I have found, rather than performance
of the unit - though I am not a big fan of riding
around hearing all the chit chat...

Plenty of studies showing that being on the phone
(or radio chatting) produces the same level of
driving distraction, be it hands free, or otherwise

Battery life has never been an issue, and has lasted
fine on lots of 12+ hour days on the bike

Have also used the slimmer Sena version on ADV bikes
and those have performed the same, but with less
battery life

My detector (though still one of the best at early
detection) is getting long in the tooth and not dealing
with all the collison avoidance systems very effectively
(so many false alerts), so just looking into a different
set up - so good info :)
 
#21 ·
Fwiw I ran a set of sena smh10's for a couple of years doing residential tree work. *Beat the living hell out of them, soaked on a regular basis. Never had any issues with battery life or waterproofness.*

My riding partner is my wife and I'm really wrestling with the practicality/reality of being in each other's ear during a ride. *
 
#27 ·
After looking at the pro's and cons I have ordered the Cardo Packtalk Slim DUO so I can have one in both my helmets. I got the model without the JBL speakers as it was $150 cheaper and that is the only difference in them after doing some digging. If I want I can buy the JBL speakers after as an add on. I do ride in the rain often and realized that I don't want to run into the issue of destroying a unit because its not water proof. I should be receiving it this week so I will see how it goes. It will be nice to not have ear buds that pop out while putting my helmet on. Super late to the comm's game but feel like this is the best bet.
 
#28 ·
For those on the fence, it may be worth noting SENA released a major update at end of the year 2018..

Products with New Firmware Releasing October 8, 2018: (updates are to be found across the entire line)

30K
20S
20S Evo
Momentum INC
10S
10R
SRL (Note: A new firmware update is not available for the SRL, as it currently has support
for 30K Audio Multitasking, along with the same updates from 20S v2.0 and 20S Evo v2.0)
 
#29 ·
yeah, but you cannot polish a turd, so firmware is not going to fix the bulk of the issues with noise, disconnects, etc.
 
#41 · (Edited)
hence why i responded with a stupid remark.. BOLD NEW GRAPHICS (the actual term) has been around for years
and is directly related to how manufacturers slap STICKERS on their motorcycles claiming they are better than last
year's models. But you need to understand, the BNG are slapped on the plastics, metal etc covering the outside of the bike.

It might only be “bold new graphics” for these 2019 model year bikes, but the fresh liveries are very fetching.




a firmware upgrade is a complete RE-WRITE of the software which runs the actual electronics device. the term BNG does not apply.

I dont know ONE engine builder who paints the internals of their engines. :D

was i being a dick with my response? YES.. did it get the point across? perhaps not :(
 
#47 ·
So now I have to figure this out. It's been hinted that I may be getting a set of comms for Father's Day next month. At the same time good friends who we ride with most often if we ride with others just told us they're going to order a set of senas, not even sure what model they're thinking yet. Sooo. Do I convince them to go with cardos? *Or do we just go with senas if that's what they order? *I'm having a hard time with this. *I've never listened to music while riding and don't really know if I would. So I don't know if something more than a basic model has any value to me. But if I was going to listen to music than I'm curious if the jbl cardos would be worth the upgrade?

I lost my wife on our first outing of the year this past week so now she's really wanting us to get setup. Usually we have no issue as I'll wait at turns for her, and we were doing a small local loop that we've done countless times before. But it seems I underestimated my wife's ability to miss a turn/forget a route. I'm guessing that with the amount of distance I put between us at times that the cardo units that seamlessly re pair will be worth it. I never had to deal with that ever when I had my senas for treework as mostly it was fairly close quarters, just a noisy environment.*
*
I'm seeing my best pricing I can find on f9. Anyone have any other suggestions?*
 
#49 ·
At the same time good friends who we ride with most often if we ride with others just told us they're going to order a set of senas, Do I convince them to go with cardos? *Or do we just go with senas if that's what they order? I've never listened to music while riding and don't really know if I would. But if I was going to listen to music than I'm curious if the jbl cardos would be worth the upgrade?

I'm guessing that with the amount of distance I put between us at times that the cardo units that seamlessly re pair will be worth it.
*
I'm seeing my best pricing I can find on f9. Anyone have any other suggestions?*
Ok, well "What your riding buddies use" should be the #1 criteria for choosing which system you use. Regardless of what some may say, SENA/Cardo do not play well together. I think it would be worth a chat with them to see if they have a preference or not. If they don't, then I would choose Cardo.

Music is secondary, bike to bike communications is the priority. Being able to re-connect without having to touch a button is VERY beneficial. I'm not sure how old you are, or what your hearing is like, but I personally cannot do speakers. I just cannot hear anything over 100km/hr. I just have to use custom molded in-ear speakers.

Best price does appear to be Fortnine.

If all you want is good solid communications on a budget, buy a case of Sena SMH10's. You can find them for about $100 used. But, make sure the base unit has the boom mic setup not the wired button mic, Big difference.
 
#50 ·
Thanks for that input. My hearing is marginal at best my wife would say but checks out a-ok through my work for a 44 year old. But. My bike is loud too with the Coffman shorty on it. And my helmet is crappy and noisy. So I'm guessing that music will be more like a little background noise, maybe enjoyable for lower speeds.*

I have one question about the cardos. I don't think I'd spring for the jbl speakers from what I've researched but I'm curious too what the difference is between the packtalk and the packtalk bold if anyone has any insight on that?
 
#51 ·
Packtalk bold has a better speech recognition engine. If you don't plan on using voice commands a lot (I don't), the normal packtalk is good enough. As CDG had mentioned, in-ear monitors are the way to go for hearing protection and audio fidelity, no need for JBL's.
 
#53 · (Edited)
Cool. I think I'm going to push the cardo units, see if our friends will go that way. For me the real deal breaker is the seamless re-pairing. I feel like that alone is going to be worth it's weight in gold for my wife and I when we ride together which is most of our riding. Also if I'm following correctly it's not that pricey to get a second pair of mounts with speakers and mic so I could set up our dirt helmets too.*

Thanks again for the input. *
 
#57 ·
Thanks. I did as previously mentioned in this thread own some smh10's wired into hardhats and earmuffs for treework and found them to work well. But never used any of the newer sena stuff.*

Just got them yesterday and the install into our helmets was simple enough. Tried them out in the living room and so far so good. The wife was somewhat confused/concerned with the the streaming volume changes in correlation with the conversation. I think it's great to be able to talk and still hear the music. I'm looking forward to road testing them over the next few days. Pretty crappy weather on the forecast here and I'm working the whole long weekend too though so may not happen for a day or two. I didn't buy these for their waterproofness lol. I hate riding in the rain. *While I never thought much about riding with music I'm really looking forward to it now. *I am slightly worried about the 'psych' factor as I like harder tunes. Even in my 40's I don't need any extra encouragement lol. But still I think it's going to be enjoyable.*

I am concerned a bit with the mic sensitivity and hope that road, bike, or other noise doesn't constantly activate the comms, but I haven't actually used them on the road yet so not sure if that will be a actual issue or not. By the lack of mention of it here and elsewhere I've researched I'm guessing not, but just in the living room it seemed very easy to activate the comms with ambient noise?

*Oddly enough our friends have 'researched ' a bunch and are going with senas, still not sure I think a older cheaper model like the 10's. Soooo, I pushed as much as I could but at some point people have to make their own mistakes right? **
 
#59 ·
Excellent, good to know there's adjustment. I did download the app but must have missed that option somehow. I'll look again. But I figured I'd ride with it some first as it is and then fine tune it.*

I've never ridden with a phone mounted to my handlebar or anything either. I'm figuring that it may become convenient though now with this packtalk. *Curious somewhat if that's legal with all the cellphone laws here in BC now? *I'm assuming so but figured I'd ask. It seems my luck is running out this year. I got a fix it ticket for no front plate on my truck(bought it out of Alberta five years ago and never have had a mount for one). *And have had a couple of other real close calls with disastrous fines this spring. I'll be rereading the radar detector thread as it's time to gear up a bit. I heard from a co-worker there is a zero tolerance enforcement blitz this weekend in the okanagan. *
 
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