Rating: 
Summary: Works for me most times, but forget about shuffle mode
Review: I've had no problem using the iTrip in New York and New Jersey thus far with regard to getting a good clear signal. However, I am surprised that nobody else here has mentioned one major flaw I've encountered so far.iTrip works by process of dumping radio FM frequency tones onto your iPod as a song playlist. This is great if you want a collection of stations that you can tune in to in the event you need to find another frequency to broadcast over when your original one is tuning out, however, if you're like me and you like to listen to your iPod in shuffle mode then the result is that iPod will also shuffle in and play back all of the FM frequency tones you're not using at the time. Do you enjoy listening to your songs shuffling, only to be rudely interspersed with annoying frequency tones? Neither do I. So far, the only solution I've found is to copy only 1 frequency tone over to my iPod (the one I usually broadcast over, which happens to be 87.9fm default). So far so good, but if I do hapen to drive out of range of my frequency I won't have any other FM frequencies stored on my iPod to access. The other solution I've been given is to trick the iTrip into not playing these tones by creating a smart playlist in iTunes, i.e. "artists - not FM frequencies". I haven't tried that yet but I'll give it a shot.
Rating:
Summary: Not Perfect, But Not Bad Either!
Review: I've tried the iRock, the Sound Feeder SF120 and the new iTrip. The iTrip is the best of these units by far in my car (Altima with back window antenna). Sound quality and the ability to lock into a station and "over power" an adjacent station are superior to the iRock and the Sound Feeder. But the sound is "acceptable" FM quality sound. There are some snap crackle and pops, but for the most part road noise drowns these out. If you need to change stations while driving, the iTrip could be useless. To change stations, you need to select the new frequency off of a play list, push play, wait 3 seconds, push play again and then go back and find the music you were playing. Kind of hard to do while trying to keep the car between the yellow lines. The unit works very well in the house. I can transmit to my Bose radio from just about any room in my house and the sound quality is just as good as the radio. How well this unit works for you is dependent on: your car and how crowded the FM band is in your area. It's worth a try for $30.
Rating:
Summary: Bad service
Review: I don't know about the product, but if you buy this from J&R Music and Computer World, be warned: the service is terrible. They sent me the wrong product, were very rude on the phone, they didn't offer to send me the correct item, they haven't yet refunded my money, and after two and a half weeks, I'm still waiting for a return shipping label.
Rating: 
Summary: This is a Terrible Product
Review: I love my iPod, and I have purchased several great accessories for it. The Griffin iTrip is not one of them--it's a bad product. I'll keep this brief to be as helpful as possible. Conceptually, the product is great--it's small, it doesn't suck much power from the iPod, it is visually appealing and snaps right to the iPod. There are a couple of basic problems with it, though. First, the software that came with the iTrip is set up to work only with MusicMatch (for PCs), not iTunes (though you can use iTunes for the Mac). Griffin tech support was helpful, and directed me to a Web site to do a workaround for PC iTunes. I was then able to get the iTrip to operate. The second (and much more important) problem is with performance/sound quality. Once I identified a clear FM frequency over which to broadcast, I sat back to hear the tunes. Unfortunately, the sound was very faint, and not even FM quality. Heck, not even AM quality. Not even 8-track quality. It could be that in a big city, one can't find a clear enough FM frequency. Whatever the case is, I returned the iTrip and got one of the Sony kits that outputs through the car's cassette player. That's not as elegant a solution, but it sounds 100 times better. Hope Griffin can improve this in the next generation.
Rating:
Summary: Big City - forget it
Review: The iTrip just doesn't work in the New York, Northern NJ area. I tried all the recommended stations, but the sound quality is not even remotely acceptable. There is considerable static. Just terrible.
Rating:
Summary: Installation is not difficult on PCs
Review: The one review scared me after I purchased mine that I was going to have to deal with musicmatch, but this is not the case at all. Go to this link for instructions on easy windows installation; ......
Rating:
Summary: Horrible Waste Of Money, Time, Effort, and all that is left
Review: I bought this nice and early on a sunday morning, expecting to use it on the long day ahead. Unfortunately I spent the entire day trying to get this thing to work. So I opened the box and marveled at how small and light it is. This is the only thing that the iTrip has going for it. Right off of the bat I realized that you cannot just plug it in and use it. I thought that this would be o.k., and that I would spend a few minutes installing the software. Boy was I wrong! After installing the software, I clicked to open it up and an error message popped up. It ungraciously informed me that, even though it has support for the new iPod, that if you are using a windows (like me) you need to install it through Musicmatch jukebox software. This struck me actually as funny, the main reason for me selling my old mp3 player being to get as far away as I could from Musicmatch. So I went musicmatch.com and downloaded the software. On opening it up, I got all sorts of advertisements, the whole MusicMatch being a marketing scam. And it turns out that I also need to download a driver for the ipod, because it is not a supported music player. This is especially annoying since the iTrip software makes me use Music Match anyways. Not being able to find a working driver, I call in to the Griffin Tech Support. They are almost helpful, and direct me to a website link. This webpage instructs me how to use iTunes to make the iTrip work. So I am sitting there for a long time exploring the disc for the right files. It turns out that the way you control the iTrip is by playing 3 second beeps in the form of mp3's. So in a sense the way it works is that the iPod tricks the iTrip into broadcasting over an FM radio station of you choice. After a ton of frustration, at this point it is 4 o'clock and half of my day is ruined, still nothing is going my way. So I figured out that it would work best if I opened each song and put it into a playlist manually over iTunes. This means opening up each song and converting it to AAC. This on it's own is not a quick, easy task. But it gets even worse. While normally what I would do is double click on the song in the CD to get it to open in iTunes, now that I was forced to download Music Match Jukebox, it opens there. Now I am really angry. Music Match Jukebox automatically sets itself as the default music player for mp3's. So I have to go uninstall the whole program, and then after that go back and make the playlist in iTunes. By now as you can probably guess, I am at the end of my rope, but I am making progress, because now I have the playlist created and everything is going well. Or well compared to everything else. Now it is 5 o'clock, but i have decided to put my social life to rest until I get this finished. So I flip the instruction manual away from the creased "installation" section and over to the part that shows how to use the iTrip. It turns out that the way it works is you open the playlist, play one of the 3 second long encoded beeps and constantly press play on the ipod until a light blinks 3 times. One can only imagine how much fun I had getting that to work! Since you are expected to press play a lot of times (the actual number seems random each time) in order to switch radio frequencies, you would expect that the system was better designed. But you only have 3 seconds to press the button x number of times. So by the time that you have gotten enough clicks in, it is three "songs" later, and set to a radio station that is already established. And since it follows the FCC's guidelines, it will not broadcast under those conditions. The act of changing radio broadcasting stations is so annoying, and physically painful (carpal tunnel syndrom) that unless you enjoy smacking your head against the wall, don't bother. After all of this trouble, and a larger price than the rest of the wireless adapters, the least that should be expected is decent sound. But it is far from that. Unlike the advertised range of 10 - 30 feet, the signal gets all fuzzy when the iPod is just a mere foot away! What's more, even when there is contact between the iTrip and the radio I want the music to play on, the sound is very poor quality. I strongly urge you not to buy this product. It is a piece of junk! After all the trouble of getting it to work, and gettting nothing in return, I am extremely angry. Normally I don't write reviews to products, but my passion against the iTrip is far to great. So I urge you to stay far away from this piece of junk being passed of as a good product because it was designed for the only the iPod.
Rating:
Summary: Griffin iTrip: beautiful design but inconsistent performance
Review: The iTrip fits iPod like a glove. On the surface it looks and feels like the perfect companion to play your iPod's music on any radio. And for some people it *is* the perfect companion. For others, though, it's not. I'm a product researcher, and scour the Internet reading customer reviews and opinions before buying anything. I have never encountered a product before with such divergent views. I have come to realize that someone's happiness with the iTrip is highly dependent on the operating environment. THE BASICS: iTrip is a tiny radio station. Through your iPod you tell iTrip which frequency to use, and your iPod's music gets broadcast out to the public. Any radio within range can play your iPod's music because, to a radio, the iPod is just another radio station. However, as required by the FCC, the radio signal broadcast by iTrip is so weak that it cannot compete with stronger radio stations using the same frequency. So in order for your radio to receive a clear signal from iTrip, you need to select a frequency that is not being used by stations in your area. Ideally, you need to select a frequency that also does not have a strong radio station adjacent to it on the radio dial, because strong stations usually bleed over into adjacent frequencies. TUNING & STATIC: Selecting clear frequencies is nearly impossible around big cities. In the New York City area where I live, there is a radio station or very strong static on every single frequency. While driving from New Jersey to Connecticut (through New York City) one day I found it necessary to change channels due to heavy static about once every 10 to 15 minutes. Unlike other radio transmitters that have channel buttons on the outside of the product, tuning iTrip requires selecting an iPod playlist of stations and 'playing' the song that corresponds to the radio frequency you want. But first you need to find another clear frequency on your radio, which takes time. And then once tuned, you need to re-select the music you were previously listening to, which involves navigating back to the album or playlist, and remembering which song you had been on. The process of tuning iTrip does work, and it's definitely elegant in that it doesn't require buttons or a display on the iTrip itself. But the process is bothersome and disruptive in the middle of listening to an album, and definitely not something that you can do by yourself while driving. For me, the need to frequently tune to new stations while driving was the deal breaker that caused me to trade in iTrip for a cassette adapter. ITRIP WORKS FOR SOME: On the flip side, I've talked to a few people who also live around New York, and some report success with iTrip. A few of them have disconnected their radio antennas. Some, though, have done nothing and still report great results. Perhaps some car radios are more sensitive than others? The Bose radio in my Maxima appears to be very sensitive. BUYING ADVICE: If you plan to use iTrip indoors, don't bother. Simply use a cassette adapter or hardwire iPod into your stereo. If you plan to use iTrip while driving, first do some homework. Sit in your car and listen to every single radio frequency. Note how many stations are completely clear of sound and static, and do not have a strong station adjacent. See if the list of clear stations remains consistent throughout your driving range. The idea is that you want to predict how much static you will encounter while driving. If you can find even one station that is consistently clear throughout your driving range, then maybe iTrip will work for you. Otherwise don't bother and compromise with an admittedly inelegant wired solution. COMPETITION: While iTrip is the only FM transmitter I tried, the others should have similar performance with respect to static. The only significant difference might be that the iTrip competitors are easier to use because of their external buttons for changing channels. This would make them less disruptive overall because you don't need to stop your currently playing music to retune the device. I didn't bother with any of the competitors, however, because they lacked the design elegance of iTrip. All of the iTrip competitors are small boxes that dangle off of iPod via a wire. To me they're just as ugly and clunky as cassette adapters. And compared to cassette adapters, the iTrip competitors cost more money, require batteries, and offer poorer sound quality.
Rating: 
Summary: Performs well consistently
Review: I have the version for the newer iPods. I use mine in the car and at work. It performs better than the Belkin Tunecast transmitter, and under pretty demanding conditions. Setup was quick, so I'm not sure why others have had trouble. The instruction manual is minimal, but has all you need to get the iTrip up and running. The unit works best by finding the best station for your area. Also, sound is improved by adjusting the iPod and radio volumes so you get a good signal to your radio without too much gain to cause "clipping" (which makes your sound harsh and distorted). It does drain the iPod battery a bit quicker, but there are ways around this.
Rating:
Summary: Shockingly bad product
Review: I have to say I was simply astonished at how useless this product was. Firstly the 'manual' is a waste of paper and I had to get info off the web to tell me how to install the FM channels into ITunes thru Wondows. Secondly, once you get it going, you'll wish you hadn't bothered. I've heard AM stations that sound better. Static, more static and even more static thrown in for good measure. It's no different whether you're in the car or at home. Don't waste your money. Instead, think about a wired-in option for a car set-up or make do with the headphones.
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