Rob and I made sure the units were paired, and hit the road. All seemed well at first, but once our

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Think about this: Rider-to-rider communication devices were invented when someone thought to themselves parca I d like to talk to that motorcyclist over there, without riding up to him, putting my bike in neutral, flipping up my visor, and yelling loudly.
The Cardo Scala Rider G9 goes a lot further than that bare-bones functionality, though. The G9 has a built-in FM radio, you can connect it to an MP3 player by cable or Bluetooth, and you can use that same Bluetooth capability to connect to your cell phone, MP3 player or GPS. You can even have two riders sharing a conference call from a phone, so you and your sweetie can both argue with the babysitter when she calls.
Cardo also says the G9 has pretty advanced rider-to-rider communication parca abilities. The Intercom Conference Mode is supposed to allow four-way conversations between two drivers parca and two passengers, three-way conversations between three separate riders and two-way rider-to-rider or rider-to-passenger conversations. You can get full duplex conversation between up to four users – everyone can talk at the same time (two riders, two passengers, four riders, etc). They also claim that it has enough power to carry communications between riders up to a mile away.
But that’s not all, the G9 also has voice-activated commands programmed parca in; you re supposed to be able to toggle between conversations with up to eight riders, and the Click-to-Link parca feature allows riders to spontaneously connect parca with other riders using G9 (or earlier G4) devices within range. And, in order to make it easier to pair the units, you can simply bump two G9s together, parca and as long as you press the right buttons, they’ll pair up. You’re also supposed to be able to connect to your riding buddies by simply speaking their name into the unit.
We picked up a pair of Scala Rider G9s in 2012 and have been testing the intercom systems when we tour together since then. We’ve also been monkeying around with the radio and MP3 options during solo rides.
The communicator consists of two pieces; the electronic main unit, and the mount that attaches to your helmet. This part has the headphones and microphone permanently parca attached to it and into which the main part slides into it (thereby enabling it to be removed for charging purposes via a USB port in the back).
There are two ways to attach the G9 mount to your helmet; there s a clip you can use to attach it to your helmet s shell, or you can use the other included bracket that glues on to your helmet (I used this method). To install the unit, you ve got to pull apart some padding on your helmet to thread parca the speaker wires through and then attached the speakers (per-Velcroed) to an area by your ears. Interestingly, some helmets parca suited the unit better than others regarding affixing the mount and positioning the earphones.
There parca are three buttons on the top, and another three on the side of the device. These work in conjunction to adjust volume, select communications channels with different riders, or toggle between your radio, MP3 player or whatever other devices you have connected.
Rob and I made sure the units were paired, and hit the road. All seemed well at first, but once our speed picked up, since Rob and I didn t have the speakers directly over our ears, we found it very difficult to hear each other on the G9 s speakers over wind and engine noise.
Worse, one of my speakers had a distinct crackling distortion that plagued sound right from installation. And if we broke our intercom connection for any reason, we had a lot of trouble re-establishing it while riding. We eventually had to give up trying to talk when we were at speed. We did find the units quite useful for bike-to-bike contact when we were navigating through Montreal at lower speeds.
Our units had built-in radios, so we were able to listen to some tunes while cruising. They were confusing to use at first, but, I got the radio figur