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Technology Stocks : WDC/Sandisk Corporation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tumbleweed who wrote (14023)	8/19/2000 7:43:55 PM
From: Steve 667	Respond to of 60323

* MpTrip Discman Review by Yours Truly * This is a little off topic, but several of you have PM'd me asking what I thought about the MPTrip Discman MP3 CD Player as discussed in several earlier posts. So if you are not interested just hit the next button. The player I am talking about is: zdtv.com easybuy2000.com Before I begin, no I am not a shill, and have no vested financial interest in this thing. But if you want to send me money, that's OK with me. So here goes. I finally got my package from Easybuy2000. I had ordered 2 weeks ago, and when it had not arrived the first week, called them. They were very nice, knew immediately who I was and told me they had re-shipped it the day before. They are in Canada and it seems customs returned their first shipment to me because there was a new "radiation" customs form to fill out because they were shipping a laser. (In case I want to resurrect SDI) I received it Thursday. The unit is made in Hong Kong from what I have read elswhere. It is also called the Genica player. I received a PM from one member a couple of days ago that one review on this was horrible, but I have not seen any such review. The ones I have seen (link above) have been positive. As soon as it arrived I opened the box. Included was the player (see picture), a recharger, tiny earphones and a small instruction manual. It is a nice looking sturdy player, appears well made. No carrying case. I quickly loaded 2 AA Alkaline batteries and popped in a normal store bought CD of Phantom of the Opera. Sounded good. So naturally the next step is to shake the unit to see how hard I have to shake it til it skips. Hey, I'm a gadget guy. It's my job! It didn't skip but started making static noise!. I rolled my eyes and looked around for a return package label to send it back. But first I might as well try a MP3 cd. So I popped in an old CD with a bunch of MP3 files all on one directory. First thing it does is show in the little LED window - SORTING 85 - 03:22. Telling me the disk had 85 MP3 files totaling 3 hrs 22 minutes playing time. Sound was great. OK, now the same shake and bake test. Gently at first. To my amazement - NO STATIC. Crystal clear music. Well naturally I have to shake it harder, right? It didn't flinch. Soon I was shaking it like a paint can with the marble inside. Absolutely perfect sound. No skipping, no static. Latter my girlfriend came over (who by the way actually ordered it for my birthday, bless her heart!) and I put the earphones on her head and proceeded to flip the player into the air like a pancake. She was impressed too. That was it. This puppy is a keeper. (both!) Now to the manual and the details. The manual was written by a Chinese rickshaw driver using a commodore 64 and a Chinese to English translator program first generation! If you liked the Rubric cube then your going to love figuring this thing out. I do a quick Google search on the web and uncover a better MPTRIP manual in PDF format and print it out. Much better, still bizarre and hidden secrets. Heres the deal. There are two modes to play it in. Files Mode and Directory Mode. It starts in files mode which just plays songs in the order recorded while displaying the number of the song in the window from 1 to last. The second mode allows you to pick a directory and it will only play songs in that directory until you change it. Figuring out how to actually change the directory, then play in that directory is a real mind teaser even with the good manual. I finally solved the puzzle! A challenge for the best teckie! I have not read the solution anywhere else, even after searching several discussion groups etc. If anyone else buys one, I will PM you the answer after giving you 3 days to try to get it on your own. Other features are random play, programming, directory programming. The unit has 7 shinny chrome buttons that do everything but the volume (seperate control on side). It also has a switch on the side that de-activates the buttons so you don't accidentally push one of the buttons and change a setting. There is an earphone jack and separate line out jack (different impedance), mic jack. Oh yes, the player will record 8 minutes of voice recording which is lost when you shut it off. Requires mic, none supplied. Earphones are tiny stick in your ear type, good quality, but I prefer my older softer Sony set. Both work fine. That night I took it jogging, and it worked flawlessly. So before I went to bed I put a blank CD into my computer and moved over 4 directories of Napster MP3 music files using Adaptec CD crater and went to bed. One of the boards had said that Adaptec Direct CD would not work. Took about 10 minutes to set up. Next morning, the burned CD is ready and waiting. I pop it into the player and it spins up and tells me I have 145 songs for 7hrs 22min playing time. The sounds are perfect and the endorphins are flowing! OK, next I have to hook it up to my home stereo so maybe I won't have to make WAV cd's from my Napster files anymore. So I go down to Good Guys and buy and adapter and plug it into my home amp. Puff, one song later my $350 Sony 415 CE 5 CD player is obsolete. The sound was undistinguishable from my regular CD player listening through my BOSE 901E. I am picky and did not expect this kind of excellent sound quality at all. Either that or I am going deaf and no one wants to tell me. Well, while I was at Good Guys, I also just had to buy a the car cassette Walkman/Diskman converter so I can play the MPTRIP through my car cassette player. Puff, my car Bose CD player rendered obsolete. Works great! One problem I always had with it was getting my homemade WAV CD'S to play. Now it doesn't matter. While I was there I also got a Discman carrying belt. OK, OK, while I was there, I asked the salesman how the pocket MP3 players were selling. He said they are quite popular but the Sony Mini Disk players were outselling them for what it is worth. But still he said they are all selling better than he originally expected. So it looks like all those rich day traders are using up some of those profits. Great. Hope it keeps up. I still think it will be a passing fad, but I won't mind at all being wrong and watching Sandisk shares soar higher. Does anybody have a real quick and dirty list as to which players use Sandisk cards? Well in summary, my MPTRIP is much better than I expected for a first generation gadget! There is room for improvement, but the quality, and sound are definitely there. Regular music CDs will cause static if you move the player much, but MP3 CD's are rock solid. You can buy the Sony Discman for $300 plus but it doesn't play MP3 files :-). For $115 this thing Rocks! And if you get this instead of a flash card mp3 player, you will have more money to buy a bigger flash card for your camera. So last night after going to bed my girlfriend are like a couple of kids, stealing the earphones back and forth. And I haven't had to listen to the same song twice yet! Steve 667 ‹^› ‹(•¿•)› ‹^› yes, that's me wearing my little earphones and waving.