Best $127 I've Spent in a Long Time
Written: Aug 20 '00 (Updated Oct 23 '00)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Value, availability, "cool" factor
Cons: Cheap production, poor manual, bad recharging circuit?
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| peachboy's Full Review: MPTrip MP3-CD Player |
Before the purchase
A few months ago, I was about to pay $200 for an off-brand DVD player that also played mp3 files burned onto a CD-R. DVD would have been nice--my VCR was about four years old--but I really wanted the unit for its mp3 capability. If it worked, it could replace my 5-disc CD changer; instead of sixty songs on five discs, I could have 160 songs on one disc! Ultimately, I decided against buying the unit, not because of the price, but because I was skeptical that it could live up to its mp3 claims.
Imagine my surprise when I read about a PORTABLE CD player that had the same functionality (minus the DVD, of course). This was the Pine D'Music MP3 Compact Disc Player, sold by TigerDirect for $199--the same price as the DVD player. Even so, it seemed like a bargain. Two months later, the D'Music still isn't shipping (vaporware, as some have termed it). The only unit that was shipping was one made by Genica, the MpTrip. I heard about this unit in the hardware section of mp3.com; you can go to that site to read the comments of other owners. (There is also a review of the MpTrip on zdtv.com/freshgear.) There seemed to be only two places to buy the MpTrip: computergeeks.com and easybuy2000.com.
Apparently, computergeeks.com sells the unit for $99, but they were backordered when I wanted to buy and are backordered at the time of this posting. Easybuy2000.com did have the unit in stock, but they charged $115 plus shipping. [10/21/00 Note: Easybuy2000.com has lowered their price to $87 and has thrown in free Ashampoo CD-recording software.] I decided to go with easybuy2000.com. A week after I placed my order online, I received a Priority Mail-type envelope (a large one) containing my MpTrip--no UPS service here. Although easybuy2000.com is a Canadian company, my package had a return address from New York state. I was quoted a price of $123 when I placed my order ($115 plus $8 shipping), but my credit card was charged for $127 and change. I think this has something to do with the fluctuating exchange rate since my credit card statement shows the conversion, but I'm skeptical that there can be a four-percent fluctuation in a week. Keep this in mind when ordering from easybuy2000.com.
The MpTrip
The MpTrip came in a retail box that included the CD player itself, an AC adaptor, earbud headphones, and an instruction booklet. The AC adaptor is 4.5V; no car adaptor is included. The headphones are average, but you probably own a pair of better quality earbuds. The unit is about the size of a regular portable CD player (like a Sony Discman, though more compact than a cheapie Audiophase I own) but about a quarter of an inch thicker. It weighs eleven ounces. The case is handsome, I think, a brushed aluminum look ala the Palm V. However, the buttons are very cheap looking and feeling, especially the open button. Be extremely careful with this button; it seems as if it can pop off at any moment. The instruction booklet is somewhat difficult to understand--English is not its writer's native language. You're better off going to the MpTrip FAQ on the easybuy2000.com site for instructions.
In addition to the open button, there are the standard Play/Pause, Next, Preview (previous track), and Stop buttons. There are also Rec/Dir/File (more on this later), Play/Mode, and Repeat/Enter buttons. The Play/Mode button lets you choose among these options: All (all tracks), Intro (the first ten seconds of each track), One (plays just one track), Random (shuffle--worthless on regular CD players but priceless on this one), Dir (plays only songs inside a given directory), and DirProg (program track order). The Repeat/Enter button is used to set repeat recording and repeat playing. There are three buttons/switches on the side of the unit: Normal/Hold switch (hold prevents buttons from working), Bass button (gives you five equalizer presets), and Rec/Play (toggles between voice recorder and CD-player mode).
The MpTrip also doubles as a voice recorder, believe it or not. Apparently you can record up to eight-and-a-half minutes of dictation. There's a microphone jack on the right side of the unit. This might be useful if you're listening to music on the MpTrip in your car and have a sudden burst of inspiration that you need to preserve. The sound quality of the voice playback is passable but by no means great. It's difficult to figure out how to activate this feature. This is what I've figured out so far: 1) Plug a microphone into the Mic jack. 2) Switch the Rec/Play switch to Rec. 3) Hit the Play/Pause button. The LCD will display "Record." 4) Push the Rec/Dir/File button. The counter starts counting down from 8:32 (hitting the Play/Mode button will cause it to count up from 0:00). 5) Start talking. 6) Push Stop to end recording. 7) Press Play/Pause to listen to your recording (thru headphones or line out). The Next button will allow you to skip ahead five seconds at a time. I think the player erases your message when you shut it off. But there is a line out jack, so if you have enough battery life you can download your message to your computer or even a tape recorder.
The unit has fifty seconds of shock protection, which is nice. I've used it for about four hours in the car and have only heard it pause (for a second) two or three times. A pair of AA Energizer lithium batteries (not included) powered the MpTrip for almost eight hours (there's a battery gauge on the LCD panel). A pair of regular alkaline batteries lasted about four-and-a-half hours. The MpTrip has a built-in rechargeable circuit that works with NiCd batteries. I bought a pair of Panasonic nicads and let them charge in the player for a few hours. I then listened to music for about an hour before the player ran out of juice. I don't know whether to credit this to a less-than-optimum charge or what, but I was disappointed. I then let the batteries charge for twenty-four hours in the player and only got through one song before the batteries died! However, I recharged the nicads in an external battery charger and once again got a little over an hour's worth of playtime. The recharging capabilities of the MpTrip are suspect (at least on my model), but if you can get almost five hours of playback on a pair of alkalines, it's not the end of the world. Using NiMH and Ray-O-Vac rechargeable alkalines, I got a little less than two hours of playback using each kind of battery.
The MpTrip FAQ on the easybuy2000.com site shows a player with a "Remote" jack on the side. This is to allow the MpTrip to be equipped with a remote control in the future. I'd love to have this option, but my MpTrip is missing the remote jack. Perhaps it was standard on earlier models.
Performance
The player sounds great! I encoded most of my mp3s at 128 kbps; the MpTrip chokes on anything greater than 196 kbps (sounds like you're playing a 45 rpm record at 33 1/3). I couldn't discern too much of a dropoff from CD quality at 128 kbps, but you may want to go up to 196 kbps since you have 650 MB to work with (try that on a Rio!). The player does not read a 700 MB CD-R. I used standard Imation 650 MB/74 min blanks, and they work just fine. However, I have not been able to get a CD-RW disc to play in the unit. At $0.50 a CD-R, however, I don't really care that CD-RW is not an option. Obviously there's little reason to buy the MpTrip if you don't own a CD burner. I have an HP 8110i, and it works great with the MpTrip. You can also play regular CDs in the MpTrip, although I admit that I haven't yet done so.
There are some dos and don'ts when burning a CD-R for the MpTrip. First, you should put your mp3 files into subdirectories. The player doesn't like it if you try to cram 150 mp3s into a single directory. I've heard that seventy files or so is a good number per directory. The first disc I made for my MpTrip had about 140 songs in four different directories. The MpTrip will play through all 140 songs as if they all resided in the same directory (it's pretty exciting to see "100" in the LCD track display), or you can play only the songs in a selected directory. Second, don't create a multi-session CD-R; that is, burn all of your songs at once and close the session and disc. Third, don't put other non-mp3 files on the disc. And remember not to exceed 196 kbps bitrate. I used Adaptec's Easy CD Creator 3.5c to burn the data disc. Although I've heard that you should not burn at 4x or higher, I burned a disc at 4x and it worked fine.
The only thing that I would like to have on the MpTrip is ID3 tag support. All you see on the LCD display is the track number, and nobody is going to remember what track his or her favorite song is when there are 150 to choose from. It's a good idea to print out a list of songs and their track numbers. You can fast forward or reverse through tracks by "double-clicking" the Next or Preview button.
This omission isn't too much of a bother because I almost always use the MpTrip's randomizer function. Randomizing a 12-song CD is ridiculous, but randomizing a 150-song CD-R is sublime. It's really amazing to listen to your favorite music for over ten hours without ever repeating a single song. It's like your own personal radio station. Driving long distances has suddenly become a lot more enjoyable. A cassette adaptor for the line out jack is an essential investment. One caveat: it seems that if you are on random play and hit a bump that causes the player to pause, the player will play only the first few seconds of the next song before advancing to another song (although the skipped song is not "counted" as played for purposes of the randomizer--i.e. you will eventually hear it).
Conclusion
As I said in my title, I can't remember when I've been this satisfied with a purchase. The MpTrip exceeded all of my expectations. I'm thinking about buying another one so my wife can have her own. Sure the MpTrip has its rough edges, but it's a first generation device that still delivers. I don't know how long it will take RCA and other companies to release slicker, second-generation devices, but why wait (and pay twice as much) when you can get all the functionality you need now? You might like to know that I also own a Rio player with a 32 MB expansion card. All in all, the Rio and extra memory cost me about $250. I can listen to about an hour's worth of music on the thing. The MpTrip can store ten times as much music on a CD-R that costs half a buck. If I wanted 650 MB of music on my Rio, it would cost me over a thousand dollars in Smart Media cards! Maybe I'll take the money I saved and buy a nice Sony DVD player.
Note: I-Jam is selling the same player under its own brand name. It costs about $40 more but is otherwise identical to the Genica.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
peachboy
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Reviews written: 1
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