Nomad has again made some new strides into MP3 device usability and portability... their newest product is called the Nomad MuVo. Creative's MuVo (short for Music Voyage... hey, that what Creative says, not me!) is a nice little combination product. It is supposed to be both a MP3 player and a portable USB storage device. Regardless, you get a small little package that accomplishes both rather well.

The Short Take

The MuVo is a nice little gadget that will appeal to some people... but not everyone. This seems to be one of the smallest if not the smallest MP3 players out there (only the SD players may compete on the size and weight issue! I haven't looked at the newer Samsung Yepp MP3 players however.) that I've used to date. It's also simple to use... but maybe too simple.

The device is best suited for people who want skip-free playback and just want to start listening to music without worrying about fiddling with settings. It's a decent storage device but not the best solution because of the limted memory sizes.

It's biggest weakness for some people will be the lack of options... whereas, for some people, that will be the MuVo greatest strength. If you want a simple no nonsense MP3 player, the MuVo will fit the bill.

Pros:

1) Size
2) Battery life of 10+ hours on a quality alkaline AAA
3) Excellent sound quality
4) Simple controls
5) Easy to transfer files to
6) Can act as a mini disk drive

Cons:

1) Maybe too simplistic
2) Lack of options like equalizers
3) Crappy earbuds
4) Proprietary storage
5) Expensive for the amount of music it holds

Where did I get it?

Best Buy! I got it there at the full retail price for the 64MB version of this player... but I returned it 1 1/2 weeks later. That goodness I buy such items with the American Express Blue Card!

MoVuing it along

The MuVo has dimensions of 2.87 x 1.38 x 0.63 inches! That like a value pack of Gum. Just a bit bigger than a Tic Tac container... it is that small! The MuVo weighs 28 grams... i.e. 0.99 oz! I think you get the picture of how small this bugger is!

The MuVo is really just made of two parts... in the current release, there is a white memory/control portion and the bigger blue battery portion. The battery portion contains the slot for the 1 AAA battery and the connection for the USB memory part of the MuVo. There is also a hole to attach a lanyard or something to it as well. Really, the battery portion is just that... just to attach a battery to the device.

Now the main portion of the player is the white memory portion. Currently sold in two sizes, the 64MB and 128MB versions. Supposedly, larger sizes will appear in time, but currently, you cannot buy any of the memory portions of the MuVo separately. The memory portion is white with the USB port and a total of 6 buttons for playback/pause/stop, fast forward, reverse, volume control, and repeat control. The headphones also plug into the memory portion of the MuVo.

That's right... there is no LCD or other menus on this device. That lack of an LCD helped reduce the size of this device as help keep up the battery life. As for battery life, I got about 10-11 hours on Duracell Ultra batteries. That's pretty good for 1 AAA battery!

The device supports MP3 and WMA formats only so far.

Volume seems to get decently high... although I can't tell you what level this corresponds to since there is no LCD displaying that informaion.

How do I get files onto it

Well, the memory portion has a big old standard USB plug on it. You just stick it into a USB port. It seems to be only USB 1.1 compliant however... which is just fine for the small amount of memory on the unit. On my Win XP installed computer, the MuVo memory stick appeared as an additional drive. On my Win98 SE installed computer, I had to install the drivers from the CD included with the MuVo package. Either way, it was just drag and drop all types of files into the MuVo memory module. You would manipulate it just like any other hard drive. In less than 10 minutes, you could have the 64MB pack full of various files. Transfering file from the MuVo memory stick to another drive was just as easy.

Playback

The playback from a good MP3 file is excellent. It beats my Creative Nomad II MG and RioRiot player. It sounds as good or just slightly worse than my iRiver Slim-X and Creative Nomad Jukebox 3 player. Cnet says that the equalizer settings are fised at Creative's rock setting... I guess that's about right. It didn't sound exactly like the rock setting on my Nomad II MG and Jukebox3, but I guess it's close enough. for your info, the signal-to-noise ratio is at least 90 dB... Cnet states 93dB but it didn't sound quite as good as the JukeBox3 to me but better than my Nomad II MG player.

Since there are no moving parts, the device didn't skip when shaken, stirred, or given to a little kid.

The repeat functions allow a to be B playback, single track playback, and all tracks playback... unfortunately, you have no way of telling what playback mode you just activated without a LCD screen.

Possible shortcomings

If you're more serious about music playback... then the MuVo isn't a good answer for you. You can not tweak equalizer settings at all on the MuVo. Unless you've memorized all the track orders, you may have difficultly navigating tracks to get to the song you want.

The price is a bit of a setback... you are paying for a very small unit that can double as a mini-portable hard drive, but the Nomad IIc with 128MB can be had for less money than this and you can still buy a 64MB SmartMedia card and a SmartMedia reader with it for about the same price as a MuVo 128MB player!

If Creative decides to sell larger memory modules, they would also be expensive! Why? Well, the control buttons and the headphone jack are only on the memory part of the MuVo. Any memory module for the MuVo must contain these parts and that adds to the cost of the part! I hate to say it, but the battery part of the MuVo probably costs $20 maybe $30 tops! That means the memory portion is that expensive!

The small amount of memory for the price you're paying doesn't leave alot of room for music MP3s and other files for storage/transfer. Even if you got the 128MB MuVo, you can barely store 2 hours of CD quality (128) MP3s. You want to waste some of that on files for transfer... just use a CD-R instead... it's cheaper and more useful!

Unlike alot of other MP3 players in a similar price range, you get little to no extras with the MuVo. You don't even get a case for this divice... either a belt case or an armstrap or anything! You can't voice record or even receive FM stations on it.

Overall

Simply put, I do like the MuVo as a simple, easy to use MP3 player that is extremely... and I mean extremely portable. Transferring files are a snap, battery life is excellent, and you don't skip in playback. It also can serve as an emergency storage and file transfer device although I would suggest buying at least the 128MB version to that. However, that is it... there are no extra features on the MuVo. If you like some flexibility in playback and additional features, you should look to other flash memory based players and/or CD-MP3 based players which offer more features and more MP3 storage for the buck at the cost of the extremely portability that the MuVo grants. A quick warning though, if you plan on buying this and upgrading the memory when it comes out, be forewarned that the price of the memory unit will likely be rather high and that the bigger memory units will only be made if the MuVo sells in large enough quantities.

As for me, I returned the unit once the novelty wore off. If a 256MB unit or larger were available for under $200, I think I'd pick it up again. But for me, my Nomad II MG will serve as my most portable MP3 player as well as my Toshiba e570 Pocket PC unit. If I take my Imation multimedia reader with me, that solves some storage problems for me as well!

Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 130