waste of money
Written: Nov 07 '01 (Updated Jan 27 '03)
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Pros: It works, easy to use, compact, plays RWs, high sound quality
Cons: Allergic to the cold, No ID3, no seeking, can skip, no accessories, headphones.
The Bottom Line: Good player if you don't operate in the cold.
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| kinsiderby's Full Review: Panasonic SL-MP50 Personal CD Player |
Why I bought this player
My Walkman was starting to wear out. Changing tapes was also a hassle. So I decided to upgrade my portable audio.
I compared the options. A CD player requires changing the discs every hour or so, Minidisc is expensive and MP3 players are expensive and have small storage space, and Hardrive players are expensive and I'm worried about dropping it and smacking the heads against the disc.
I was interested in CD players that play MP3s. I've been following them for a while, they all start in the $200CDN range but first generation ones had a lot of problems (like horrendous battery life). The Panasonic SLMP-50 stuck out because it was in the price range, looked better than other models, didn't appear to have any big flaws and it was from a big brand.
Pros
The player does work. The moment I got the unit home I plugged it in and placed a MP3 backup CD-R that I had lying around in and it played it fine. The initial load time is about 15 seconds for data CDs, which is understandable because it has to read the File information off the CD, but it will retain this information for 10 minutes after the machine is shut off on batteries or indefinitely if plugged in.. There is minimal load time for individual MP3 tracks. It plays audio CDs without a problem.
The antiskip does work. It advertises 40 seconds of audio CD antiskip time. I tested it and this is the value. For MP3s it claims 100 seconds max. In the little window on the lid I noticed that after reading a MP3 CD for 15 seconds, it will stop spinning the disc for a minute and a half, so it is only spinning one eight the time, good to help conserve batteries. For an audio CD after 2 minutes of spinning it stops for 15 seconds. I tested the antiskip from the moment the CD started to spin up again.
The player is very easy to use. On MP3 CDs the album buttons change directories and the normal track change buttons change the file in the current directory. It also has a very plain LCD screen so it doesn't look too busy.
The SLMP50 is fairly compact. It is the same size as a normal CD player. It fits in my jacket pocket, so I can walk around without holding it. The hold feature works and prevents buttons from being pressed while playing in my pocket or from turning on in my bag.
The resume feature works, which is useful on a CD that holds 150 songs, so you hear the whole CD. Even though it is small it is still fairly durable. It accidentally fell from a height of about 1.5 metres (5 feet), the battery lid came off, a battery fell out, and the disc came off the spindle. After I reassembled it, it worked, and even went back to the track I was on, even though the power was interrupted. Although it survived, I would like to see Panasonic make a similar model in a "shockwave" version to make it.
It read my noname CD-RWs, but I did have some problems with RW playback that I fixed (see below)
The sound quality is exceptional. I was comparing the same MP3 on my computer and the player simultaneously (with my expensive Koss headphones) and I couldn't tell the difference, very clear. It can also send a fair amount of power out the headphone jack, enough to play the Koss headphones fairly loud and enough to cause severe hearing loss with my Walkman headphones. It claims it will read 32-320 kbps. I've only tested 128-256kbps MP3s with no problems.
The instructions say it prefers ISO9660 burned CDs but Joliet (from Easy CD creator 4.0) played fine, so you won't have to loose long file names. It won't however support packet writing like DirectCD.
Cons
It doesn't have ID3 support so you might not know what the tracks are; I solved this by printing out a file list (normal CD players don't display the name). Because of this it is a good idea to divide it into directories. This allows for easier access.
It will not seek to different parts of a song, which can be annoying during long songs, or audio books. It will seek during audio CD playback. The resume feature also starts off at the beginning of the song you were playing, in both Audio CD and MP3 CD modes.
It will skip occasionally on improperly burned CDs and will only get worse as battery life runs low. I solved this by burning at a slower speed and including CRC in the MP3s. I don't know which one it was but now there is no skipping problems (to convert MP3s to have CRC, I use the high quality free encoder Lame: http://www.mp3dev.org/mp3/)
Mine didn't come with an AC adapter or a car kit. It is listed on some sites as coming with a car kit so if you buy it, it might have one. Both our cars already have car kits and we have a few AC adapters for portable CD players, with exchange rate factored in mine is cheaper. The extra $30 is probably paying for the car kit. It uses 4.5V so most car / AC power adapters will work.
It came with ear bud style earphones. The sound quality is descent, but they fall out of my ears if I turn my head, and are not comfortable. I just used the headphones off my Walkman.
The battery life can be a little low. For Audio CD the manual claims: 35 hours on alkaline, 12 hours on NiCads. For MP3 it claims 14 hrs on alkaline, 5 on NiCads. It also promises "playtime will be considerably reduced when playing CD-RW". My NiCads, which are a couple years old lasted 2 hours on an RW. I have a big pile of batteries so it isn't too much of a hassle and I expect it will get close to 5 hours on a MP3 CD-R. I haven't tested it yet. If you find the battery life is too short, consider investing in NiMH rechargeable. The internal recharging circuit only works for specially designed NiCads.
It doesn't support Firmware upgrading. Some worry this might make it obsolete. No matter what format sound is in you can always convert it to MP3 (I converted my CD collection to MP3s), it would be just as painless.
Price
I bought it for $200CDN initially, the next week it went down to $195, this week it is $190. Futureshop guarantees the price for 30 days, and will pay me the difference, so I don't feel as bad.
update: November 14, 2001
Once the cold weather (-2°C to 4°C)hit I started experianceing problems (it skipping often) at first I thought it was my RWs so I burned it onto a CD-R, it was still skipping, sometimes unable to read the TOC, sometimes unable to begin a file or even recognize there is a disc inside. I tried the backup CD-R that I tried when I initally got it. It has issues with that disc. It will play audio CDs still. I'm going to exchange it for a new one. I already did this once after it made a "clunk" sound when changing tracks. But that one stilled played fine. If the third one has any issues I will ask for a refund.
update: November 17, 2001
After thinking about it for a while I figured I had best just get a refund. The fact that the unit stopped working after being subjected to cold was enough for me to want to return it. It even started to have issues playing audio CDs.
Recommended:
No
Amount Paid (US$): $200CDN
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Epinions.com ID:
kinsiderby
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Reviews written: 5
Trusted by: 2 members
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