Ironcladd's Full Review: Philips HDD1630 (6 GB) MP3 Player
The Philips GoGear 6 Gb Mini Jukebox: Function and Price Override Storage.
By
James P. Zaworski
That introduction course to computers that I took half a dozen years ago at a community college has proved prophetic. The prophecy was that as time goes on, computers and associated technology will become faster and faster in their processing speeds, and become smaller and smaller in size, with greater storage capacity as a bonus. Another added bonus is that these devices will become less and less expensive. In today’s competitive market, this cannot be more true. For example, my first PC had a storage capacity of 850 Megabytes on its hard drive, with a 75 MHz Pentium I processor. When I made the leap to a CD player, and associated recordable CD-ROM drive, each CD could now hold between 650 and 700 MB, nearly as much as the hard drive capacity of my first PC. Now comes the Ipod generation of MP3 players, and their mimics and clones. Philips has come out with a mimic that has added functions and capabilities, with a storage capacity of 6 Gigabytes.
My nephew recently introduced me to his Ipod music player. He received his as a birthday present, and it holds some 20 Gigabytes of music storage space. His music collection spans some 4000 songs, and his Ipod holds most of his collection adequately.
I have a personal collection of about 300 music CD’s, and to load each one into a carrying case and bring it in the car, or on a vacation, or even an extended year or so long international work stint, can be cumbersome to say the least. I was impressed, to say the least, that he could hold some two to four thousand songs on his Ipod. I craved something like this, infective consumer that I am, and shopped around a bit. I ended at Sam’s Club the other day, and saw the Philips HDD 1630 Mini for sale for $199. I bought it. My review follows.
What I Like About the Philips GoGear HDD 1630 Mini.
Music Storage.
Yes, music storage. You can put about 2000 two minute MP3 file format songs on this device. I was talking with my nephew about the 20 and 30 Gig alternatives that can put many more times the number of songs on their MP3 players. I came to the conclusion that at any given time, 1000-2000 songs is more than I can ever listen to! The nice thing is that you can always change the songs that are on your Philips MP3 player, so if you get absolutely sick of the songs you have on it, you have that option. I’ve got about 1000 tunes on mine right now, and am about to go to China for the holidays again. It’s more than enough music to listen to on two sixteen hour plane rides, methinks!
Other Functions.
This MP3 player does not just play music in MP3 format. It also has a radio you can listen to, attach a microphone to it for voice recording purposes. You can put other stuff on it such as photos.
Playback Capability and Functions.
This MP3 player plays not only MP3 files, but it is also specifically designed to interface with Windows Media Player, and plays the wma file format as well. It also plays wav files, but since those files are larger, I usually choose to put the MP3 files onto this device.
There are many options for playback in this MP3 player. You can use existing playlists on your windows media player and just drag and drop them to synchronize onto the player. You can also edit and establish playlists on the player itself, such as “most often played songs” playback, which seems to be an automatic playlist that the player creates once you play at least one MP3 song on it.
The buttons.
There are four buttons and one volume control and a hold on and off switch. There is a power button, a menu button, a view button, and playlist button. All of these are situated on the left and right hand side respectively.
The actual play and pause and forward/back buttons are on the face of the unit, under the mini lcd display. The “touch pad” as it were is easy to use and very intuitive, and blue lights show what you have touched.
Mini-LCD Display.
Another cool feature of this MP3 player is the mini liquid crystal display unit from which you do your visual navigation. It is here that you see displayed the title and duration of the song, playlist information, settings, and the general menu as well. In addition, you can see displayed the album cover from the currently playing song, and also photos.
Photo Storage.
One selling point plus for me on this is the ability to put your digital photos onto this MP3 player. I actually bought two of these, one as a gift for my fiance’ and one for myself because I liked it so much after putting songs and files on hers. I like the ability to put photos on it. It’s nice to see pix of your girlfriend on your MP3 player.
Radio Capability.
This is another function that comes in handy. My radio is broken in my car, so I can now listen on my MP3 player. You can preset your favorite radio stations too.
Voice Recording Capability.
I haven’t used this one yet, as I can just use the windows media player to put the voice message onto the computer. I’ll have to try it out.
Radio Recording Capability.
This is another capability which is cool. You can record stuff from the radio onto your MP3 player. I haven’t used this function yet either, but I like that it is there as an option.
Windows XP and Microsoft Windows Media Player Compatibility.
This MP3 player was designed to be able to mesh very well with windows media player.
I suppose that was one of the selling points of this, or some kind of marketing ploy where Microsoft has to horn into every aspect of the computer and digital market. No matter to me, however, as I enjoy their media player and use it quite a lot on my computer to make playlists, burn and rip cd’s, and generally am pretty well versed in synchronizing the songs to the MP3 player. So for me, the transition was pretty seamless. For others not too familiar with windows media player, you will just have to learn. The windows media player comes in the installation software, and the tutorials give you step by step instruction for use.
The USB connection is how the music gets from your computer to the MP3 player.
Compact size!
Man, this is really a neat device in terms of size! You can easily slip it into your pants or shirt pocket. This is great for me, as during the past year or so of international travel, I’d have to mess with my CD walkman player, and fiddle with CD’s, and felt generally that a CD player was a cumbersome thing. This device is incredible. I’ll be on the 14 hour jet ride across the Pacific Ocean tomorrow night, and I have this little device to enjoy my time as I see fit.
Additional Stuff.
This MP3 player comes with its own docking cradle, power and USB cords, and a nice set of high quality micro headphones. The docking cradle powers up the MP3 player, but it has to be plugged into the wall socket, or to the USB port to gain power to charge it.
The USB connection is how the MP3 player interfaces with the computer. The plug in for the headphones is also the same place you can insert the microphone, but the microphone is not included.
What I do not like about the Philips.
There are two things I dislike about this device.
1. One computer compatibility.
I don’t like this feature. I have two computers, a laptop and a desktop. I have much more music on the desktop than on the laptop, but initially installed this device with my laptop. I then tried to put lots of other good music from my desktop to the MP3 player, and it seemed to synchronize those files onto the device, yet would not play them back for me.
Then when I put it back onto the other computer, all of those MP3 audio files were magically gone! I just wonder if there was something I was doing wrong.
2. Battery Life.
This one I’m a little worried about. It seems that if the backlighting is on, you lose battery life like a hemophiliac loses blood after being stabbed. Even if you fiddle with the settings for power saving, I don’t know if it will survive the 14 hour jet ride to China.
However, all in all, I think that this is a really nice MP3 player. Philips GoGear is really cool, as it combines a decent price (under $200), with small size, high storage, great song playback performance, and function in one little unit. I’m in love with my little MP3 player, and am never more than a few fingertip touches away from at least 1000 of my favorite songs, favorite photos, or a radio. Bravo Philips!
Happy Holidays to Everyone.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 179.99 Recommended for: Music Lovers - High Capacity Storage for an Entire Album Collection
6 GB hard drive digital audio player with 1.5-inch color LCD Compatible with MP3 and WMA files (including DRM protected Plays For Sure WMA) Display JP...More at Amazon Marketplace
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