Customer Reviews

Aiwa XP-MP3 Portable CD/MP3 Player with Anti-Skip Protection

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I used this unit for one week, several hours at a time. Performance is flawless, plays my whole collection of MP3's without a problem. The only complaints I have about the XPMP3C is the fact that there is _no_ EASS function with MP3 CD's! Why not? Also, the unit has a cheap feel to it; it feels too light! Not at all like Aiwa's MD line... For 180 I'd expect a remote.. Aiwa: replace the "car kit" with a simple corded in-line remote!!

Buy Aiwa though, it is superior to the no name brands out there..

I bought it two weeks ago. I use it as an audio CD player most of the time because it has no anti-shock for MP3 CDs. What is good is that it has a support for CD-R and CD-RW discs. Batteries are enough to play like 4-6 audio CDs with anti-shock feature turned on. I like this CD player but nobody told me about absence of anti-shock for MP3 CDs when I was to buy it. This thing disappoints me. But what is really good is that even without anti-shock turned on it works rather pretty when you walk.

I have been listening to mp3 songs for almost three years now, mostly using PC (Kudos' to Winamp team) in the initial years and wanted to buy a portable mp3-CD player for really long time. As with any technology I expected that the price would come down, so I can buy. Finally I bought this player two months back when it was on sale for little less than [money] after returning my Creative JukeBox (20GB,[more money]). My ratings are based on the extremely low price I paid. I use it in both at Home (hooked with my Sony music system) as well in my Car. I am extremely happy with the purchase (less $$$), and happy with the product.

Tips/General:
1.If my mp3 CD is organized into folders/files reads quickly as opposed all the files in the root directory.
2.Like all AIWA products the BASS is more in the output, that is a negative rating to me (which is the main reason I went for Sony in the past).

Plus:
1. Extremely low price
2. Plays all my mp3 files. Both fixed (128/44) and VBR encoded.
3. I liked the display and the absence of backlight never bothered me. The Album and Track information is more than sufficient for me to decide whether to play or skip a song.
4. Navigation is really simple with Folder/Track skip buttons.
5. I noticed very little skips on very bumpy roads in the mp3 mode.(It doesn't bother me, since most of my driving is in good roads) I don't jog so I can't rate the performance of Jog proof.

Negative:
1.Quality of the mp3 decoding is poor when compared with creative jukebox and Winamp outputs. I have offset this by encoding my CD rips into VBRs. I use EAC and Lame for encoding my CDs.
2.The Cassette adopter is poor. It does not align with my CAR deck. I have to manually move the adapter up/down to get better sound. If I listen using headphones it is fine.
3.Output volume is low (It doesn't bother me much, since I jack up the volume in the CAR/music system)

This unit does all that I wanted from my MP3-CD player; search capabilty within a mp3 file, resume play, restart exactly where I left, album & track names display etc, which my other mp3 player (Philips exp 101) was not doing all that well. No shock resistance for mp3, but it hasn't really skipped alot and I am happy with it. But my only complaint is this unit is so sensitive to the way the burner has burnt. I had to make several tries before it could understand the files in it. But with my Philips it is a breeze. For the price and performance this one is a good buy.

i have been in mp3 players for more than a year and last week i bought myself the aiwa xp-mp3 player and can say so far that it didnt meet all my expectations..i was going to buy a rio volt sp100 but because of the reduced price (plus accessories) i made my mind for the aiwa.
the negative points of it are that in addition of not having screen backlight, the contrast of the screen is too light and not adjustable (biggest minus)..on the other hand i found out that it uses up batteries fast (2 hrs) and that the recharger is not functioning properly (while charging it stops without having fully charged)..the support of ID3tag is important and this unit only supports the less detailed ID3v1 tag and not the ID3v2 tag..so if you've burned your CDs with the latter one it will show "No Title" on the screen..another deficiency i think is that info up to album name is supported in the ID3tag (no year, nor genre)..so that the displayed info in the ID3 tag is not really different than the file name..i found the max sound of the unit not satisfactory either, it doesnt have even a simple remote and is not an upgradeable unit.
the pluses on the other side is first its price.. 80 USD for such a player with all the extras is not bad..the headphones are ok..as stated in other reviews there is no anti-skip function in mp3's but it has not skipped that much while driving and doesnt skip while walking..the quick resume function and resume from the last stopped point is a good plus which for example the rio sp100 does not have..it has random play functions both for albums (folders) and for the entire CD..you can do simple navigation between albums (folders)..it is not very slim but is ok..the hold function is also a plus..
besides the attractive price i think this player does not meet the requirements of real mp3 fans who expect a lot..but this player is simple, cheap and you dont have to worry that much when you leave it on the beach and go swimming..i bought this player and surely will use it for a year until i can afford hard-disk mp3 players..

At last years prices this was probably not a good value but ..., all of a sudden this becomes an extremely good value considering you are getting a A/C adapter, car cassette adapter, car power adapter. I threw away the headphones as a ... Jensen I picked up at circuit city performed better. I really like the album up/down buttons to go through the albums and also the disc/album option for playing (basically you can play the entire CD containing multiple albums at once or play one album at a time). I wish the stand alone DVD/MP3 players have these options. There are also programming options that I didn't have a need to try. The display has three options: track time - mp3 file name - ID3 tag. In the latter two cases the display scrolls constantly. It displays very long file names.

I have held the device in all possible orientations during play and it din't skip once. In fact I have yet to see a skip during walking (no belt clip came with it). Another bonus is built in charger for rechargeble batteries. But the Rayovac rechargeable ones I picked up at grocery store seem to lose charge much faster than standard alkaline batteries. In stop/off mode you just hold the stop button for a couple of seconds and it starts charging the batteries.

All in all, a very good value...

I've had this for a couple of weeks now,
and I'm really happy with it. Things I like:

It has a Folder skip button, in addition to a track
skip, which makes navigation easy as long as you
divide your tracks into folders when you burn
a CD.

You can fast forward through tracks in MP3 mode.

Has ID tag support, so it will scroll the names of
tracks on the screen.

I use it in my car driving on roads full of potholes,
and it doesn't skip even in mp3 mode.

You can put at least 15 hours of music on one CD!

For the people who complain about these mp3 players
being sensitive to the way a CD is burned, burn
all your mp3 CDs at 2x speed or less, and you
shouldn't have any problems.

I've read bad reviews of players that cost almost twice
the amount of this one, and this player comes with
a car kit. I've read a lot about mp3 cd players before
finally chosing this one because it had such a low price
and a lot of features, and think I made a good choice.

The only thing some people might not like is that the player
is probably 50 percent thicker than most players, but I figure
this makes it more durable, and I either use it at home hooked
up to my home stereo, or in the car so the size does not bother me.

ROBERT

I purchased this item so that I could hook it up to my home theater system and listen to my mp3 cds. It plays all burned cds with no problems, unlike my 'Bose Home Theater System' and my 'Sanyo Home Theater System'. I am buying another one today so I can hook one up in my bedroom and one in the living room. I have done extensive research on foot and on the internet and this player hooked up to my aux input line is my best solution. As I said I have two other home theater systems that say they play mp3 cds but they are terrible at it. Won't read disc right or skip over alot of songs. The Aiwa unit performs great. If you are in the same situation as me then you can't go wrong with this unit. I keep it stationary so the anti skip doesn't affect me. Hope this helps in your decision.

The little toy does exactly what you want it to do, it plays MP3's and playes audio cd's, plus you can look, select and even read albums and guess what the mp3 tag and the file name (the dot matrix screen it's like a banner)
So I give a hell if the EASS doesn't work with the mp3's, so what the car kit is just heaven, the little buddy eats and drinks batteries not like the instruction manual says (10 hours yeah right), so just plug the ac adapter or the car adapter, or charge, yes it charges batteries (rechargeble).
The reading that is a little slow but is has to detect if is a mp3 disc or audio cd, but in mp3's you can see every album, and if you put the resume, you can stop and turn it off, and when your feeling in the mood for music again just push play and it starts in the song you last heard whitout reading (only when its pluged or it has batteries, if not it reads the whole cd again).
You hear the music, low sound it isn't on this baby, high volume and really deep (it has 2 levels of deep sound), so buy this discman is cheap and cool, plus your not going to put it to play in a rocky road or in the wild and savage world (must be insane, instead of that throw it to the floor then if that is the use your gonna give it), is just for home and car use, plus it jumps ancd it resume in a moment (1 second) and plays the song or mp3 just where it got cut.
Look is not perfect, but is better than most of the others.

Tip buy a cable and plug it to your stereo is a loud sensation (AUX or VIDEO L-R).

i have purchased this because of its attractive price!!!
it has got a ac/dc adapter n an inbuilt battery charger.it plays ordinary cd's as well as mp3's!!!
Positive points:
1)i liked the resume function
2)quick reading
3)hold function
negative points:
1)no esp for mp3

i think there is no need for a car kit with out anti skip protection.i didnt face any problems hearing to mp3's while i walk.
i recommend this because of its features n low price.