Customer Reviews

Coby 4 GB Flash Video MP3 Player with FM Radio (Black)

5 star:		(62)
4 star:		(57)
3 star:		(26)
2 star:		(22)
1 star:		(43)

 

 

I recently ordered this product off of Amazon and I am extremely satisfied.

First I will give you a run down of what equipment I use this with. My laptop (Entertainment HP, 2GB RAM, with Vista), my surround sound (Phillips Hi-Def), my Sony PS3 (not the PS3 itself, but the charger for the controllers), car stereo, & iHome speakers.

When I was browsing potential MP3 Players my main concern was playlists and if the player could hold up under pressure (aka being on my arm while jogging, being dropped, and tossed around in general).

I have put songs on it (mostly MP3 & WMA format) from Windows Media Player on my laptop. In order to create playlists, I first put them as a list in Windows Media Player and then right clicked on the list in order to send it to the player. All of the songs were in the exact order I put them in (in the past I had experienced a problem with the MP3 Player jumbling things)! The menu is easily to scroll through using the navigational keys. The player also remembers where you left off in a song and in a list. If I turn it off during the middle of the song all I have to do is scroll to "Now Playing" in the menu to pickup where I left off. It came with a disc to install it, but all I had to do was hook it up to my laptop with the usb cord. No installation was necessary (although my computer did have me name it). No additional software was necessary. Windows Media Player was enough. I have not found a way to delete songs off of the player without hooking it up to the computer, but this is not a huge deal for me since everything else is perfect.

The volume goes up to 31. I generally do not put it over 16 or 17, which is plenty. The battery life has varied some. I think this has to do with the days when I am constantly scrolling through songs as opposed to days where I select my list and let it play. This makes it generally 7 to 10 hours, respectively.

It holds up while I am jogging. I always prefer to purchase electronics that can take some abuse since I am clumsy. This player has held up under my treatment (which is saying a lot)!

To charge it I did not purchase a charger. I use the charger I bought for the PS3 controllers. It works just fine and does not take forever to charge. I also like that there are no batteries I have to replace.

I also hook the player up to iHome speakers so I can "jam out" when I am doing laundry or some other house chore. It also works well with the surround sound system I have. All I have to do is plug it in with the usb cord.

I highly reccomend this MP3 player if you're looking for something that works with the rest of your electronics. In the past I have purchased players that have had serious compatability issues and it drove me nuts trying to figure out how to use them. Next I am going to purchase one for my nine year old. He already can use it perfectly! So, if you're looking for compatability, user-friendly features, and durability, look no further!

Update as of 10/4/08

I dropped the mp3 player off the upstairs deck at my house and thought I broke it, but luckily there is a reset button on the lower back of the player. You have to use a small point (I used a thumb tack) to press the button. It was a total life saver.

Update as of 1/8/09

I noticed when I was updating the playlists that the playlists already on the player that had less than 18 songs on them were jumbled. All of the playlists in which I had placed 18 or more songs on them remained perfect and in the order I had originally specified.

PS. I would highly advise buying different headphones.

Update as of 1/1/2011

After almost 4 yrs (I wrote this review awhile after starting to use it) it's time to purchase another one. I used it for, on average, about four or five hours per day (sometimes more). The hold button no longer works without having to tape it down. It is difficult to add/delete playlists without having to hit the reset button on the back a couple times.

This is a fantastic product! It's about the size of an Apple Nano (the older one); holds a tremendous amount of media; is very durable; and costs about 1/3 of the cost of a Nano. The best part is not having to mess with the

I purchased this to replace my last Coby mp3 player. Coby is a gem in the rough. Many people don't know about this company. They put out a quality product at a much more reasonable price.

There are only two small down-sides. You can't delete the file from the unit. You have to plug it into a computer. Also, the controls take a little getting used to. Even though it has a circle, it doesn't have the feature of scrolling by tracing the circle with your thumb as Apple does.

Transferring files is very easy. You can either use software like Windows Media Player, or open the files yourself to give complete control. You can't as easily do this with Apple. The battery lasts a long time as well. The best part is you don't have to mess with proprietary software with Apple that restricts your capabilities to add music for a cheaper price than iTunes.

I just received mine today and it was just what I expected.
As the reviewer before me said, it's got lots of space and great
battery life.
The buttons look like they light up blue, but mine's are actually a pale green, it's little and has a really nice, sleek look to it. The box came with the USB cable, head phones, a little CD for converting Videos, manual, a card for 50 free songs, and a soft little cloth to keep it shiny since it does smudge easily. The keys are sensitive but easy enough to work.
I am very glad I took the chance to buy it, I wanted something that wasn't an iPod and this was great, just as good with half the price and twice the space, with nothing like iTunes to have to download.
And no I dont work for the company, I just really liked the player ^-^

This player is pretty nice. It holds a ton of songs. The headphones that come with it are not that great though. And it comes with a card for fifty free downloads, but it's one of those deals that you have to sign up for a membership and cancel it later. One bad thing about the player is that you have to hook it up to the computer to delete files from it. one previous review said the player doesn't pick up where it left off, but it does. if you turn it off then back on just select now playing and it starts exactly where you stopped it. Good buy for this price.

I recieved my coby mp3 player yesterday. It was so easy to put music on, i took it out of the box and plugged it into the computer and 5 minutes later i had tons of songs on it. Its's an amazing little product and i would recommend it to anyone that doesn't want to pay a whole lot. The touch pad is really neat, and is easy to navigate. And someone before me said i think, that the mp3 player doesn't play the song from where you left off... well it worked for me this morning which was surprising, because this is the first mp3 player that has done it for me.

The only thing that i dont like is that some of the wma songs won't download onto the player but other than that i give this player 2 thumbs up :)

This is a very nice player, with great sound and picture quality. It is very thin and nice looking. If you want to put songs or pictures on it, its easy.

HOWEVER IF YOU WANT VIDEOS, PLEASE READ THIS SO YOU KNOW HOW! THE DIRECTIONS THAT COME WITH IT ARE NOT CORRECT!

This comes with a converter CD that is supposed to convert videos to the proper format for this player. It does convert, but only converts from WMV format to the correct format.

So, first use a converter of your choice to convert your video to WMV format. You can download converters online. Some are free, some are not. I like Prism, because its free and converts large videos.

After converting the video to WMV format, then you can use the program that comes with the player to convert from WMV to the format needed by the player. I have not yet found an online converter that converts to the proper format for this player. (220x176)

Then you just drag it from where its saved to the player. A window may come up saying its not the correct format, but as long as its 220x176 it should work.

Now that I know this, I love it! So far, I have 5 movies on the player and only used up half the space.

I would recommend this to anyone looking for an inexpensive way to keep there music in their pocket(2000+songs). It looks cool. It is reliable. You cant beat the price.

Watching videos on it is tough. That is a picture you see displayed on the demo there. Video plays horizontal and much smaller. It might work on a plane ride but it is tough on the eyes.

*Radio does not get great reception but it works.
*Pictures look awesome in it.
*Text feature I rarely use, but who buys an MP3 to read on it

I have bought 3 for my family. Everyone is happy :-)

I have own many mp3s, over the years: my Coby 4G mp3 is the most outstanding of all. The Coby is easy to navigate and the sound is supered. The touch sensitive is cool. The downfall is inability of the mp3 in accepting WMV. You have to convert videos to AVI. Also, The Coby 4G will not play WMA files thats non DRM. Ovarall, I love the 4G coby mp3/4

The Coby 4 GB Flash Video MP3 player enabled me to resist the compelling urge to drop $150 on a video iPod. While the software isn't as elegant as the iPod, the Coby unit includes a simple text reader and an FM radio. It shows up on my iMac desktop as an addressable drive, allowing me to move files in and out of its memory without touching iTunes. It also syncs with Windows Media Player and includes a simple (if imperfect) Windows-only formatting utility for importing video with the proper aspect ratio and file format (.avi.) I have downloaded TV shows and full-length movies (Ben Hur!), etc. and viewed them on the little screen - a very neat trick when ultimate portability is the goal.

The text reader mentioned above accepts .txt files only. This means it is handy for off-line reading of any long document that can be saved in that format, including web contents, Word documents, and most of the free online books. (James Joyce/Ulysses is on there now).

The mp3 functions are comparable to other mp3 players, although I haven't yet bothered to figure out how it assembles playlists, etc. Surprising to me is the inclusion of the FM tuner, something that adds real value by connecting me to the real world instead of isolating me from it.

The touch-screen interface is really quite fun to use, and in principle, trumps Apple's much-vaunted touch wheel. Using my wife's iPod seems so low-tech and old-fashioned to me now. In actual use, the touch screen is a bit too small and sensitive to be ideal - it's just too easy to touch buttons inadvertently. There is a "hold" setting that inactivates the buttons, however, even with "hold" invoked, if the function buttons are touched, the display is interrupted with an on-screen message that tells you that "hold" is turned on. It's an unnecessarily intrusive interruption.

All in all, though, for less than $50, this player is my new best electronic friend and constant companion. I am never without a book to read, music to listen to, or a movie to watch.

I ordered this because my old Phillips finally froze for good, always had a problem with it. This was pretty cheap and had a lotta memory, and it works great. Sound doesn't get as loud as the phillips had, but it gets loud enough to blow your ears out, but not great for speakers unless you have good ones haha. Anyway, my only problem with it is that every video I have attempted to put on it, even with the program they give you, will NOT play, but oh well still great for music. A plus though is that it can store pictures and lets you view them on the player rather than just for storage.