Customer Reviews

Digisette DUO-ARIA 64 MB E-Cassette Multi-Format Digital Audio Player

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

The Duo-Aria is a great concept since it allows you to dispense with the cassette adapter. The sound is on par with other players like the Rio 500, and the battery life is reasonable, esp. when taking the car recharger with you. It also provokes response from people when they see a cassette with a headphone plugged into it. The small/thin form factor of the digisette is exceptional, even compared with other MP3 players.

However, there are some problems with the Digisette concept. After having a LCD display on several other players, I found that its absence is sorely missed. The power connector on the player is quite fragile, being composed of two easily bendable metal prongs. They should have went with a circular design like almost all other consumer devices. The control of the device through your cassette player is hit-and-miss, with the rewind and fast forwarding working some of the time. This was particularly true when using the player with Audible.com's audiobooks. If you almost never bookmark, rewind, or fast forward, the device works great.

I LOVE this machine! I've looked at the reviews and also the user discussions through Digisette's site, and I know that there are some frustrations. However, it's such a great device that I can overlook the shortcomings and still recommend it whole-heartedly because of what it does right: It looks cool and plays what I listen to (audiobooks) very well; it works great in my car cassette player and beats stacks of audio book tapes floating around the floor of my car; the customer service people are helpful and the other users on the website are also very helpful.

Of course Audible is great too, and pairing this machine with an Audible subscription has been the best thing I've done in years.

As to the flaws--a couple of hints that seem to solve the problems that would otherwise bother me:

1. (This is only a problem with audiobooks--it wouldn't matter for music) The player does not set a bookmark if your battery goes out while you're listening, so sometimes you have to listen to what you already heard because the fast forward doesn't work very well, at least in the cassette player, maybe sometime they'll add a separate control for fast forward or a battery power end bookmarker, and then this issue would go away. Until then, my cure: When you know your battery must be coming close to the end start turning the tape off and on every 5 minutes or so and you'll have a bookmark closer to the spot you want when the battery dies (or just change batteries--they're cheap and you can charge a bunch at home on the wall plug-in charger). If you would have to listen to a very long portion over to get back to your place you can just estimate where you were and then re-load the portion you haven't already heard from your Audible in-box.

2. The memory expansion cards are expensive, but I think worth it if you are on a car trip and want to carry a bunch of books. Go for the 64 mb cards. It's true that sometimes the computer doesn't recognize the extra card when you're loading new material, but all you need to do in that case is to take the card out while the machine is hooked to the computer and still turned on (disregarding the instructions that say not to do this) and then click on the additional memory selection on the screen again.

3. The instructions that come with the machine are very short and not as well written as they could be. Maybe Digisette will fix that or post a better set if instruction online. However, the customer support people try to help and are nice. The best help I've found is the other users who are very helpful on the website help-chat section.

What's really great is that all of the stuff you might want is included with the machine, even a really nice case for carrying it with two pockets to hold extra memory. You can order extra batteries from the Digisette website at a reasonable price, and I think that's almost an essential purchase.

I feel like this gadget was something designed by Q from the Bond flicks.

It looks and reacts just like an ordinary cassette. But then I'm able to load and play my top secret MP3's from any cassette deck. :)

Loading the files are fast.
In about five minutes or so I have 128 megs worth of music or audio books loaded. My long commute is now filled with my favorite tunes. If I want to I can fastforward just like a regular cassette or instantly skip to the beginning of the next song by hitting rewind for a second and then hitting stop and play.

The software could be a little bit better.
It's obvious that they spent more time and effort on the hardware.
Sometimes it takes a try or two before my PC sees the Digisette.

I've read a few bad product reviews here and it seems to me that the problem was with the user and not the product.

Fast forwarding through songs is simple.
However, navigating through an audio book is nothing that I recommend. It's easy to get lost in the large amount of megabytes... Unlike a regular book, if you lose your place, you cannot figure out where you are.
Luckily the Digisette bookmarks where you leave off each time it gets shut off. If you think the battery is getting low, just recharge them while it is still in the Digisette.

When using the Audio Book feature, I find it best to load only one book at a time and I don't add music files to the spare space.
It just makes it easy to get yourself lost.

I updated the firmware and can fastforward and rewind at a much faster pace.

So far the only problem I've had was with the additional 64 meg Sandisk MMC that I bought. After 1/2 a day it went bad on me.
Digisettes' tech support was excellent. They walked me through a few test procedures and determined it was the faulty Media card. Amazon quickly shipped me a new one.

I also enjoy walking around with the Digisette using it as a walkman type device. It's very light weight and it is a cool gadget to show off to people around work.

This certainly beats my old method of burning mixed complilations on CD's and then having them stored under the seats of my car. Every other night I put a new mix of songs together and play it to and from work. I've given it quite a workout and still no complaints.

Oh yeah... I just remembered one problem.
It was playing the songs rather low when I first got it.
I had trouble hearing it and had to put the car stereo volume up high.
I thought perhaps it was not lining up with the magnetic head of the tape player.
Eventually the idea to try to turn the volume up on the Digisette, crept into my brain. Beautiful, clear sound came piping out of speakers. So if it seems like the sound is less than that of the normal radio sound, increase the volume on the Digisette.

Have fun with it. It's a great toy!

I purchased this product through audible in February. The unit was a nightmare. it would simply lock up in the middle of an audio book losing all bookmarks and starting over after pulling the battery and clearing it. The first unit lasted 1 month before it quit charging. Digisette was very good and replaced the entire setup (brand new box) and I had it in 5 working days from my e-mail. The second unit contained an extra battery. unfortunate it did me no good because the charger in the new box didn't work. Days later I was finally up and running. this unit does work better than the other one, but it's still a pain. Half the time it's won't recognize the 32MB MMC memory I added, locks up occasionally at the end of a 6 hour book, losing the bookmark and starting over, picks and chooses what WMA files to play. The device is fragile, and I expect the USB connection to stop working any time. Don't buy this unit, go with something more friendly and durable. Classic example of a good idea, and a bad product from it.

In the few weeks I have had this product, I 1) have yet to get it working, 2) have yet to successfully access the Audible.com promo offer the Digisette comes with (their website insists I've already done so), and 3) have yet to get either company to respond to repeated attempts to get support. And believe me, this product is too tweaky to use w/o lots of support.

Also, be forewarned: the documentation comes with a tiny little technical warning not to use other USB devices while using the Digisette. In my case, I guess that would mean my mouse and keyboard...

I want to say that I read the reviews, and went out and bought this device. I had to return to write a review. This product does EXACTLY what the manufacturer says it can do. If people would actually read what it does, IT DOES IT. I must add here that I am in NO WAY affiliated with the company. After reading the bad reviews, and then buying it, I must say the bad reviews are not just. I needed a way to get my MP3 files to play on my brand new Harley Davidson, without adding a new stereo. The bike came with Cassette... This thing really kicks but. ALl I do is pop it in without any wires, and it plays "effing" great. What it is, is that it does not have a interface when using as walkman style, but you do when useing the software, it shows all music, space available and you can organize songs in any order. Very simple and very functional .The software was easy to install, and everything worked the first time. You may have to turn it on or off once or twice to initialize when connected to your PC...Big deal,,,How many times have I needed to reboot my computer in general. I mean in realty, this thing is a very mini computer. I am not even sure if it is the device or Windows. It never took more than once or twice to click on. The thing is you have to READ the instructions. Most people are lazy and think they know it all. I read and did just what it said and had no problems. It is not hard, it has certain steps to take. I am listening to it as I type this and it sounds great. Now, also it does not have tone, or bass controls, but you do not need it. What MP3 player does? The battery is even rechargeable. This technology is so new and for this thing to do what it does, I have to say, I love it....I actually have the AR264 which is a lesser model than the AR300. Anyway, I am running out of space here so all I can say from my point of view, It does just what it says it can do.
Incredible!!

I have read all of the reviews and they were sort of mixed! So I still bought this thing...and yes its fragile and yes it sometimes freezes in the middle of a book. But I still say that I would recommend this little thing...it works pretty nice and even though it is a little flawed its still very very convenient and I take it with me everywhere!

I've owned a Digisette Duo Aria AR264, a very similar MP3 player, for a couple years now. I can't really say I've ever had any serious problems with it, but this won't be an ideal MP3 player for most users.

First, maybe it's just because I'm rather tall with large hands, but the Duo Aria feels rather tiny, delicate, and fragile, and the controls aren't very easy to handle. I've owned this MP3 player for a long time without any problems with it breaking, but it's hard not to feel like this device is about to face impending doom every time I handle it. The controls aren't impossible to use, but the visually-impaired, and big clumsy oxes like me, may have problems.

The software was hit-and-miss, giving me trouble more often than it worked - this appears to have mostly been because of a hardware conflict between my computer's USB port, network card, and sound card, but the software utilitarian, somewhat dated and basic-looking, resembling home-made internet freeware. Nothing wrong with that (and it's admittedly preferable to sprawling, clunky software full of pointless bells-and-whistles), but it did seem a bit strange. Even so, I have always been able to get it working right with a little work, and like I said it seems to have been a hardware problem un-related to this player and its software. Sound quality on some MP3's has been rough, but I think that was caused by some flaky third-party software.

In spite of these little problems, this MP3 player has held up well against light usage over a couple years, and has done everything I've ever wanted it to do: it makes an effective little MP3 player, the tiny MMC expansion cards work nicely as a way to expand the player's memory and capabilities, and the device worked great on my portable stereo cassette deck and played a long time before the battery ran down. It works excellently as a walkman-type device on long hikes and walks, and I sometimes listen to it while mowing the lawn (though as you can imagine much of the music gets drowned out, especially using the included earbud headphones.)

I'd recommend buying an extra battery or two, and at least one or two 64MB MMC chips; these items are relatively inexpensive and they go a long way to expanding the amount of music available to the player and the amount of time it stays running. You will probably also want to upgrade the free earbud earphones to something better, too - I'd gotten a pair of generic, light, over-the-head headphones somewhere for less than US$3.00 that were a HUGE improvement over these.

This player isn't perfect, it isn't for everyone, but I can't think of an MP3 player I'd rather have. It has lasted far longer and performed far better than I expected, though it still looks like it requires the walking-on-eggshells-treatment more than, say, a cheap CD-player would. And in spite of a number of other minor problems or complaints, I'm rather fond of this neat little gadget, and couldn't give it fewer than 3 stars.

I have to agree with the person from Edgewater, MD United States. I had exactly the same situation with my DUO-64. I purchased the DUO-64 on June 2001 and on October 2002 the internal memory got corrupted somehow (few months after its one year warranty period). I contacted DIGISETTE and they said that the product couldn't be repaired, i.e. if you ever have a major problem with it... throw it away in the garbage. The product is just a great idea. It's fragile (battery cap and its contact, on/off button, head alignment button), sometimes it does not line up with the magnetic head of the tape player, making the sound too low and bad to hear, and once and a while the software won't recognize the player or the expansion memory (if you dare to have one installed).
As I was not satisfied with their response, I tried everything I could to overcome the internal memory problem. After lots of attempts I managed to successfully low format it, and the player went back to operation. But for the price and problems that I had, I wouldn't recomend it at all.

My new car only has an in-dash cassette and will only accept the factory $... CD Changer, No Way! This item is a perfect substitute. I had it loaded with music and in my car in under 30 minutes. It would take 30 minutes to burn a CD alone The sound is CD quality and jumps between songs just like a CD. If all you need is an MP3 player this isn't for you, but if you need the cassette application you can't beat it!