Customer Reviews

Lexar Media LDP-200 SD Digital Audio Player with 512 MB SD Card

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

 

 

PROS:
Best 2GB MP3 player for under $[...]
My NiMH 1000mAh AAA battery lasts 9 to 10 hours.
Nice sound quality if you have good headphones.
Tiny and lightweight.

CONS:
As noted by others, there is a maximum limit of 128 files per folder, and maximum limit of 40 folders+subfolders. That's not too bad considering 40 folders x 128 files = 5,120 songs. If each song is 4 MB in size, that's 20 GB which will not fit in your SD card anyway. With a 2GB card, you only have room for 500 four-megabyte songs. Therefore the file system is more than adequate for the purposes of this small inexpensive device.

CONCLUSION:
Basic functionality at rock-bottom price, so don't expect iPod performance.

As of this review, the LDP-200 SD was one of the least expensive digital music players available. Considering the price and the contents of the package, you do get a considerable value:

- The actual player, with Drag & Drop SD card support within Windows - quick and easy file management! The LCD display shows a 3-line directory structure and song names for easy navigation during playback.

- a 512mb Lexar SD card. Not bad!

- Decent ear bud speakers, at least the equal to my old Sony MDR-WO8 headphones.

Battery life is fine as long as you use rechargeables. A normal alkaline Energizer AAA battery is included with the package, but you will only get 3-4 hours of use of it.

There are some small negatives:

- The beginning and last fraction of a second are cut off on each song. This isn't good for songs that start off and end right away without any buffering quiet space.

- The central control stick/button seems fragile and may one day break. Still, easy enough to use through a t-shirt by touch alone.

- During playback, Menu operations sometimes make crackling noises when you are loading the directories navigation or while changing options. This seems to happen with just a few of my 192 and 160 KB/s songs but not with anything lower so far.

- Rock is the only good equalizer setting - everything else is muffled. However, the Rock setting is perfectly fine with it's heavy bass and sharp treble. Clear and strong.

This is my first digital music player. After a week of ownership, I am very pleased with it and it helps the long hours at work fly by.

I purchased the LDP-200 so that I could play Windows Media files that I store on the SD card that I usually use in my PDA phone. I don't want to risk damaging the phone while participating in adventure recreation.

The only thing weaker than the LDP-200 firmware is Lexar's customer support. They are uninformed, lazy, unresponsive, and entirely too quick to dismiss problems.

In theory it's a great device. Cheap, small, simple, flexible. For the price you can forgive that it doesn't include features like playlists, and doesn't resume tracks where you left off. What is not forgivable are the MAJOR undisclosed limitations of the file management system programmed into the Version 0.5 firmware (the only known publicly available firmware version).

With no playlist capability it's critical to be able to sort music by folders. The problem is that the LDP-200 is only able to read 40 folders / directories regardless of how they are organized! The count begins with all folders in the root path of the SD card and then continues with the next level of subdirectories in alphabetical order and so on. So let's say I sort my music by artist then album, if I have an average of two albums per artist and I cherry pick my tracks so that I only have an average of 3 songs for each album I can only play 76 songs. Worse yet if I'm storing photos or data in other directories on my SD card as Lexar says you can do, depending on how many folders I have dedicated to them I might not be able to browse/play ANY music at all! Furthermore even if I opted to place all media files in one folder the LDP-200 is limitted to reading only 130 music files per folder. This is especially bothersome for someone who shelled out the extra cash for a high capacity card.

As for Lexar's customer service. Before purchasing the device I inquired with customer support if the device could support SD cards larger than 1GB. I was told no. I reserched reviews and discovered it supports all FAT32 Formatted SD cards. So I bought the device and verified it. (Note: I also performed my file management tests on a 128MB SD card). When I reported to them that directories and media files in certain directories were not visible to the player and that I could make them visible by renaming directories to start with letters earlier in the alphabet they told me to format my card and recreate my files. When I pushed the issue and provided them links to similar customer feedback with examples on how to recreate the problem they told me they used my file structure and there "should not" be a limit to the number of directories. When I provided them with further guidance on how to recreate the problem they simply sent me a form letter response saying they were sorry I was having problems with my device (not acknowledging that there is a problem with their firmware) and they'd get back to me. It's been over a week and I haven't heard anything.

For those of you that already own the device I strongly encourage you to perform the tests yourself and report back here with your results and DEMAND that Lexar resolves the firmware bug to make it function AS ADVERTISED. If you don't already own one don't buy one until they have released a firmware and you have read reports that the problem has been resolved. In the meantime you may be interested in a different MP3 player / SD card reader such as:

SanDisk e100 Series

Grand MP3

MyMusic PD201

Coby MP Series

I can't say that any of these work better but I would certainly reserearch them before purchasing the LDP-200

I have had my Lexar MP3 for a few weeks now and have greatly enjoyed it. My girlfriend and I both purchased one to match our red and blue New Beetles as a cheap alternative to a CD Changer. This isn't my first MP3. I purchased one last year and since have listened to the same music repeatedly. It is such a hassle to reconnect it to the computer and change the internal memory. With the Lexar Media LDP-200 SD Digital Audio Player You just change the SD Card. We purchased a few extra 64 MB cards and plan to get a Memory Card Wallet. Whenever we get the chance we transfer 2-3 CDs from our library onto a card. At any time we can switch out the Cards to change the music. For longer road trips we just grab the 512 MB card that has a collection of all of our favorite songs. Some of the features we have noticed due to having two players is that when you stop the player it will come back on at the last song you were listening to. Remove the card and place it the other player and it starts at the last song played on that player. Return it to the original player and it still starts up where you turned it off at. The ability to scroll through the menu to find a particular song is also a nice addition.

I have already recommended this player to many other people. I don't know of any other player that has removable memory cards. This is a feature that stands out from all the other MP3s on the market that I am aware of at the moment.