Customer Reviews

Oregon Scientific MP120/ON128C 128 MB Waterproof MP3 Player with FM Tuner Orange

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

 

 

It's a fantastic idea because if you're like me, when you swim laps after awhile you get a bit bored. I bought this back in Nov. 2004. I've only used it in the water once. (Here's why)
I hooked it onto my goggle strap and wrapped the headphone cord around them too (It's way too long). I had an extremely hard time getting the waterproof headphones to stay into my ears. (They are a little big and oddly shaped.) In the end I had to pull my swim cap over my ears and hope they stayed. They unfortunately didn't, I was consistently adjusting and putting them back into my ears as they would fall out of my ears when swimming. Another thing that I noticed was when I was swimming I could hear my music when my ears where out of the water, but when my ears got covered with the water, the sound wasn't clear, it was as if the music was far away, like the music was being played from the side of the pool instead of in my ear. I had it on the loudest setting yet it wasn't very loud when swimming.When I had finished my swim, I noticed that there was water behind the rubber covers on the headphones. Couple of days later it looks a little rusty. I haven't used it in the water since. I don't want it to break. I use it dry-side now. It's lightweight and shockproof, good for running.
It'll be great when they work out the kinks, if it had better waterproof headphones it would be my best gadget and a definate must have in the pool. BTW- there is totally no way you could use this in the ocean (despite what their marketing people say), it wouldn't stay on you and it would totally corrode.

I've had this for almost 2 months now and I just love it! There are a few little quirks about it though. As mentioned, the ear caps are soft, but as long as you wear a swimcap, they will stay in. I use a regular latex cap and haven't had a problem. Water may still get in, but if you position the earcaps correctly, you could still get a good amount of sound. The headphones, you have to "screw" in, any coin will do to screw them on and off. It is a minor inconvenience - I just always keep a coin in my pouch. Also, the earcaps do come off. I actually lost one after 1 day of having this item. I emailed Oregon Scientific for replacements and they were sent to me for free (Thanks Oregon Scientific!). The wire for the headphones is pretty long, so I have just kept it rolled up, tied with the twisty it comes with, so I don't get tangled in it.

All in all, I love this device! Swimming is not boring anymore! You can also run with it - it clips on to your top and doesn't fall off. I've definitely enjoyed exercising a lot more now that I have it. For less than $80, I'd have to say it is definitely worth it.

A great product. The closest item I found mounts on top of your swim cap, and sends vibrations thru your skull for a cost of $299. That unit is very funky looking to say the least. This is a great unit. If you expect the earbuds to staying in while swiming with the headphone wires splashing around, you are being totally unrealistic. I write that because of one of the other review. Wear a swim cap silly - then they stay in. The construction is great, because not only is it waterproof - but by default it is perspiration proof, dust proof and beer proof. It's cool looking small, and Apple offers nothing like it.

This product is useless, and never worked, not even for one minute. Amazon has effectively zero customer service so I got stuck with it.

I am not sure if any swim p 3 products actually work -- My advice would be to forget about music and join a masters squad if you really want to swim. WHatever you do, don't bother with this piece of garbage.

I swim almost every day for about 30-45 minutes. I thought it would be really neat to try to add music to my workout so I got MP120 as it was the only player under 100 at that time. First thing I noticed about MP120 was that the headphone wires were too much in the way and needed to be tucked under the swimming cap or wound around the goggle strap. Second and far more annoying problem was that the ear buds would fall out whenever I immersed in the water or tried to do a flip. So if you are only planning to use a kick board, this player may be great for you, for free style, [...] stroke, butter fly, or flips, I wouldn't recommend it.

After about 3 months, the water started getting into the ear buds and I noticed corrosion in and around the headphone speakers. It wasn't long before the left speaker started buzzing and the sound was seriously degraded.

The customer support for Oregon Scientific is absolutely of the worst kind. Long wait times, false promises and no records of previous calls are all too common. I called three times just to get a request in for a replacement ear buds. The person took the request, and said they would ship a new replacement free of charge since the product was still under the warranty. After three weeks I still haven't received anything. I tried calling the support again and after about 40 minutes of waiting I got to the same person I talked to the last time, however he had no recollection of me and was not able to pull anything on his computer, so he took the order again. I called again 6 months later and asked if they could try shipping the replacement since I haven't received it, but this time I was told my product is no longer under warranty and that I would have to buy a new MP3 player. Nice.

My next set will be Finis SwimMp3 Player which I have heard is superior in many ways.

Update (April 4, 2007): I did received a call from Oregon Scientific tech support on March 28 with an apology and a claim that they are commited on improving the user experience. I got the new set of ear buds the other day, and they seem to have a better design. For one, they don't fall out anymore and the sound is better. On the older set, the sound would degenerate when the cap was placed over the buds. The new head phones don't have this problem. I'm willing to give them another try.

I bought this product to be able to use in the rain and it is great for that. However, it has been difficult for me to learn how to use it. Also, the adapters that go in the ear quickly fell off, were lost & now the headphones are uncomfortable.

I had to write a positive review after I swam with this device, but hadn't tightly screwed in the bottom with my trusty nickel. It promptly filled with water, and my techie husband declared it trash. I waited a week for it to dry out, plugged it in, and it totally works again!

On a side note, I've abandoned the protective swimming caps . . . since they're way too big, and it's still working fine (plus, I can hear better). The radio works really well too!

Always tightly secure the bottom before swimming!

After using this product several times I find it to be lacking. The sound quality is very poor and takes me back to the transister radio days. I've also just found that if you screw the waterproof bottom in too tightly it affects the earbuds adversely. Take my advice and pass on this one.

The idea of creating an underwater MP3 player with quality sound is far from a reality. This product is expensive and poorly constructed. The sound quality when you are able to keep the earplugs in your ear is extremely poor to non existent.

I swim about 3 miles a week. I was tired of couting the tiles on the bottom of the pool due to boredom while swimming. The waterproof MP3 seemed to be the answer. I already had a waterproof swim radio from another company. That one lasted 1 lap before it was usless. This one is much nicer. There are a couple of problems:
PROBLEM 1 - The earbud caps are horrible. They are to soft and too big. I can't make it 1/2 of a lap without water leaking into my ear and cancelling out 99% of the sound. One thing that seems to work. I took the earbud caps from my Swimmer's choice radio and used them on the MP3 player. These are not as soft, and a little smaller. This works much better. Unfortunatly, I lost 1 of the caps. I wrote swimmer's choice 5 times asking to buy just the caps. No response. I bought a set of waterproof headphones from www.waterproofcases.net. I pulled the caps off of these and now use them on my MP3 player. These are much better at keeping the water out of your ears. WARNING. The caps from waterproofcases.net are glued onto their headphones. Take them off carefully.

They still leak every once in a while. Mostly when you push off of the walls, but the sound is much improved

PROBLEM 2- This is made to attach to swim goggles. The cords to the earbuds are 3 feet long. This is a minor inconvience. wrap them up with a rubberband and tuck them into your goggle strap.

The good news:

1) It's still a lot better than counting the tiles on the bottom of the pool.

2) They work with standarf headphones out of the water

Bottom line. Plan on spending the extra $30 on better headphone caps from somewhere else, but still the best idea for swimming since the swimsuit.