Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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37 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good music player, bad alarm clock, May 1, 2005
I got this little guy hoping it could be a good alarm clock replacement, but I've found that it doesn't work so well in that regard. That is not to say that it is a bad music player though, it's just not meant to be an alarm clock.
It looks like it would be perfect as a portable speaker set for an iPod or something, due to it's size and rechargeable battery. Or if you didn't have a computer at work and wanted something you could bring in to play music files on. It's very portable.
The good:
1. sound - puts out some pretty decent sound considering the size.
2. size - smaller than I thought it would be. not pocket-sized, but not prohibitively big or heavy either.
3. looks - very polished design.
4. accessories - comes with cord antenna, line-in cord & carry case, all good add-ons that complete the function of the unit.
5. firmware upgradeable, so more (or more improved) features may be yet to come.
The bad:
1. clock displays in 24hr format all the time. I'm guessing Europe is the primary market for this thing.
2. When plugged in and turned off, the LCD backlight is on all the time. Might bother some people who are light sleepers. and when you have the unit on, the backlight has a 5 sec timeout? it would seem to make more sense the other way around to me.
3. alarm snooze is only 10 minutes, and automatic. I prefer it to only go into snooze when you hit a "snooze" button, so I can leave the radio running while I get dressed and stuff in the morning. as it is now, you have to turn it off after the alarm goes off, then turn it back on again, or else it will automatically go into snooze mode after 10 minutes.
4. you have to use musicmatch jukebox to upload music to it. well, you can upload music manually, like it was a flash drive, but the device uses a SQLite database, which needs to be updated or else it won't see any new music in the music folder. there are some third party apps for updating this db for you, but they are flaky at best. I just hate having to use an app to do something as simple as moving files.
The good news about most of these bad things is that because the unit is firmware upgradeable, Philips could release fixes for them eventually, if they are on the ball.
So, I will still say I like this thing, even if I do have to still stick with my older, uglier alarm clock for now.
UPDATE: the latest firmware for this has fixed two issues:
1) it now does 12 hour time display as well as 24 hour.
2) the backlight will dim after a short timeout period when it is plugged in.
Just an FYI.
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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not Good Enough, May 31, 2005
This little device is adorable and has good feel in the hand, and I was satisfied with the sound it makes if it's just sitting there on a desk or table. However, I bought it hoping that I could carry it in an open-top bike handlebar bag and listen to it while commuting, but it's not quite loud enough for that.
Further, I found the radio reception terrible! It has an automatic scanner, but it could not find a single station in the middle of the San Fernando Valley, which is not exactly a place lacking in signals. Interface-wise, trying to enter a station manually meant clicking a tiny button progressively through every .1 increase in channel numbers -- holding down the button would not automatically progress through them as expected -- so it's a real pain to reach high-numbered channels. And when you do, the PSS110 is not likely to receive them.
My experience with moving files to it was an exercise in patience. It took more than 20 minutes to clear the machine and download a new set of files to it (4 hours music). That's just way too long. The small 256 MB size really wasn't ideal either, but might suffice if it didn't take so long to clean and refill with new files.
Of course I knew this machine was meant for Windows only, but it does run via a SQLite database. Theoretically it ought to be possible to find a Macintosh client to edit the playlist, but several hours of hacking around resulted in no progress on that front. It still might be possible, but otherwise you must use the provided software to manage its playlist. You can drag and drop files into it, but it won't see them for playback.
One final but annoying characteristic: the machine offers a way to randomize playback, however when powered off it forgets that setting, which necessitates navigating a couple menu choices down and around in order to re-set the playback preference every time it's used.
If Philips creates a new model that remembers the playback setting, has greater capacity and file transfer speed, allows non-proprietary access to its playlist, receives radio signals as advertised, and has a bit more volume, I'll buy it. This one was returned for a refund.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The little boombox that could...well sorta., August 20, 2005
I purchased this product because I'm looking for something that I can use while in the bathroom/shower in the morning. Normal shower radios always sound awful and most don't have MP3 capability. Obviously I can't take this unit into the shower, but it takes up very little space and I can set it near the shower without any problem.
First the good:
1. This unit sounds really good for what it is. It's not going to compete with your stereo system, but the sound is clean and crisp. It's also very loud when you turn the volume all the way up. Easily loud enough to accommodate a midsize room. It sounds better by far, than any other speaker I've heard that is a similar size.
2. It has a rechargable battery, with a life of about 10 hours. Some people may see this as a liability, but I hate changing batteries all the time so I like it.
3. This thing makes a very passable alarm clock. Some of the other comments knock this feature, however, after upgrading the firmware many of the problems go away. After upgrading the firmware, you can choose which song the alarm plays. Also hitting any button engages a 10 minute snooze. Hitting a button while it snoozes turns off the alarm. I'd even consider using it as a replacement for my current clock radio, and then taking it with me while I get ready.
4. The unit got great radio reception for me. I know some people had problems with this, but after I attached the included antenna, I was able to receive a lot of different stations. I suppose other's mileage will vary.
Unfortunately, the unit has has some real limitations which as a result caused me to return it.
1. It's only USB 1.1. It takes quite a while to fill the device. I do not understand why they didn't go USB 2.0 on this. Basically, if you add the full 256 MB of music, you might as well go get some coffee while it loads.
2. It only works, officially, with the included musicmatch software. Since I run Linux, this software is no good for me. I was able to get this to work using a third party software package named pyGogear: http://freshmeat.net/projects/pygogear/ This software manipulates the SQLite database which the unit uses to access the playlists and what not. It has no GUI and certainly is not for the faint of heart, however.
I don't understand why they didn't make it so that you can just copy the tracks on. Granted you may not get the ID3 taginfo (this is my guess as to why they didn't do it) and hence song navigation by artist, album, etc; but it could still just play the music and maybe list the filename.
3. It has no expansion capabilities. An included flash reader seems like it'd be a no brainer to me.
4. This one is the biggy...It's only 256 MB. I knew this going in, thought I could make it work, but I couldn't. It simply is not enough capacity. It takes so long to transfer music to the device, making it painful to change the track selection often. I thought maybe I could bear re-encoding my MP3s to 48 or 64 kb/s, to get a larger selection on the unit but I couldn't. They simply sound too horrible at the lower bitrates, particularly through this device which sounds pretty good with higher bitrates. WMA isn't much of an option for me because I run Linux.
In short, I really wanted to like this unit. I do like this unit. It's so close to amazing (you have to hear it)...If Philips releases another one that uses a microdrive (a few gig capacity) with usb 2.0, or uses a flash reader (this would be optimal); I'd totally buy it, keep it, and give it 5 stars.
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