Creative MuVo TX FM 512MB MP3 Player

The unit itself is tiny, even with the battery module it fits easily in the palm of my hand. I use the mp3 format for my music files, encoded at reasonably high quality, and can easily fit 10 albums on this player, more than enough for the gym! This player also plays .wma files which would let me fit around 20 albums, and although the greater compression means you take a hit on battery life it's easy to get/carry spares as it runs on one AAA battery. Since it only arrived yesterday I can't really comment on battery life but Creative claim upto 15 hours if you play mp3's or less for wma's.

O.k. the storage space per £ is less than the 20-40Gb hard disc players, but then it's designed for a different purpose and is significantly smaller and lighter than probably any hard disc player.

Having not used any other mp3 player I can't really offer any comparisons but sound quality is really good and the 5 band equalizer works well with 4 presets and one custom setting, plus the default. The supplied headphones give a good sound, only struggling if I cranked the base up, but don't fit well in my ears so I'll be replacing them soon. The supplied software is incredibly easy to use, although you can also just drag and drop files into the player using Windows Explorer as it acts as a removable Flash drive. The only time you need to use the Creative software is when transfering DRM protected .wma files.

The player itself is also very easy to use, it only took a couple of minutes to familiarise myself with the menus. Playlist options on the player are limited, you have various types of repeat and shuffle options but if you want to play tracks in a particular order then you'll need to do a bit of clever file naming. One thing I especially like is that the player suppots folders, and as my PC music collection has a seperate folder for each album I simply copy across the entire folder and there is no danger of 'mixing' albums togeather and it's easy to move to the next album using the 'skip folders' menu option.

The FM radio works ok although I guess this depends on the strength of the signal in the area, it's just a useful extra as far as I'm concerned.

At £130 it's not cheap but it's still £100 less than an iPod or similar and comes with a belt clip 'case' and jogging armband included (unlike the mini-iPod). It seems to be well designed and constructed. I particularly like the way that it draws power through the usb port, either from the computer or when plugged into the battery unit, somehow that just seems a neat way of doing it.

So, if you're looking for a neat Flash-based player with good sound quality and decent storage levels you could do worse that the MuVo TX. Obviously it's not going to keep your entire CD collection on it but with half a Gb of storage you won't be updating it every day.

Overall, I am really pleased I bought this device and use it regularly - which is the measure of a "good purchase" as far as I am concerned.

Down to my opinions

Pros
*****
Great size and weight - portable in a jacket pocket
Robust - I have dropped it on a (Carpeted) floor a few times. The music playing did not miss a beat. Sory, I'm too clumsy for a hard-disk based player
The controls are simple to operate, easy to hand and effective
The display of the tracks is small but clear and tells you what you need to know
The menu system is easy to get used to
Album load time. This is OK with USB 1.0 ports - and the device can support USB 2.0 so should take less than a minute for an album.
The free service to download CD, artist and track info is really useful to navigate the albums.

Neutral
********
The 512Mb storage capacity is a tad limited for me - but I think the 7,000 tracks of the iPod I would never be able to fill. I'm going to experiment with the wma (?) format in place of mp3
The time taken to convert cd tracks to mp3 is a bit tedious. But that process is needed for any mp3 player so I can't hold it against this device - and one only needs to do it once per CD.

Cons
*****
The tracks are played alphabetically - which is disconcerting if one is used to the order of play on a "favourite" or "themed" album. One can prefix each track title with the track number - a little tedious but it works.

Other stuff
***********
Also, I have kept an adapter from an old portable CD Player that allows me to play the TuVo through my car cassette player. Works fine and no fiddling with tape or CD changing on a long journey.

The TuVo doesn't have the stlye appeal of an iPod but it does the job it sets out to very well and is good value-for-money.

The MuVo is probably the best toy I've bought in years. I am an MP3 novice, but I found absolutely no problems using it. So long as you can get your music onto your PC in the first place, and know how to do basic file copying on your PC you can't go wrong.

The plus sides are:
o it does not use rechargable batteries like iPods and other products
o it does not need any software installed on your PC - just plug it into your USB port and drag and music drop files (or folders containing music files)
o it supports WMA and MP3 - unlike the Apple iPod - and WMAs are half the size of MP3s! Twice as much music on your player.
o it is dead light
o the armband it comes with is useful, if a bit basic
o the navigation is a piece of cake
o the ability to plug straight into the USB is fantastic
o it can be used as a flash drive, to store Word documents, etc, if you need to

The minus side is:
o it doesn't support playlists (though I don't mind - you can arrange files in folders to group them)
o it may be a bit too light - i sometimes think it's fallen out of my pocket
o the headphones are not that fantastic. They're OK, but I would have expected better from Creative
o when plugged into the USB slot, it may block adjoining slots as it is about 8mm thick. If this is a problem, buy the N200 or whatever it's called (newer model) as this uses a cable

Overall, though, it blows away the iPods I have seen/used. Half a gigabyte is fine (too much, even) for jogging/gym work.

I recommend one to anybody who wants to ditch that massive CD Walkman!