Nike Sport 128 MB MP3 Player

Rating:
Summary: Bad experience
Review: Before buying this player i must have read fifty review from amazon.com to circuitcity.com to nike.com. I was sold on this player becasue it was designed for athletes and I planned on using it while running and going to the gym. I loved the design of the product and the features, all seemed perfect. When I finally got it, I had nothing but headaches. The included software, Music Match, is crap. It was bulky, slow, and kept asking me if I wanted to upgrade to the registered version instead of the partial that was provided by Nike. I used it and imported my playlists and MP3 into it and finally got it to running ok. When I tried to send music to my Nike MP3 Player, it took forever. Granted I was using USB 1.1 ports, it took me almost 15 minutes to transfer 30 minutes of music. Once the music was on my Nike player, nothing would play right and I could never figure out why. I tried everything that the manual (on the CD) said. I reformatted my music to 64K to 128K, I did it all. No matter what, music would skip. When I played to same music from my computer it played perfectly, go figure.

Also if you are planning on using Windoews Media Player to copy music to your Nike player, beware. I had lots of trouble with this as well. Although Media Player makes the process much easier the Nike MP3 does not sync correctly with it. After looking on the WMP website I found out it is not compatible and as of this time there was no patch available for it either.

I do not recommend this player to anyone, but there are others here and elsewhere that swear by it. Whatever you do, good luck.

Rating:
Summary: So far so good..
Review: I have had this mp3 player for about a year and haven't had any problems. The music sounds great, and it is the perfect companion for running. The only complaint I have is that the memory is not expandable. I've had to purchase another mp3 player to store more music on that I can take to work, play in the car, home, etc.. After reading other reviews, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that my luck continues... It's been good for me!
Also, I have to agree that the musicmatch program is a pain to use.

Rating:
Summary: DONT BUY IT
Review: understood its cheap.... but not worth the hassle. you never know when the bloody thing will not switch on - i hate those file error messages... especially when you are all set to pump some iron. half the time the POS with hang - and now it wont format. i am just going to buy an ipod... pricey but atleast i will have my music in the gym.

Rating:
Summary: Promises a lot, delivers very little.
Review: I've owned the Nike Sport 128 MB MP3 Player for about 3 months now.

The Hardware
I think it is a beautiful design, and it was a nice idea to have an extra remote on the wire leading to the earphones, that way, I don't have to reach at my arm every time I want to change songs. (This is very useful when lifting weights at the gym.) If you are a runner, however, you may find that leaving the wire with the remote control out may be a better idea because it carries a magnet weight that fastens to another magnet in order to stick to your shirt. This easily becomes entangled and if you let it swing freely, it becomes annoying. The magnets feel like they weigh too much. The MP3 player (unit itself) is very durable, I must admit that it takes a beating and keeps moving. Taking out the batteries may be a little confusing at first, as you need to hold the button down, and the battery cover does not pop off readily once you do. The rubber ear pieces come off very easily, and I have already lost both. It also comes with a battery charger (charges two batteries at a time) and one battery (why not two?).

The Software
I had no problems installing Nike's software onto my computer, though I received a warning about an incompatible device. You would think that a correction would have been made with updated drivers, but it seems that the company does not care about this product. The interface was confusion, at first, but then I got used to it. I was able to drag and drop the music files into my MP3 player. My girlfriend wasn't so lucky, as her computer fails to recognize the MP3 player, so she has to come over to my house when she wants to change songs.

Using this thing.
The player holds plenty of music to work out and then some. Sometimes, however, it freezes (stops playing music) for no reason, and it happens on the same song. When it runs low on batteries, it simply shuts off, but that battery meter, at times, does not indicate a low battery level. Taking the battery out and replacing it corrects the first problem. The speakers are loud enough that you can turn it up to the highest setting and let it fill a quiet room.

Overall.
I am very embarrassed that I have bought this thing for my girlfriend, as she hardly ever uses it because of its inconvienences. I use it for my workouts, when I run, and when I bike. For me, I am ok with this. I feel bad for anyone who would pay full price ($200!!!) for this, because it seems that Philips/Nike does not care about the quality of this product. Look into getting an iPod, or something else, just not this.