Rating: 
Summary: What a GREAT company!
Review: After reading several happy reviews I decided to go with the NEX 1A. I love the Compact Flash/MicroDrive capabilities for expansion. The unit itself is well made and comes with all the necessary adapters etc. Mine actually did not have the power adapter in the box. No problem. A quick e-mail and literally 2 minutes later I received a reply letting me know they will ship the adapter right out to me... no hassles, no questions. Great company to buy from!
Rating: 
Summary: Benefits vs. Drawbacks
Review: Benefits:
.Good sound quality
.Inexpensive
.Easy to download MP 3 files
.Compact and will withstand a 5 mile run with consistent sound quality
.Adequate for cd copied files
Drawbacks:
.Really can not handle wma files such as those downloaded from Walmart,com. These all need to be converted to MP3 before you can copy. Their suggested work around really doesn't work. This is extremely frustrating and time consuming. Not really wma compatable like they advertised. WMA files will download but won't play.
.Get rid of the chincy headphones. Use the ones from your standard cd player.
.Use is not intuitive. I eventually figured out proper player download settings by trial and error. If you don't immediately format the 1gb flash memory, you can only load about 50 songs leaving 90% of memory unused. You get a sideways hourglass which is not explained anywhere. Means you've maxed out the buffered unformated space. If you format afterward, you lose everything recorded and you have to start over. Another frutration. Instructions both written and on-line from the cd are not very good. Unit was not tested properly with newer users like myself. Even my son who is a respected graduate computer engineer from CWRU (Steve Balmer's alma mater)took more time than necessary to figure out the problems with wma.
If you are going to dowload wma files(buy music off the Internet) I would pay a little more($50-$100)) for a truly wma and MP3 compatable player.
Rating: 
Summary: NEX IA bastante bueno
Review: Compre el NEX ia y me ha parecido bastante bueno. Es relativamente pequeño. Con W98 funcionó bien y me sirvió para descargar mis fotografias de mi camara que no tenia USB pero usa una Compact Flash. Puede grabar desde la radio directo en MP3 o bien usarlo como voice recorder. Tiene 21 posiciones de memoria para radio predefinidas, y el control remoto es facil de usar (yo uso el Nex Ia cuando ando en bicicleta).
Lo que no me gustó mucho es el sintonizador de radio, parece ser que no tiene mucha sensibilidad o un control automático de ganancia de calidad, pero en breves cuentas anda bastante bien.
Otra cosa pero bastante menos importante es que el estuche incluido no deja libre los botones.
A quien le interese una unidad de backup, radio FM, MP3 player y además funciones de grabado usando una memoria compact flash le viene bastante bien, si además su camara digital usa la misma memoria podrá compartirla con ella. Si en el futuro se tiene acceso a un microdrive, el NEX iA también le dará compatibilidad. Tengo entendido que el Ipod de Apple usa un microdrive de 40 Gb de hitachi, que debería ser compatible con el Nex Ia... entonces solo hay que conseguirlo.
Rating:
Summary: works OK
Review: Don't plug the USB cable into the unit while the unit is paused w/ a recording, it freezes. It would be nice to be able to move files into folders on the device.cummingseng.com
Rating:
Summary: A Very Good Player For The Money
Review: Easy and simple to use... The sound is great and I like how it looks like the iPod. Fits right in your hand and doesn't skip!
Rating:
Summary: I'm looking for a replacement already...
Review: Going to be jogging/running? Get a flash based player.
Not going to be jogging/running? Get a drive based player. First one I got worked for 1 min. then the nav. stick would not go up, even w/ the remote so I had to exchange it. Using 2100Mah NiMH batteries worked for a couple of months then it just kept freezing even w/ new batteries. Suffice to say I have to use alkalines now. Battery life is poor, about 8-10 hours w/ alkaline batteries. I'm looking for an iRiver (17hrs avg. play time on 1AA battery). For 2AA bateries I expect better life. Updated firmware helped bugs but not battery usage even w/ the backlight off all the time.
compact flash door is a but flimsy but I keep it in the included case so it is not much of an issue. Radio recording is okay but the reception sucks and is restricted to 64kbps only. I don't use the voice recording but if I went back to grad school I'm sure I would. Sound is extremely good but not w/ the included headphones. Use your own. User EQ is a nice feature but every player has that now. I've had this Nex IA since Summer 2003, a month after it was released. Too bad there is no better compact flash based player w/radio. Compare the features of this player and the iRiver 390T or 395T series players and you'd be willing to give up the compact flash player for it, especially for the ability to encode to MP3 at any bit rate w/ line in. I thought that I could use this as an all around MP3 player but am restriced to using it only when jogging/running because of the battery life. Pros: Great sound w/ other headphones (SQL and SPL), Nice display, compact flash based if you use compact flash memory a lot for digital cams and USB memory, nice white/acrylic look. Cons: Too many freeze ups, Poor battery life for 2 AA, flimsy construction, Poor radio reception, old for its time. There are better alternatives but unfortunately no alternatives if you are looking for compact flash based players.
Rating:
Summary: Best CF MP3 player
Review: Great sound quality, loud, good remote, easy setup. Headphones sound OK, but I use smaller ones. Voice memos and radio recording quality is poor as well as FM reception, but I love the concept. This still seems to be the best CompactFlash (CF) card MP3 player.
I bought this gadget without any memory because I had several CF cards for my digital camera, so whenever I'm taking tons of digital pics I can still use its card if I run out of space; in the evening it all gets loaded into (or from) the laptop anyway...
This device has no moving parts when used with a regular solid state CF card. I dropped it several times; once it hit the ground so hard that the batteries and the CF card fell out, and people around me probably thought I was faking it when I picked up the pieces, put them back together, powered it on and continued listening and exercising. It still works flawlessly, probably because plain CF cards have an operating shock rating of 2,000 G's and can store data for over 100 years.
I prefer not to use the thicker, shock-sensitive microdrive cards (CF II) which consume more power and reduce battery life.
Speaking of batteries, do our planet and yourself a favor and buy a set of 2 or 4 rechargeable NiMH AA's batteries and a charger if you already don't have one. It's best if you can find the AA's with 2500 mAh or greater capacity, but almost any NiMH cells will give you much longer battery life with both microdrive and CF cards. While connected to a PC, NEX iA uses the USB power, so the batteries are preserved for standalone operation.
However, I don't usually connect the unit to my PC because I have a CF card reader and just manually drag & drop MP3's and create and organize folders. Cards over 256 MB w/ large number or files need some subfolder organization by artist or album for easier navigation.
As with most MP3 players, there is no mic or line in jack, but I doubt I'd want to use it with this recording quality.
The designers should consider fixing the shuffle mode so it could also work within a chosen folder instead of only with all the files on the device (maybe it's coming with a new firmware upgrade?)...
I can definitely recommend this gizmo to technically inclined consumers who already have CF card(s). It could use improvement in voice recording and FM reception, but the core mp3 player is good engineering and has great sound quality.
Rating:
Summary: Good MP3 Player
Review: I am a first time user of MP3 player and I find the NEX player a very good one. The player comes with a memory card, CD-ROM, earphone, a pouch and USB cable. Installation was easy and simple. In a few minutes I was already downloading my favorite mp3 songs onto the player. Took it for a run and the sound was excellent. Its a little bit heavy, but hey, if I can't even handle a 1 pound of weight, then maybe I really do need to do more exercises! Only complaint would be the included earphone, it clips on to your ears but they keep falling down while I was running. I had to change it to my earbud which I had for my walkman. Otherwise, NEX is a very solid mp3 player.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't buy if you want to support Ogg Vorbis files
Review: I bought one of these for my wife so that she could listen to some of our CDs at the gym without having to carry a dozen CDs. Since their web site claims Ogg Vorbis support through a firmware upgrade, I figured that was included in 1.1. However, contacting their tech support reveals that Ogg Vorbis support has been in development for over a year, and is not ready to be released and there is no estimated release date. Lesson learned, spend the extra $100 and get the iRiver iGP-100 which comes with 4x the storage capacity and supports Ogg out of the box. As an mp3/wmv player, it is quite nice -- even though the application included expires after 30 days and costs another $29.95, but, you can access the unit directly and just copy files over. The radio tuner works fairly well in my area, although I doubt I am 15 miles from the station antennas.
Rating:
Summary: A disappointment
Review: I bought the NEX ia over other models because of the FM receiver. That was a bad decision because living just 20 miles out of central Houston I can't get but maybe one obsure station. Battery life is nothing like claimed. I get about 4-5 hours before it starts freezing up and skipping. My remote quit working after about a week. The download is agonizingly slow. There is no cover over the computer connect port unless you use the cover which I do for running to help protect from moisture (sweat). On the positive the sound quality is good but you will need new headphones and it is stable while running.
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