VIBE Digital Audio Player (256MB)

Rating:
Summary: VIBE - Excellent Flash Player
Review: I have bought two of these Vive players, a black 512 MB version and a white 1-Gigabyte version. The 128 MB Vibe is the same except for the reduced capacity.

The unit is about the size and shape of a tube of lipstick. It is very light and hangs from your neck on a lanyard as some people wear a cross. The Creative Vu2 Micro NX 200, which competes with this player, does not have a needed metal stub to attach a lanyard or chain.

These things are too tiny and too expensive not to attach to your person in some manner. If you lose pens on a regular basis, you should pay attention to this detail in the Vibe's construction.

I plan to replace the supplied lanyard with a gold chain someday. I usually drop it inside my shirt for covert use. The Vibe comes with a higher end set of black ear buds.

It lasts around 12 hours on an AAA battery. I buy super alkaline AAA at the local drugstore for about thirty-five cents each when on sale. You cannot accidentally turn the VIBE on and wear down the battery because most controls are under a sliding faceplate. The only two external controls are up and down volume.
The hidden buttons are

AB switch
Fast Reverse
Mode - Menu
Fast Forward
Record
Play

The Vibe pulls apart to reveal a USB connection. It draws its power while connected to the PC from the USB port. You can plug this into a cable or directly into a USP port if there is room. There is no need for any special software except for Win98 drivers to access the Vibe with Explorer. All the functions of Explorer, format, rename, delete, copy, paste, etc. work while using the Vibe attached to your PC. You can also use the Vibe as a USB flash drive.

There are three functions in this player of interest.

MP3 Play

One is the obvious MP3 or WMA playback. The blue back lit LCD shows three lines of text or a line of icons depending on the mode. The Vive LCD displays more information than the Creative Vu2 Micro NX 200, which is a similar player. There is a user defined equalizer and several presets like WOW, SRS, FLAT, BASS, and some other choices. This player can drive a nice set of external amplified speakers with a subwoofer with some amazing music. I also have feed the Vibe audio output via a Belkin's FM transmitter or a cassette adaptor to mobile radios with good results.
You can fast forwarded or reverse within any file that is playing. When you power off and back on and hit play it resumes exactly where you left off. You can tag folders or files if you want to limit playback to a list of choices. There are also choices that randomize playback, play once, or loop the list.

Voice Recorder

The Vibe has a built in microphone that is very sensitive. It produces acceptable recordings as long as you get `into' the microphone or if there is little other background noise. I once recorded TV audio from across the room and it was quite good. I had bad results when I first tried a Vibe held a waist level inside an automobile with the AC running at full blast a minute after I bought the first one. I almost immediately returned it as unacceptable. I am glad I did not! You could turn this on to record, drop the unit out of sight, and covertly record until the battery died eight to twelve hours later. The recording is stored as wav file internally. These files can be uploaded to your PC to be played there or stored as notes. You can also rename the file on the Vibe using Explorer.

FM Radio

The FM radio in the Vibe is comparable to some better FM units found in cars. It features search, auto program store of the sixteen strongest signals in presets as well as manual tuning. You can record any FM signal and play it back using the Voice recorder mode.
I use it with an XM Roady 2 to time shift the XM satellite broadcast. The Roady down converts the satellite channel to the FM band and the Vibe can pick this up as far as twenty feet away in the house. While driving I sometimes have it pick up XM content while I am listening to the car radio or books on tape in the cassette. I then carry this with me and listen to XM inside buildings. The Vibe makes a good companion to XM. What is funny to some geeks is that Delphi is now selling a similar time shift solution for XM for $350 and that one only stores five hours. The Delphi unit does include a built in XM receiver.

If you got any ideas from this post, be sure and vote about this review on Amazon.

Vic