Rating: 
Summary: Bang for the (few) Bucks
Review: I just wanted to add my comments to the many others on this CD-mp3 player from Philips, many of which I found helpful before my purchase. I have found the Philips EXP 103 to be a reliable, solid player with a few drawbacks which I am willing to overlook at the present price point (...). I have the EXP 103 model that comes with the wall outlet 4.5 v transformer and car kit, which makes it a good value. It does have the problems in that it lacks the "tag" reading ability so the songs are identified only by their number on the disc (in AIFF), or by their folder ("AL" for album) and number (in mp3). The display is indeed really tiny and lacking backlighting, especially for knowing which mode you're using (repeat, shuffle, etc.). And you can't fast forward through a tune in mp3, though you can in AIFF (audio CD) as you would with a typical CD player. Others have mentioned this, which I am willing to overlook for the price and accessories. On the PLUS side, it has a great sound when played through the home and car systems. It handles typical jostling well (no skipping) at home and in the car with the buffering off, though I have not yet used it during jogging, walking, etc., with or without buffering. The earphones are loud enough for me though Philips may have upgraded the amplifier or found more efficient earphones since the original complaints. I am able to burn mp3 CD's using Toast Lite on a Mac as long as the .mp3 suffix is used. I have not had luck with session writing. Only the last session is recognized, but this may be an artifact of my system and software since the manual suggests that a Windows machine can add songs in separate sessions. (**Please note that the packaging materials say CD Creator is NOT compatible with this player.**) On my Mac (OS 8.6) and software I must burn all my mp3 songs and folders at once. No big deal, to me. BTW, the player does not recognize the number in the name of different songs but plays them back in the order they were burned. So you may have to number them to get the burner software to burn your songs in a given order, but the player simply plays them back in the order they were burned, within each folder. It also does not matter what the folders are named or numbered but you probably should not place folders within folders but keep all folders at the first level on the disc. That's enough for now. I hope other buyers find this info useful. Overall, I find this first generation CD-mp3 player to be a good value, worthy at this time of 5 stars. Dan
Rating: 
Summary: no good for jogging
Review: Everything about this product is good, except the fact that it is useless for jogging. I bought it because one of the primary features is 45 second buffer for CD, 100 second buffer for MP3. I turned on that feature and went out. By the third mile, it was shutting down completely within 1-2 steps. When it shuts down, that means stop, restart it, wait 30 seconds for it create the play list, and then advance blindly into the songs to try and pick up where you left off. Oh-- that's one other feature which is a bit disappointing -- I fit 112 songs onto a CD, organized into folders by type or artist, and the player seems to rearrange the structure. It's very hard, for example, to go the the third album and listen to the fourth song. If you don't mind just random everytime, then it's fine. Otherwise, you'll need to do some planning and experimenting on how to create the directories when burning the MP3 CD to find out how to best work with this player. Bottom line: If you're buying one of these for jogging, choose another brand. If you're buying for other walkman like uses (or for car listening), then it's a good one.
Rating: 
Summary: it worked fine for 1year..
Review: now.. it plays first track and it wouldn't willing to play next song.(mp3 files) keep searching... and searching... have to stop and play it again.. and I get to listen to the first track over and over.. press FF? tried and I'm tired -_-;
don't waste your money.. get a better one
Rating: 
Summary: Great portable CD player with MP3 capabilies
Review: Ok, here is the good stuff-- The Philips EXpanium has a tough, rugged case. It plays regular audio CDs as well as homemade CD-Rs and CD-RWs, which is a real PLUS! The biggest plus is that it also plays CDs that have been recorded with MP3 files. It can play up to 999 MP3 files, if you can squeeze that many small ones onto a CD. More likely, you will have about 200 songs. Compare that to the 10 or 12 songs you get on a standard audio CD! The sound quality is, as you would expect, great. It has anti-knock protection. It can play the songs in sequence, or shuffle them. It has all the standard features found on most portable CD players. And, it has a separate audio out jack in addition to the headphone jack. Now, for the bad stuff-- The silver control buttons look pretty sharp, but they're hard to identify. The LCD display is tiny and not very bright. If you record more than one "album" (that's the name Philips uses to designate a separate file folder), the CD will play all the songs in all the folders (shuffled or not). You can "program" it to play only certain songs, but that's kind of tedious. It would also be nice if the display showed the file name or song title instead of just the sequence number of the file. And, although it does come with a car adapter, I found the volume is not high enough. You have to turn your car stereo volume up to the point where it begins to hum. Overall, it's a good buy, and in my opinion, it represents the future of music players.
Rating:
Summary: The best unit in its day
Review: This model was the first to hit the market (in Aug 2000) that supported both CDRW and VBR (Variable Bit Rate). For that reason, I bought one the day they became available locally. I have yet to be truly disappointed, but I have a few gripes: Its display doesn't support any text, and as such the player doesn't read ID3 tags. Track names would be nice when navigating through 150+ songs. It can take up to a minute to start playing a new disc containing MP3s. The order in which 'albums' (directories) are indexed is somewhat odd. If you have your music separated into directories by artist and album name, they won't always be played together on the eXpanium. The model I have doesn't support M3U playlists, but that might have changed. No support for dual-format CDs (containing both MP3 and CDA tracks). This hasn't bothered me, but it is an advertised limitation. On the plus side, this WAS the only player with the features I needed, and still may be one of the best. I have used it at the gym, roller blading, and mountain biking, and it has only skipped occasionally. Usually changing the way I carry it prevents it from skipping again. Bottom line? Shop around, there might be a better choice on the market by now. If you can't find anything else, then the eXpanium is still a good choice that should keep you happy for a long time.
Rating:
Summary: So far, in early 2001, best of breed. The one to get.
Review: This eXpanium is the best, I think, of the MP3/CD players. It does not display text, but does a CD player? And I am not personally interested in short, one line text displays like the Rio Volt anyway. When they come out with a text SCREEN like display that displays multiple lines of data, so you can search through folders, then I will upgrade. The eXpanium worked flawlessly out the box. Other's I have tried did NOT, and were returned. I kept the eXpanium! I think it is very reliable. It has never failed to read any brand of CDR. It does read CDRW, but I have never tried one. And it won't skip! Even in MP3 mode! The ESP skip protection is switchable for CD, but always on in MP3. Strong Points: No skipping. Good battery life. Handles folders well (some brands don't). Has good bass boost. HAS A RESUME FEATURE!!! With RESUME turned on, it will remember the last track played, even if you remove CD or the batteries go dead! Love that feature! Good feature, if you have 150 songs on a CDR, and the battery dies at #75, and you were not watching what track you were playing! The RESUME switch has three positions: OFF/RESUME/HOLD. HOLD turns off buttons, you don't inadvertantly press one. You can program it easily. You can scan through tracks or folders easily. Has LINE OUT connection. Analog/dial type volume control. Has many modes, like repeat and shuffle. Comes with AC adapter, DC CAR adapter, cassette deck adapter. Sound quality is very good. Better than my other CD players (portables). Good quality construction. Good manual (some players come with manuals that look like photocopies). AND THE WARRANTY IS A ONE YEAR EXCHANGE, NOT FIX WARRANTY. The warranty says they will REPLACE the unit if it has a problem the first year, and take it to dealer or Philips. How many portable electronics items do you know that do that????? Ok, now the downsides...... Display is dim, and basically, slightly yech. Hard to see in dimmer light, or if you have eye problems. The output power to the headphones (volume) is not impressive. It is barely adequate..I use max volume or near to it sometimes. So if you want to destroy your hearing with loud volumes, this may be a limitation. The battery compartment cover is a very tight fit over the batteries, and sometimes you have to work it a bit to snap completely shut. It will "fast forward" within a track in CD mode, but NOT in MP3 mode. If you press the ">>"/fast-forward button while playing an MP3 CD, and hold it down, it will just jump folders. Out of curiosity, I connected the eXpanium to my $6000 stereo via the LINE OUT of the unit. I did not expect glorious sound better than my home components! I wanted to see if the sound was "nasty", like some devices that use audio compression are, especially at low bit rates. The lower the bit rate, the smaller the mp3 file, and more you can fit on a CD or MP3 device. But the lower the bitrate, the worse the sound, and it can be nasty in some cases. I use freeware CDex encoder/ripper program, with the "LAME" (yeah, that's the name) encoder option, set to 256 kbps. Sounds fine on my stereo. No nasties at all. 192kbps was also great for my classical music. Very good for what the eXpanium is. For rock and roll and many other types of music you can do fine at 128kbps, or in some cases as low as 80kbps. You can really store a LOT of songs on a CD with the low bit rates. At 256kbps I can get about 6 albums on a MP3/CD disc. In summary. I love the eXpanium. The only other contender for me was the RIO VOLT. I had my reasons why I chose the eXpanium, even though they are about the same price. I am 51 and have been an audio enthusiast for many years, and do have a background in electronics. My choice, the Philips.
Rating:
Summary: The future of portable music is looking good
Review: I've only had this thing a couple days but i am extremely pleased. The sound quality is great. If you have a cd burner your a fool if you buy an MP3 player over the Expanium. The good: Hundreds of songs on one cd. I put about 13 albums on one cd (700mb),they were ripped at 128 kbps. The sound quality is excelent and plenty loud which from what i understand can not be said about many MP3 players. This thing works with both 650 mb and 700 mb cds and the shuffle works over all albums(in order to organize your music the player allows you to place your songs into separate folders which it refers to as albums: eg. If you have a bunch of Doors songs you place them in a folder labeled Doors etc.). The player reads songs and "albums" in alphabetical order. Don't use characters other than numbers i wasted a couple cdrs before i figured out the player wouldn't read the songs with symbols in them. The Bad: Buy a nice pair of headphones b/c the ear buds that come with the player are horrible. The LED display could be made darker/easier to read. When the player is laying on a table its fine but when you look directly down on the player the display looks faded. It can't read ID3 tags, which means it won't siplay the name/artist of the MP3 song your listening too. When used in a car with the tape adapter there is a fant hiss if you turn the volumn up, I'm not sure if this would be corrected with a better tape adapter or not; but given the quality of the headphones I would imagine if you bought a high quality adapter the hiss would disapear. Overall: Its cheaper than the MP3 players out there. MP3 players usually offer 64mb with the ability to expand dependent on you willingness to buy flash cards(expensive), the Expanium offers you the ability to use 650-700 cdr/cdrw (cheap). So if you have a CD burner and your a big music fan then having 11 hours of music in your player is all you need to hear. I recommend highly.
Rating:
Summary: Long-term update
Review: Now that I've had my eXpanium 103 for over a year and a half, I would like to update my previous review and summarize my long-term experience with it. As I've already stated, its skip protection in MP3 playback mode is nothing less than phenomenal. Even after all this time, when my eXpanium has seen heavy service and has largely replaced FM radio in my mobile listening habits, I STILL have not been able to make it skip in MP3 mode! However, it has not been entirely smooth sailing - I have encountered a few other minor problems, but they are generally rare. On a few occasions, the eXpanium has locked up and refused to play certain MP3 tracks. When this happens, the <> buttons often fail to work as well. This usually requires turning off the unit to clear the problem and, in some cases, making sure it doesn't try to play that particular track again. I had one disc from which the eXpanium never would play one certain track at all - maybe the disc had a minor defect there, or maybe there was something about the MP3 itself that the eXpanium didn't like, but it just never wanted to play that one track. Again, though, these lockups are rare - the eXpanium usually plows happily through MP3 discs for hours at a time. Since I use mine almost exclusively for MP3 playback, I have little experience with standard audio discs, but it has performed beautifully with the few I've tried. I haven't tried using it to play a standard audio CD while I'm on the road, so I can't say whether its skip protection there is as good as it is in MP3 playback mode. Other reviewers have mentioned that the output of the headphone jack is weak, and I have to agree. Even with a proper set of headphones, as opposed to the included "ear buds," it still just doesn't put out much even at maximum volume. I wouldn't recommend it for personal listening in noisy environments. However, I generally use my eXpanium in the car, with the included cassette adapter, and the output level from the "Line Out" jack is perfectly adequate for that. The "resume" feature usually works well - note that, in MP3 mode, "resume" simply restarts the most recently played MP3 track from the beginning - but I've noticed that it sometimes resumes the wrong track. This MIGHT be due to the fact that I tend to run it from the car DC adapter and seldom have batteries installed in it, but the eXpanium seems to have a non-volatile memory to keep track of its "resume" location, as unplugging it from the car [even without batteries] usually does not make it forget which track was last played. Sometimes, though, it just forgets where it was. The DC power adapter in the car kit seems to be somewhat poorly designed and does not correctly fit my car's lighter socket, nor does it fit well in a friend's car or in the accessory power socket I installed in my car. The adapter seems to be just a bit oversized, making it a very tight fit indeed. As a result, its connectors were soon damaged, and the adapter could not be inserted, so I bought a universal DC adapter from Radio Shack for use with this unit. That works just fine - at least it fits into my power socket! The display IS strictly bare-bones and does not display any ID3 tag data, but as I have stated in my earlier review, I already knew about the display before I bought mine, and I bought it anyway, on the strength of the reviews about its skip protection. Keep in mind, though, that the eXpanium 103 IS a first-generation model! Philips has broadened its eXpanium line, and newer models do have more informative displays - including ID3 tag support - and a wider array of features. If price is a factor, and you don't mind putting up with a completely basic display and sacrificing some features found in newer players, then the eXpanium 103 is a very good choice. If you don't mind paying more for a newer and more advanced player, then by all means, buy one of the newer models in the eXpanium line. To paraphrase an old advertising slogan... Hasn't skipped yet!
Rating:
Summary: Look at the price.
Review: I bought my EXP103 last January. In the past 8 months this unit has seen some heavy use. Four times a week I use it at the gym and also in my pickup truck. This unit does not skip, is easy on batteries and for the price any short comings are easy to overlook. Consider - MP3/CD Player, Power adaptor, car cassette converter for this price. If you don't need the ID tags this is a deal.
One down note: The earbuds are not that great, I replaced them with a set of inexpensive wraparound headphones and am now pleased with the sound quality.
Rating:
Summary: Philips EXP103 eXpanium
Review: I was very impressed when I bought this player a year ago but it gradually broke down to the point where it no longer reads any type of multimedia.
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