Rating: 
Summary: Works pretty well if you follow the rules!
Review: I just picked this up without reading the reviews (impulse buy!) and when I got home to read the reviews I got a little scared at all the bad reviews. I burned a CD (in Adaptec EZ CD Creator 3.5c using the 'data cd' wizard) and sure enough, I was missing 60 songs, it skipped a lot, took 5-10 seconds between tracks, and operated so poorly I thought that I'd have to return it.I didn't really want to return it, though, so I started reading the instructions. I tried burning a CDRW in straight ISO9660 format, making sure the disc session was closed, using 8 character file names, all special characters removed, using only 128kbps files I personally encoded. So far, it has played with no skips and no problems. The delay between tracks is _gone_. I think a good portion of the problems people have been having is because of the strict file format this player _REQUIRES_. I've seen some posts on the 'net about how to trick it into displaying more characters, playing bitrates higher than 128kbps or how to burn with 30 char file names...and these seem to be the same people who are having problems. After all, it's nice that the player _can_ play up to 192kbps, but if it's skipping while doing so, what do you think the problem is? So far it's played my correctly burned CD with NO problems whatsoever (It's 1/3 of the way through the CD and I've heard no audio problems, unlike my first disc which skipped every 2-3 minutes) Now, since I'm a bit happier with it, why only 4 stars? Well, needing to rename your files and only use 8 char file names and burn a special way is a pain, the 128kbps limit should have been more explicit on the packaging...and there's no easy way to skip between directories (you have to hit file/dir twice, then type in the directory #. Hazardous to your health while driving!). Other than that, I got exactly what I expected when I paid for it. In summary, it seems to me that if you're willing to play by the rules, you may find that the player is an excellent buy!
Rating:
Summary: If you bought this CD/mp3 player, READ THIS NOW!
Review: Ok, I have been testing this over and over with CDRWs, and found a system that works fairly well. Well enough for me anyway. First off, let me point out some things. I *think* it only has enough memory for 200 songs. It WILL NOT recognize the rest. It may be that it only has enough memory for X number of characters in the filenames, thus when the limit is reached, the rest won't play. I'm not sure which. If this is true, it has come out to about 200 songs each time. The CD will have the rest on it, but it won't play them. To compensate for this, you can either: encode at a higher bitrate (don't exceed 192. You won't be able to fit any more of course, but you'll have better quality), or you can combine songs. If you are encoding your own albums, you can set it to encode more than one song in the same track. Remember, you won't have the ID3 tags for the second song. You might think that you'd be able to write in the ID3 tag "track 1 name/track 2 name," but it only displays 30 characters, including dashes and spaces. If you can fit it, good for you, but you won't be able to skip directly to that track of course. To scroll through the folders, stop the CD so it's at the "main screen" ("Welcome MP3") and then press the "display" button (second button on the left). You can then press the "+" and "-" to move through the folders. Pressing "display" again will move the cursor down to the song listings. You can scroll through the songs on each album this way (once you get to the end it will automatically go to the next album). Pressing display again will return to the main screen. Don't ask me about the "search" feature, I've heard it doesn't work, and even if it does, it's probably more trouble than it's worth. WHEN ENCODING YOUR SONGS: For each album, artist, etc. make a folder. I have a folder for each band, and then folders for each of their albums inside those. Name the folder "1 AlbumName," "2 NextAlbumName," etc. Of course, if you have more than 9 albums for each artist, you'll want "01," "02," etc. This way, you can have your albums in the order you want them (it alphabetizes EVERYTHING). You will never see the band folders, but it will put them in the order you want them on the CD. Next, title your songs "01 SongTitle," "02 NextSongTitle," etc. Don't put dashes in between. You *can*, but when you are scrolling through songs/albums, it only displays the first SIX characters of the name. That is including the number (assuming you are doing it the way I am explaining). It ignores spaces, so it doesn't matter if you use them. When you are actually PLAYING the song, it displays artist, album, and song title. That is read off of the ID3 tags, so make SURE you have those correct. People have posted problems they have had, but I haven't had much trouble with it. I think it's a good price for an mp3 player. They are so new, you can't expect much better. The interface is annoying and confusing (and doesn't work very well), but right now at this price, you can't beat it. If you have any questions, comments, or info, email me at obscure-mind@excite.com
Rating: 
Summary: Memorex 8505 MP3CD review
Review: Bought it on Friday, January 26th, and loaded it up with 'used' alkaline batteries for the road trip back to Canada. Did not skip once. Used fully charged 1600 mah NiMH batteries on the 27th, and so far have had it play for 6 hours. When I bought the unit, I was glad to see that I had the suffix A or revised unit, manufactured in October 2000. I was worried that I would have purchased the earlier model, which is purported to have severe skipping problems. So far; a) flawlessly plays all of my old time radio shows (32 kbps encoding at 44Khz), b) flawlessly plays all of my personally encoded music CD's from 128-192 kbps. I've not tried encoding with VBR because I don't use that and believe that the unit might have trouble with it. It seems to have about a 95% + success rate when playing files downloaded from Napster. The files that choked were VBR or had other problems. Before burning tracks, I check the integrity of the file with a program called MP3Utility (at least now I do). If a file has a problem, I re download it. It appears to read directories alphabetically and/or numerically, although I do not know which takes preference. I alphabetize my directories and number my songs/tracks. A couple of interesting points; when using the 'previously used' alkaline batteries, I saw a low battery message appear on screen. Ignoring it, I did start to have skipping problems, which were cured by using the AC adapter. For $99.99, the package included the player, an AC adapter, headphones, a cigarette lighter adapter, and a car cassette adapter. I'm happy with it, and would not hesitate recommending it. If you buy it, I suggest using 1600 mah NiMH batteries, not burning with VBR, and numbering your songs (01 - filename, 02 - filename, and so on). Put whole albums into separate alphabetical directories. I use EZ CD Creator 4.02 and use ISO 9660 with long filenames as options. Hope this helps.
Rating: 
Summary: Not too bad
Review: I have the Suffix A model and have no skipping problems at all. The only problems I am having with this unit are- 1. The 2 second pauses that randomly happen during songs. I had one song pause 4 times. Other times I wont hear a pause for 20 min. 2. I have had the unit completely shut off after a song far before the end of the directory (what is wrong with EZ CD Creator?) Will I have less problems if I use something else? 3.Variable bit rate does not work with this unit. After I burned a CD I had certain songs stop playing randomly throughout the disc. The timer kept going, but no sound. If I paused it and hit play again it would play again. I popped the disc on my PC and tested the songs and noticed the only ones with this problem were the ones with a changing bit rate. 4. The player does not recognize some of my directories. It could be that I did not number my directories beforehand. I will have to test it. I just burned on an 80min disc over 650 mb and did not number any of my 9 directories (but did give them titles). The Memorex only recognized the 1st directory. When I tried to skip to another it gave me "No Dir". I still have some testing to do. Maybe I needto stick with 74 min discs or at least put less than 650 mb of music on the 80 min discs.
Rating:
Summary: I am very happy with my unit.
Review: I travel quite a bit and now being able to carry 100 or 200 CD's worth of music is a reality. My units works quite well. I have experianced some unexplained skips, but these are few and far between.(Maybe once an hour or two). The other main weakness is the manual itself. It is too skimpy. In order to get the most out of this unit, the best way to name files and how to best use the tags needs to be explained. For example some of my CD/Directories play the files out of order ie track 3 first, sequentually to the last track and them track1 and track2. This is not really a big problem but a few CD's need the tracks played in order. The unit will do it, but how to do it, is not in the manual. I found it hard at first to scroll down through the directories. But once I figured it out on my own (no thanks to the manual) it is quite easy. I usually use the AC, but am now using the batteries. As with most electronic stuff, I expect it will eat the batteries very quickly. I burn my mp3s on Cd at 2x and use the cheapest CD available. The beauty here is I am not worried about damaging a CD. I always have a copy. All my CD's play great. I did get a Cd given to me and only half the files were recognised. I am not sure why as I do not know how the CD was burned. I do know that all the files are at a different bit rates and could even be mpsVBR (variable bit rate). I always use 128 kps mp3s. And have no problem. And yes the CD must be burned all in one session ... something else that is not too clear in the manual. I have not played it in the car, but I have batted it around held it at different angles with no skips. For that 5th and last star in the rating, it could be a bit smaller, the controls a bit friendlier, a completer manual, and absoluty no skips. All in all I am happy with my unit as I now have hundreds of hours of music now at my disposal in my one CD wallet.
Rating:
Summary: MACINTOSH Users Note! Burning instructions.
Review: MACINTOSH users: When burning MP3 CDs for the Memorex, you do NOT need to burn in the ISO9660 format, as the instructions say. (This is also the case for the Phillips Expanium). Amazingly, you can burn your MP3 CDs as regular Macintosh-formatted CDs, and they will play just fine. However, it's wise to follow several conventions: 1) be certain all your MP3 files end with the .mp3 suffix; 2) number songs sequentially at the beginning of the file (such as 01-slipperypeople.mp3) so they stay in the order you intended (this is especially important for those who listen to books-on-tape type of files; a simple shareware program such as drop•rename will do these renaming tasks automatically) 3) don't put anything in the "root" directory, but keep a simple file structure with each folder containing an album or a selection (with no subfolders within folders); 4) be certain that bitrate is between 32-190, and that mhz is 44.1 -- if not, use a program such as soundjam to convert files into these bitrate/mhz combinations (and use a G4, because the conversion takes awhile!). Impression of the Memorex: not perfect but a great deal for under a hundred, does what it's supposed to do. Not great for vigorous walking while listening to MP3s because there is more anti-skip is memory allocated to CDs than to MP3s. Mp3s play great when unit is sitting on the seat of a car or when walking normally with the unit in a belt-pack.
Rating:
Summary: Skips
Review: I liked everything about it with the exception of skipping in the car. It has to go back and now I see that they have raised the price so I'll wait for another brand to surface.
Rating:
Summary: This thing rocks!
Review: Well, I don't know why everyone is all negative about the thing. At first, I thought that this unit really sucked. I was all "hey guy's, check this thing out" and then it would skip every 5 seconds. I thought that it was the bitrate, so I made a cd with every bitrate available (except that VBR crap.) They all worked just fine, unless you took it down too low (< 96kbps - who cares, right?) I'm big on tags in my files, so I made a cd with no tags. I guess it didn't waste it's buffer with reading all 180 tags and it worked fine after that. Maybe it was just the media, but I doubt it. I might try putting just the title tag into it and use the filename for the artist. I took it on my first raod trip a week ago. 6 hours to L.A. We made the trip there and back on like one cd (beautiful.) On the way up it skipped maybe twice (and that may even have been the mp3 itself.) Certainly no complaints. On the way back we hit a rough road and I guess it was just enough and long enough to not let it fill up the buffer ever, so it was having problems. Once it turned off by itself. But it was 10 times as good as a regular cd player. We just kicked back and listened on the whole trip. I like: Works surprisingly nice. Despite the 128 kbps warning, I've had it go at 192 for hours and even up to 320. Perhaps it has less antiskip protection or something, but it works great. It's pretty dang cheap. I don't like (or haven't figured out yet): The resume doesn't really work. I would like a shuffle play in directories. It cuts off the filename at 8 characters. If it could display more it would be great. Anyone know where to get a remote???
Rating: 
Summary: Very good idea...but sucky design
Review: Perhaps if this unit functioned correctly, it would be the best thing since bread and butter. (But what's so great about that, anyway?) For having 45 second anti skip, this thing really sucks...it skips all of the time in the car, regardless of whether it's from shock or not, it just skips, and it happens frequently. Also, I have the proclaimed "suffix A" model, and it is still a sorry machine. Just using it at home with the adapter I haven't had problems, but it also skipped very bad when I was running and had batteries in it. I would reccommend this product if you only want something to hook up to your home system. Otherwise...wait.
Rating:
Summary: Best Player For the Money
Review: Name 1 other MP3 player for approx. $100 in which 650 Mb of storage is $1, Shows Artist, Title, and Track Tag, is searchable and has all the other features that this one does... I have a 70 MP3 CD Archive with over 9,000 songs, this plays every song flawlessly. This is used in my car, mounted on a $39 portable CD mounting bracket, RR tracks, Pot holes or bass, have yet to make this player skip. For those who are unable to burn correctly. Always hit your Target, slower burns are better, make sure your songs aren't cooked to begin with, stay away from Direct CD, RIP your own MP3's for ensured quality. G.I.G.O.
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