Rating: 
Summary: Excellent MP3-CD player
Review: This is a well-designed, sturdy and versatile player. It can play MP3s encoded up to 320 KBPS (which was a major buying factor for me)
It has a relatively large, legible LCD display with good contrast and backlight. The headphones are OK if you like the in-the-ear design.Display has three modes: album, filename and ID3 tag.
If you burn a CD with folders for individual artists (or styles) the album mode will display the name of the selected folder on your MP3 CD.
The filename mode will scroll the individual filenames but only the first 40 characters. I really like this feature since a lot of my MP3s do not have decent ID3 tag info and I was dreading the prospect of having to go in and update them all.
The ID3 tag mode is just what it implies but I found myself not using this feature at all since I can just look at the filenames instead. I was impressed with the EXP50317's speed in reading and searching MP3 CDs; a friend of mine has an older Philips model which is a lot slower than this one. Also, I haven't experienced any skips or hangups during play or while changing tracks.
Sound quality of the player is very good for both CDs and MP3s and the car accesories make it a very nice addition to your car's stereo system. Plus now I can finally listen to all my MP3 while I'm driving.
The only thing I don't like about the EXP50317 is the fact that the control buttons have a chrome finish which makes fingerprints and smears on the buttons very visible. A matte finish for the buttons would've been better.
Overall, I think this is an exceptional player and, although it wasn't cheap, I'm glad I spent the extra money. It was worth it.
Rating:
Summary: Awesome Player
Review: This MP-3/CD player is great. The sound quality is tremendous and includes many different functions for MP-3 playback like shuffle (within an album), shuffle all(the whole cd), shuffle repeat and shuffle all repeat. The seak time for song to song in shuffle mode is about 1 second or less. To me very reasonable. The color of the lid is very dark almost black metalic color. It actually looks better than the picture shows.
I am very pleased with this player and would reccomend it to anyone looking for a quality portable MP-3/CD player.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty good Unit
Review: UPDATE 8/5/02
I've been using this unit daily for 1-10 hours a day for the last 9 months without any probles whatsoever. It has worked flawlessly. The "resume" function is a little annoying, but not enough to make me want to get rid of it. There's nothing like having 180 songs on cd at your fingertip. :-) I got rid of my Honda in January and now have a Maxima with the Bose system and the combination of the Philips and the Bose is absolutely amazing!!!!! Since I commute about 2 1/2 hours a day an MP3 player really appeals to me. I bought the 503 after returning 2 Rio Volts in one month. This unit is not as good looking (purely subjective) but works much better, is quieter and louder. To clarify, I use mine in the car and it doesn't whine and "thump" like the Rio. However, the cassette adapter that comes with the unit doesn't make good contact with my stock Honda cassette player heads so I use the one that came with my old Aiwa CD player. MAN! What a difference in VOLUME! The head on the Philips needs to stick out further (like the Aiwa). It's pretty easy to use, has a cool metallic black/purple finish and the best ear-buds I've ever used. It's easy to navigate and has a fast-forward (not Rio). The display is difficult to read in sunlight, impossible to read with polarized shades on, but is pretty cool at night. So, I plan on using this unit happily, until I can afford a Remote Solutions PJB-100 (20 Gig hard-drive). The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is the cassette adapter.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: When I decided I would buy an MP3-Capable CD player, I set out to compare which one was the best. Although I had originally decided that I would buy the Rio Volt sp250, finding this item in Europe proved to be too difficult, and I would have to order it specially. Then I saw the Expandium 500 Series. I reviewed this item, and it seemed good enough for me, so I purchased it. I already had an MP3 cd with the albums in their respective directories, so I was afraid that the player would not be capable of handling this, but to my surprise, and joy, it recognized it, and it makes each directory an "album", making it easy to browse the 200+ songs I had on my CD. Additionally, I have not yet been able to get the player to skip. Although the earphones that came with it are not to my liking, that is easily changed. With the handy midpoint controller on the headphones, you can easily chose ones to your own preference without having to worry about a compatible remote on them. Although I prefer the look of the Rio Volt, it was not worth the extra wait. My highest recommendations for this player.
Rating:
Summary: Wow! The one I have been waiting for...
Review: When I first heard about MP3 CD players a year or two ago I knew that I had to have one. But as with all technology sometimes it's best to sit it out and wait for it to mature. Thank you Philips for the first grown-up player! This thing is great. I am quite familiar with MP3 and I try to keep up on the latest technology and I must say that the one most important feature of this player - sound quality - is extremely excellent. All of my MP3s are "archive quality" (IMHO!) and the Philips does an admirable job of reproducing them. Most of my MP3s are variable bit rate, many with BRs ranging from 12 - 320, and I have had no problems there. Needless to say this was a big selling point for me. The ID3 feature (which recognizes artist & song info) is also excellent, as well as the interface, backlight, speed of song title recognition and startup, and included accessories. It is also very compact and light. About the only complaint I can come up with is that it does not include a case... personally I'd like to see a small case befitting this beautiful little player. Needless to say most of the CD player cases out there are bulky and ugly, so I had to create one out of a CD disc case. Ah well, one can dream... As far as the color, as others have mentioned it is not black, but more of a purple color. However, I like it! Black is so... black. The purple is something of a pleasant change and has a nice iridescence to it.
| 
