Philips Gogear HDD086 mp3 player

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Phillips GoGear HDD085
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Off we go with the Phillips GoGear HDD085 proving to be one of the best MP3 players that I have ever had. Of course most people won’t have heard of it but it is very much in line with the ipod in some respects. Upon wanting a suitable MP3 player I decided to do a little bit of research as always and then try some out. At the time the ipod’s were just being released and everyone was trying to get hold of them even though they were still very high in costs. So not really wanting to pay for an ipod I carried on looking around for another device that could hold a very lot of songs and then listen to them with a decent set of headphones.

That’s where I came around to get this snaggy little thing from Argos costing me just over a hundred pounds, cheaper than what some of the ipod’s were selling for, I thought that this was a lot better although it had lots of the same properties. So trotting off down to Argos I queued up with the catalogue number in hand waiting to pay, upon collection I saw my box slide down the conveyer belt and couldn’t wait to get it home. The box measuring 252 x 93 x 153mm was pretty standard with nothing on it diverting my attention but hey it’s just a box.

So getting home and opening the packaging I found that as well as the MP3 player I had some high quality in-ear headphones, a neck strap, a protective pouch, USB cable, CD-ROM with software and manual, and finally a multi-voltage AC/DC power adapter/charger. Jumping to conclusions I thought whay! Let’s start listening. How wrong could I be? First of all it needed charging and then I needed to put my songs on it that I wanted to listen to. So whilst my GoGear was charging I thought that it would be best to install the software that came with the device. The installation of the software and using it was all very easy to do and it enabled me to put the chosen songs on to my MP3 player when it was charged. So after the installation was finished I spent just short of an hour choosing al of the songs that I would like on it so that I could listen to them anywhere. The capacity of this MP3 player is 3GB so it took a bit of doing to fill it selecting the songs from my storage of 24GB of music stored on my computer.

Being sure that I wasn’t going to break it before I had even began I routed in the box and looked for the instructions and proceeded to read the “Getting Started” booklet. This was helpful for telling me how to put music on to my MP3 player which I already knew anyway but there is no harm in reading some instructions. There are several different bits of paper in the box. One says “NEED HELP?” where a phone number can be used if you come into difficulties whilst trying to use your product. There is also the quick start guide, a booklet called “Safety and Warranty” which basically is a big confusing list of what they consider to be their fault with the product and what you are able to return it for etc, in this booklet there are also some handy phone numbers so that you can contact them if you would like some more information from them. Finally I received a little leaflet which asks you to register your product. If you register the product you get entered into a competition to see if you are the lucky winner of TV with Amblight, DVD recorder with hard drive or a Shoqbox.

So for me to use my Phillips GoGear it had to be charged and this took around four hours as it was the first time that it had been charged, and this allowed it to be charged to 100%. There are several different battery statuses that are used on the player. Full battery, 2/3 full, half full, battery low and battery empty. Even the most non technical standards would be able to understand what each of these meant. The battery status icon is located at the top right hand corner of the screen. The good thing about this payer is that if you are recording etc when the battery runs out, moments before it does all of the recordings will be saved so that nothing will be lost when the battery does die.

The player is very easy to use and I expect that even very young people would be able to work it without the help of an adult. The main power button is located in the centre of the four buttons which also has a second function as the pause/play button. The buttons surrounding are the up and down buttons as well as the skip forward and backwards buttons. Another added feature to the player is that if you leave it turned on and there is no activity for at least ten minutes then it will automatically turn off saving the power of the battery. There are a few buttons based all around the player but they are not very hard to use and all have relatively straight forward functions.

There are also some sockets and other features to the player. The main sockets are where the charger plugs into, where the headphones plug into and where the USB cable plugs in. other buttons consist of the hold slider, View button which allows you to change the view i.e. the library and the now playing screen, the volumes keys +/-, the REC button which allows you to record voice on the player and also a play list button. This is where the selected track will be added to your play list and will periodically play.

Upon turning my MP3 player on I was faced with a rather simple menu which consisted of titles such as MUSIC, RADIO, SETTINGS, and RECORDINGS. All of the previous titles where easy enough to work out what each of the do since they are pretty much self explanatory. To navigate through the menus you have to use the directional keys up and down and if you would like to select a particular item you press right to proceed and if you would like to go back to a previous menu then you have to press the skip back button which points to the left. This is really very simple to use and I am sure that no one would have any problems with this. Eventually one you have chosen the song that you would like to listen to then quite obviously you have to press the Play/Pause button to confirm you selection.

When you first turn on the MP3 player you will see that there is already some music that has been put on to the device, this is all of the rubbish that you would never listen to if your life depended on it but still you are bale to listen to it if you do not put your own music on straight way. Searching for your music or a particular song on the device is relatively easy as there are many options that you are able to choose from. You are bale to search for your play lists, or you can search through all of your songs at once as they are listed alphabetically, you can also search by the artists of the song that you are looking for, you can also search by genre and finally you are able to search for your songs by the name of the album. All of these get shown in alphabetical order so that it is easier to find the album or songs that you are looking for.

Putting the music on to your device is very easy, once you have chosen what songs you would like to put on the player then you can connect you device to the computer where it will begin charging if it is not fully charged but anyway all you have to do is tick the checkbox of the songs that you would like to put on to the player and the click the sync icon at the top of windows media player screen and then choose the device, which is the Phillips GoGear. This will then start to put all of the songs onto the device. If it is any easier you are also able to browse the device as a mass storage device and then copy the files into the correct folder and therefore it sometimes makes it a bit quicker to put come music on the device. Either way once it has finished you will be able to listen to the music that you placed on the device through the use of the headphones that are supplied or some that you already purchased if you find that they are better than the ones that are supplied with the device.

Whilst you are listening to the music on the device you also have the options to have selected features turned on such as the shuffle and repeat modes. The shuffle mode allows you to listen to the music on the player in any random order that the device chooses. If you choose the repeat option then you either listen to the same song again and again or you can listen to a selected play list again and again. Both of these are a useful feature if you do not mind listening to any of the music that you have on the device you if you prefer to listen to the same song again and again because you feel the need to learn all of the words etc.

As with most of the MP3 players these days you are able to change some of the settings such as the equaliser, there is nothing different about this player you can also change this one which means that you are able to set different settings to different songs which is a very good feature. For example you might like the bass of one song and feel the need to increase and so you can for that song but this will not affect any other songs unless you tell the device to. I don’t mean speak to it and say apply or something of the sort although that will be coming in the next few years or so but you have to select an option for it to be applied. There are also some preset options such as rock and jazz etc this can also be very useful when you are changing the settings for some songs.

If you are looking for a song and cannot remember the name of the song etc you can listen to the first ten seconds of a song to see if you recognise it etc. all you have to do is when you are listening to your music is press down and then select the option called INTROSCAN. This will then allow for you to listen to the first ten seconds of all the songs on the device in sequence. You are also able to listen to the radio on this device which is quite good if you don’t like the radio that they have on at work etc. This feature is very easy to use and I am sure that you will not have any problems using it. You are able to save some of the radio stations that you listen to, this will save you the hassle of scanning for all of the different channels every time that you want to listen to the radio using the device. If you find that the scan does not find the radio station that you would like to listen to and you know the frequency then you can manually tune in to it using the device which is also another nice feature on the player.

The thing that I was most surprised with about this mP3 player was that you are able to record voice clips on it and then store them on the player. When you are doing this you have a maximum storage of 200 clips and when this limit has been reached it will start to overwrite the clips already stored starting from the beginning so it is always a good idea to back up all of your voice recordings on a computer or CD etc. if you would like to make a voice recording a any recording for that matter all you have to do is hold the REC key for three seconds. This will then start the recording application which is very easy.

If you would like to see what settings you are able to change then you can view them by selecting the settings menu whilst you are at the home screen before choosing what you would like to do. Some of the settings that you are able to change are things such as how long the backlight will stay on for and also some things such as shuffle etc. there is a sleep timer that can be set so that the device turns off after a set amount of time. The options are 15, 30 and 60 minutes.

You can also use the device as a data storage device if you would like to, all you have to do is browse the device in the windows explorer and then copy the file over. This will mean that you can then take the document or data file off on to another computer and then use it for whatever reasons.

There are several safety precautions that you are supposed to follow when using this device and they are things such as do not expose to excessive heat etc but most of these are pretty obvious things not to do for example do not go swimming with this device as this is not the new waterproof ipod shuffle.

Well I have to say I cannot comment on the customer service from Phillips because I have never encountered a problem which I suppose is a good thing. But there is an excellent troubleshooting section in the manual that can be viewed on the CD that comes with the device. If I were to rate this product then I would have to give it 8/10 because although it functions well it is not the best looking device in the world and it is sometimes lacking in battery power as sometimes it can only last about 7 hours. But the Phillips GoGear is generally a good MP3 player and I would recommend it to any potential buyers as I believe it has gone down to about £80.00 now which is cheaper than what I paid for it about a year ago. The Phillips GoGear can be purchased from most good electrical stores and can be purchased on the net cheaper from places such as www.ebay.co.uk or www.amazon.co.uk which are both well known so you will more than likely be able to buy this product online. Below is some of the more technical stuff of the device for those that can understand it:

Power Supply – 610 mAh Li-ion internal rechargeable battery
Dimensions – 53 x 86 x 16.7 mm (2.1 x 3.4 x 0.7 inches)
Weight – 78g (3.3 oz)
Picture / Display – White Backlight LCD, 96 x 64 pixels
Sound – Channel Separation – 50dB
- Equalizer settings – Rock, RnB, Electronica, Hip-Hop, Classical, Jazz
- Frequency response – 30 – 18000 Hz
- Signal to noise Ratio - >80 dB
- Output Power (RMS) – 2 x 4 mW
Playback time – 10 hours
Compression format – MP3, WAV, WMA
DRM – PDRM
ID3-tag support – Album title and artist name
Storage – 3GB
Tuner Band – FM
Music transfer – via Windows Media Player 10
Data transfer – via Windows Explorer

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System Requirements:
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Windows XP (SP1 or above)
Pentium II or better
64 MB RAM
100 MB hard drive space
Internet connection
Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 or later
Video display card
Soundcard
USB port

Thank you for reading this review about the Phillips GoGear HDD085 and I hope to be hearing from you soon.