Memorex MPD8081 Portable Mini-CD/CD-R/MP3 Pocket Player
By: Memorex Average Rating: 3.0 Total Reviews: 59
More Information
 On: 2007-03-02
This thing worked for 5 days after I bought it...stone age and not worth the money.
 On: 2006-08-15
Pros: Plays music in a standard format on standard discs (no MTP or other proprietary systems to deal with.) Cheap.
Cons: TOO cheap. Old and outdated. Limited format support (no WMA for example.)
Oh wow! These things are still being sold? I bought one years ago when it was a brand new thing. Back then it was good because flash-based MP3 players used the MTP-style proprietary method of transfering files so they were a pain to work with (not to mention that back then 256MB of flash was "high end" and extremely expensive.) Today you can do a lot better and frankly I recommend against buying this. Ill write from memory what I remember (I gave it away a long time ago.)
First, it doesnt remember any settings. I cant remember where it left off, and it doesnt remember settings like shuffle. That means that every time you start it, unless you go through the 5 or so button presses it required to enable the correct shuffle mode, it would play your music in the same order.
To make things worse, the displays do seem to be made more cheaply or something. I too had one where the display simply stopped working after about a month or so. While with most MP3 players a broken display is hardly fatal (you need to hear a lot more than you need to see) the fact that it couldnt remember any settings or where you left off and that it required you to go through several button presses to enable basic options such as shuffle made it become all but completely unusable since I wasnt aware I needed to memorize the exact key presses to do such things. If you want to play something in order this is fine, but, unless you rotate your discs very often, going in order will get old very fast.
Also, I recently tried to help the person transfer an audiobook to the player. In an effort to make the files fit on a single disc, I elected to decrease quality somewhat. I used low bitrates, mono, and 22KHz audio. All I got out was silence though. Officially it supports sample rates from 8KHz to 48KHz, so I guess it just wont allow mono.
Finally, if I remember correctly, I would occasionally actually get skipping despite the skip protection. If I recall correctly, it was certain VBR files it would skip on. I think I had the impression that it was primarily caused by files that could hit numbers like 320Kbps bitrate and the maximum the player was perhaps made for was 256Kbps. I may be mistaken about that, but, unmistakably whatever the cause was, it had troubles with some VBR. Either way, my current modern MP3 player has no such troubles.
So, I give it two stars. It is functional, and will still work today -- and its actually small enough to fit within a large pocket, so even still has some convenience factor compared to a full-sized mp3 cd player. Unfortunately, it lacks a lot of modern features and the main advantages -- the large amount of storage for such a small size at its price range -- no longer apply today with flash based players hitting 4+GB of storage and micro/mini harddrive players in the area of 4-80GB and costing less for the same amount of storage.
 On: 2006-06-01
I managed to get one of these refurbished off Amazon, so hopefully the defective-LCD screen issue has ben resolved on this unit. It gets great battery life, plays mini CD-RWs flawlessly (even multi-session discs). I use Memorex brand "Pocket" CD-RWs. The 2 minutes of skip protection is more than enough to prevent interuptions in playing. The player is small enough to fit into most pockets, probably not tight jeans, though. The included headphones are decent. The on- screen-menu is a bit tricky to learn, but once you get used to it, its pretty easy and quick to naviagte folders and songs. The only qualm I have is the lack of a backlight for the screen.
On: 2005-09-30
Ive had one of these for a little under two years and when I had it I rarely used it. It holds so little music per mini-CD that I just kept burning the much cheaper full sized CDs. Now, I have a flash based player.
If youre really considering this. Dont. Look at one of the cheaper flash players. The mini-CDs only hold 212 (if I remember correctly) and you can get a Sandisk DAP 256 for around $50 now (Sept 05).
However, for a collector of odd gadgets and obsolete tech, sure, this is an interesting anomoly.
On: 2005-09-01
The lcd which is a very vital element in knowing what is being played for MP3 cds stopped working after a month. I was very disappointed as this was a gift for my dad.
The battery compartment lid is very tight and I think that is one of the reasons the lcd stopped working as some connection may have gotten loose inside because of the pressure needed to open the battery compartment.
The sound quality of the headphones is not good. Used a sony headphone instead and the sound was great. So no complaints about the sound quality here. If the LCD worked, this player would have been a good buy.
I bought a Philips Expanium 431 instead. Not only is it smaller than this player and the lcd works great too.
On: 2005-07-13
I intended to burn MP3 CDs on my computer and play them in this Mini-CD player while I exercise. This player DOES NOT PLAY MP3 CDs! It recognized the tracks on the screen, but as I skipped through the tracks, it only would play the last track on the CD. By the way, I had NO problem playing the same MP3 CD on my Sony DVD Player, model DVP-NS575P! Amazon cheerfully sent me another unit within a few days. As soon as I put batteries in it and turned it on, I found out the display did not work, right out of the box. I finally requested a refund.
 On: 2005-05-01
I must first make a personal admission. When I first looked at the advertisement for the Memorex MPD8081 MP3 player, I thought it was a full size MP3 player that played full size disks. My bad...I didnt read close enough. When the package arrived and I say that it was a "baby" CD/MP3 player, I first was disappointed.
Well returning it was a hassle so I thought I would give it a try. Man was I happy I did. While the portable mini-CD/CD-R/MP3 player is larger than a "chip memory" based MP3 player, it is quite a bit smaller even the smallest stardard CD players. Small enough to fit in my pants pocket.
The player came with three pocket (or mini) CD-Rs. I quickly burned one with music I ripped from my personal CD collection using Microsoft Media Player. The burn went flawlessly. I put the little disk on my new player, but on the supplied headphones and listened. WOW, I love digital music. Sounds great. The bass-boost worked very well.
The LCD display showes a great deal of information. I must say that I am at a loss why it didnt pickup any information related the song playing except for the title. The title, BTW, was dirived from the file name. As I stated before, I ripped the music with Microsoft Media Player. I was connected to the internet so WMP found the information on each song. I dont know if it is the fault of the ripping or the MP3 player, but I cant see the album and artist info while playing the mini disks.
The main reason I bought the Memorex MPD8081 was to use it in my car. I have tried using portable CD players that said they had great skip protection, but it sure skipped in my car. The MP3 pocket player worked flawlessly! No skips and the music using a cassette adapter in my car stereo sounded great! Note: The bass boost feature is a little much when playing in a stereo system like one in your car or home.
I use a 192 Kbps rate when ripping my MP3 files. A little more than most people, but I am willing to give up smaller size for a bit better sound. Using this method, I can get around 29 songs on one 210 MB disk. Not bad! The memory capacity of a mini CD-R/CD-RW (210 MB) compares very well to your standard SD or MMC memory chip of 256 MB and at only a fraction of the cost.
The battery live with 2 AA batteries was remarkably good. I was suprised! Also, the battery "gas meter" worked very well compared to many other devices using this feature.
Bottom line:
Good points: Much smaller than a portable CD player. Great sound. Great battery life. Cheaper money outlay for additional memory. Mini CD-R/CD-RWs completely compatible with almost every burner ever made. Fantastic addition to your AM/FM/Cassette car stereo. Benefit-to-cost ratio very high.
Bad points: Larger than almost every "chip-based-memory" MP3 player. DOES NOT PLAY WMA FILES CREATED WITH MICROSOFT MEDIA PLAYER. (Sure wished it did.) Poor job at identifying the music being played. No built-in equalizer (although I hear a newer Memorex model does.)
All-in-all the Memorex MPD8081 portable mini-CD/CD-R/CD-RW pocket player is a great value. Try one.
On: 2004-11-08
Ive had this mp3 player for at least 2 years now, and I havent had a single problem with it. Ive dropped it on hardwood floor more times than I care to remember, but nothing has broken, a testament to how durable it is. The sound quality is good but nothing exceptional. The only gripes I can think of are the slow scrolling display and the relatively short battery life (about 5 hours). If you need a cheap mp3 player look no further.
On: 2004-11-07
Ive had this mp3 player for at least 2 years now, and I havent had a single problem with it. Ive dropped it on hardwood floor more times than I care to remember, but nothing has broken, a testament to how durable it is. The sound quality is good but nothing exceptional. The only gripes I can think of are the slow scrolling display and the relatively short battery life (about 5 hours). If you need a cheap mp3 player look no further.
On: 2004-03-28
I bought this at a electronics store near where I live, and I was estatic about it. After a few days my feelings had changed. First of all, my unit has problems connecting to a AC adaptor. It is very tempermental about when it thinks it is connected to one, and if you move it or the AC adaptor, the whole thing shuts off. Also, on Windows 98, you cannot rip songs from your CDs and put them on a mini cd in MP3 format, so any songs you want to listen to you need to download. The battery life is also under 4 hours play time. Overall, I have been compleatly unsatisfied with my experiance with it.
by: Anonymous On: 2004-03-15
I really liked the idea of a compact player, so I thought this 3" cd player would be just the ticket. The unit seems to be very cheaply made - which goes along with the $30 price. The big problem was the audio artifacts introduced from the MP3 decoder. That and the annoying click after every track compelled me to throw this into the trash after a half hour of distorted sound. Dont waste your money!
by: Anonymous On: 2004-02-14
Display didnt work at all right from start, so I exchanged it. Replacement worked for a couple of weeks. Then the dispay went out on that one, too.
by: Anonymous On: 2004-01-27
I bought this three months ago. overall, I am happy with this product.1). it can play both mini CD-R and CD-RW. 2). the battery life is good; 3). compact. The reason I gave it 4 stars instaed 5: 1). no hold function, thus not suitable for sports or even travel; 2). the LCD displays sometimes does not function.
On: 2003-12-20
This is a pretty cool player -- as long as you know that you pretty much have to make your own CD-R mini cds before you can use it as a player. If you dont have a CD burner or access to some other source of the 3" sized CDs then youre not going to have anything to play.
If you do have something to listen to, then you will be pleased. The sound is fine or even beyond fine and the anti-skip features work beautifully. The lower mass of the cd itself helps, but the large memory "skip buffers" really do the trick. I didnt try it running, but it should have no trouble there with MP3s. With regular CD audio the skip buffer doesnt cover as much ground, so to speak, so you should ask a runner about that if its a concern for you.
In at least one version of the Amazon blurb for this player it says that the player comes with "ear bud" phones, but these are actually pretty decent phones of the type that go around the back of your head and sort of loop over your ears.
The "Pocket" in the name may be slightly misleadind if your pockets are tiny, but it does fit into the pocket of my jackets with no trouble at all. Overall this is a pretty fine player AS LONG AS YOU CAN BURN YOUR OWN CDS and dont need to play any regular sized CDs with it. Mini CDs only in this player!
On: 2003-11-14
I purchased this item at the end of April 2003. Everything was fine. I used it only a few times, then it sat for a few months untouched. Then in November 2003 when I went to use it again, there was absolutely no display. Swapping out batteries made no difference. I went to the Memorex website... they dont even list it. I dont have a clue as to why the display went out. It plays, but without a display its next to useless. Of course now that more than 30 days have elapsed Im stuck with it. $60 wasted. Dont buy this item.
On: 2003-11-04
While it worked, the player was ok. Its quite a bit bigger than youd expect, because they use the guts of a regular sized CD player, so the unit itself is quite a bit bigger than the Mini-CDs that it plays. However, after only a few weeks of light use, the display went flakey and has now completely stopped showing anything. Its so sad when a company throws what little reputation it had left into such a shoddy product. Ill NEVER buy anything with Memorex name on it ever again.
On: 2003-08-29
Im piping in to confirm that the displays are a serious problem. I have received two from Amazon and neither had working displays when I started them up. Its great that this player has id3 tag support, but the fact that the display doesnt work makes this feature somewhat moot.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-08-08
This product should never gone into production with such a poor display component. It took it a couple of days, but the display eventually failed on me, just like it did for other people thatve reviewed this player.
Aside from that, its a pretty decent player for the money. Reads MP3s with all kinds of bit-rates and doesnt even complained about damaged files.
The interface could be a little simpler though. For example, to skip to next album, you have to press the "mode" button twice, then the "stop" button.
In the end, I redurned it and got a Philips EXP411 instead. Little more expansive, but definately worth it.
On: 2003-08-01
I have dropped this pocket player quite a few times but it still works. Perhaps I just got lucky, but as far as I can tell, this player is well-made and isnt likely to break on you. I took it around West Africa for 2 months and it was a life-saver on long bus treks though the desert. Despite the constant bumpiness of the bus, skipping was never a problem. That isnt to say it NEVER skips, because it does. It just takes quite a bit of josteling to make it skip (like jogging up stairs).
My only complaints:
1. Its like reading brail figuring out which buttons do what in the dark.
2. The "random" feature, which I use quite a bit, could be more accessible.OVERALL, its a great product and good price. And, thanks to this little player, a young Bedik boy in a remote East-Senegalese village is a huge fan of The Cure.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-07-31
I opened up the package, put in a disc (which I had made prior) and played it. The sound was fine, But the display didnt function at all. Now I have to send it back, will not buy again from memorex!
On: 2003-07-14
While some may not have had as good luck as I have had with my Memorex Portable mini-CD player, I have had excellent results. I accidentaly soaked mine with water over night without any adverse results. The battery life with this machine is better than most at least in part because it stores as much as a whole song in memory leaving the drive turned off for the duration of the song. The headphones leave something to be desired, but I wasnt buying the machine for headphones. If you hook these to a 39.00 pair of cambridge sound works self-amplified speakers, you have a really nice little stereo system. One of the biggest advantages to this machine is that you can truly slip it into a pocket (helps if your clothing is loose) and walk or run around or ride a bike or whatever and listen to music truly on the go. For the price...a really good buy!
On: 2003-07-11
Bought a Teac mini cd player, was a battery hog and after a short while it worked less and less. Sent it back (after some hassles) and got a new one. Same problems, now it lies in some land fill.Memorex mini cd player has been used for about 4 months now. Great life with rechargeable batteries and has not given me any problems. I work as a handy man and music makes the work more enjoyable. Dust and minor abuse have not stopped it. Only problems. The player normally sits in a wallet sized hip pack and from time to time the pause button gets hit or the volume level changes contact with stuff. A hold switch would fix that problem. I bought a second unit as a reserve because I liked the first one I bought so much. I guess I thought by now the first one would have broken. The new unit sits on a shelf, an investment for the future. I bought 2, go buy one.
 On: 2003-05-31
Heres the problem with these "mini" CD players: they use a fullsize CD mechanism! No manufacturer has had the guts to build a dedicated mini-CD reader mechanism, so all the so-called mini-CD products just try to pack the guts of a full size CD reader into a smaller package. The result is something thats only 1-2 cm smaller (in linear dimension) than its full sized brethren. Not too compelling!Having said that, the unit is not bad; its just not small. There are occasional quirks in the audio between songs (as others have reported) and the unit seems slightly more prone to skipping than other CD players Ive used. Continous jostling movement (e.g. jogging) will result in occasional skipping. (Note: I recently downgraded my review as the display stopped working a few months after purchase. When it works, the unit is pretty good, but its kind of hard to use with the display out!)
On: 2003-05-16
THREE YEAR UPDATE:
It finally died! It got medium levels of use and under some hot conditions. I would have expected to last longer.
TWO YEAR UPDATE:
I now keep this in the (very very hot) car (in the desert) and its still alive two years later. Gotta like that.
I have given up on using the menu buttons since they are too distracting for driving. Still, it works as a good cheap-and-easy MP3 player. Those little CDs are wonderful.
----
STRENGTHS:
* Its [inexpensive] and the small CDs are [an inexpensive], handy format. One little CD holds about four or five regular CDs when ripped to MP3.
* It is relatively simple to use
* I takes advantage of the open MP3 trend and the CD-R burners we now all have.
* Efficient use of batteries. It seems like a pair of AAs last a long time -- certainly WAY longer than a traditional CD player.
* Did I mention that it was [inexpensive]?
WEAKNESSES:
* Lower bitrate MP3s dont sound great or even work.
* It really needs a lid/button lock. Its quite easy to accidentally open or press a button.
* It is a little clunky -- especially when compared to some of those cool MP3 or MiniDisk players.
* The display is slow so you have to stare at it a long time to see all the MP3 tag.
On: 2003-05-11
Purchased this player just over 3 months ago, and just out
of warranty the display has died. It has worked ok, but trying
to burn cds with Windows Media Player is awkward at best. The
only way to fill the 210MB cds is by creating a folder.
The 8cm, Pocket Format is just not supported well in the USA.
Im dumping this in favor of a full sized CD MP3 player.
Buyer beware....
On: 2003-04-21
I ordered two of these players, one for my wife and one for my son.
The display didnt work on the first one, so I sent it back and ..., to their credit, very quickly sent me a replacement. Unfortunately, the display on the replacement quit the very next day. I asked for and received a refund. Now after five weeks the display on the third one quit. So... out of three of these little players all had bad displays. Under the circumstances my advice would be to stay away from this item.
On: 2003-04-10
I got this about a week ago. It worked very nicely for several days. And then, a couple of days ago, I turned it on and the display no longer worked. It worked again for a few hours, and then died again. It is kind of hard to use the device without the display, especially since you can only tell whether you are turning it ON or OFF by the using the display. Oh well, I guess Ill send it back. It sure seemed like a cool idea! I should have paid attention to all the other reviews that mentioned the faulty display, but no, I thought "I wont have a problem with mine."
by: Anonymous On: 2003-04-05
I was looking at several mini-cd players and this was the only one that displayed file names, and was the cheapest one too. But, you get what you pay for; first off the unit is a little bulky (trust me, it wont fit in everyones pants), second the headphones are worthless, uncomfortable and lousy sound quality, third A Click IS heard at the end of every song which IS annoying for audiophiles like me, Fourth and most important, the display isnt backlight AND IT ONLY WORKED FOR 2 days.
With good headphones the sound is awesome (except for the click), battery life is ok ~8-10 hrs. I returned this one and ordered a second unit (price is just too good).I`ll wait and see what happens.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-04-04
This player is great if you have a mac you can get 40+ songs with mp3 but if you windows youll have to stick to having about 4-6 songs unless you are good with computers and can figure it out(which isnt too hard).
Everything else about the player is great despite what some people say.
So.. great for macs not so great window
by: Anonymous On: 2003-04-03
This is a great mini-cd player. Its small and very convenient. Each mini-CD holds about 210 mb of songs (mp3 or wav). You wont find an MP3 player that can hold this many files for even close to the amount of money you will pay for this mini-cd player. The only reason I gave this four stars is because there is no hold button, so you have to take out one of the batteries if you are leaving it somewhere where the on button can be pressed.
On: 2003-03-30
Let me first say I have one of each type of mp3 players, flash based, HD based, and CD based, and of course, one in my car. I have been a user of mp3 technology for a long time, and can say each formayt has its own strengths and weaknesses. I thought I would try mini cd just for fun and keep it hanging around, but after some use I have a respect for this format and it ultimately may be the best bang for the buck in a convenient size. Dollar for dollar, a regular size CD MP3 player, like a Rio SP100, is the most useful device, but its size is too big. Flash players are good, but expensive, limited in size, and a pain to load. HD based players are fantastic but bulky and need a lot of power, not to mention that they are not good for activities. If I have one gripe about the Memorex is that it is not firmware upgradeable. I dont know if any mini cd mp3 players are, but that would definitely be a deciding point. Otherwise, this is a very good player. It seems sturdy, battery life is good, sound quality is good, and it is easy to use. Get rid of the supplied headphones, try a pair of Koss Plugs to start. I have purchased 20 Memorex CD-RW discs (210 MB) and when I get tired of a disk I just erase and put something else on. This Memorex player (and most Mini CD MP3 players) is the best truly portable solution for those on a budget.
On: 2003-03-28
First off, I notice that a lot of people are complaining that they didnt know that it doesnt play regular sized-cds. I think its quite obvious in its size, in being called a "Mini-CD" player, and Amazon stating that it plays smaller 8cm CDs that its not a regular CD player.I own this product and am quite satisfied with it. By leaving files in MP3 format, you can easily get 40+ songs onto a mini-cd. The display probably isnt the greatest but, for the price, Im not complaining. Im quite satisfied.
On: 2003-03-07
First item does not work with all mini-discs, I burned about 15 and only worked with 3 and sometimes.
Second Display worked only for one month.
Third .. Headphones did not work anymore.So, nothing works at all. I also buy another mp3 player and all of the 15 mini-discs worked with this new mp3-player. Sorry about my english.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-03-06
This is my second Memorex CD-MP3 Player (I bought the first full-size CD-MP3 player they put put two years ago and it still plays well), and I am even more delighted with this product than with the original player. I am a big fan of being able to swap music selection without having to download songs from a computer (I have had two non-CD MP3 players and that was my biggest frustration with them). I am able to get 40 to 50 MP3 tracks per mini CD, and the sound quality is great. I have had no trouble with skipping, and have not noticed the click others here have mentioned. At half the price of its competitors (and with ID3 track tagging support, which many others DO NOT have) I am very happy with this product. I have been using MusicMatchs CD burner, and have had no difficulty with playability or track tagging support. The headphones included did not fit my head well, so I am using another pair of headphones, and the size of the unit could be a bit smaller in my opinion, but overall I would highly recommend this product for anyone looking to get a CD-MP3 player and wanting a smaller sized unit.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-02-22
I got one, display didnt work right out of the box. Sent it back for another...display worked for about two weeks then went out. The idea behind this product is great, but without the display its just too hard to navigate the files. Id reccomend buying a different brand because there is obviously a flaw in this one.
On: 2003-02-14
What good is this without WMA capability??
Dont buy it. Wait for one with WMA.
On: 2003-02-11
Absolutley satisfied with my purchase of the Memorex MPD8081 Portable Mini-CD/CD-R/MP3 Pocket Player. The unit has a nice solid feel. Very easy to use. Can get about 50 tunes (avg) on one of those mini-cds. Instructions are quite clear. Unfortunatley, beyond the little owners manual, the Memorex web site wont provide much more info. Dont think youll need it though. Sound is very good. Headphones are nicely matched. Whats my gripe about the unit? Well...would it have killed them to include a belt clip on the unit so that you can wear it on shorts or pants that dont have pockets? Anyway, the unit is small and does fit easily into a pocket...Recommended? Most definately, yes!
On: 2003-02-05
I was looking for CD players for quite a while until I ended up looking for mini-cd players. They all have 185-210 megs each CD, depending on which you buy, and MP3 encodes at about a meg a minute, so that ends up at 185-210 minutes of music. One reviewer said that they couldnt rip his own songs and put them on, which means he was probably just stupid, because after theyre ripped MP3s are all the same, so I dont know what they were thinking. They also said the battery life was only 4 hours, which is also untrue, because I use rechargeable batteries which dont have as long a life as normal batteries and I still get about 8-10 hours of battery life. With normal batteries I get 10-12 hours. One reviewer talked about a click at the end of the tracks, but I didnt find that annoying. I usually listen to my songs at a low volume and didnt even notice it until I went and read these reviews, so I turned the volume all the way up and did hear it, but it isnt loud or anything. The CD player is about 4 inches wide, 4 inches tall, and 1 inch thick. The biggest problem is the thickness, but it still fits into the pockets of all of my pants. I was happy to find that the buttons are designed so that the buttons arent pushed while its in your pocket or bag or something. The buttons are still big, and the interface is fairly simple and easy to use. I put MP3s in between 48 and 192 kbps and all of them worked. It loads up very quickly, only about 10 seconds with a new CD. The skip protection is good, if longer then 2 minutes it spins for about 16 seconds while its playing and then stops spinnin, and then after 2 minutes spins for another few seconds during play. The headphones are good quality, but mine went faulty from not taking care of them very well. Its pretty well built, since Im rough with all my things, and I have little brothers and sisters that get into it and drop it and whatever else they want to do to ruin my life, and it still works fine.
On: 2003-01-23
all of these people complaining about how the MINI-cd player wont play regular cds. dont you actually read the title/ description of items before you buy them?! dont cry about how you cant use this and have to pay shipping to return it, its your own d@mn fault.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-01-13
I bought this at a electronics store near where I live, and I was estatic about it. After a few days my feelings had changed. First of all, my unit has problems connecting to a AC adaptor. It is very tempermental about when it thinks it is connected to one, and if you move it or the AC adaptor, the whole thing shuts off. Also, on Windows 98, you cannot rip songs from your CDs and put them on a mini cd in MP3 format, so any songs you want to listen to you need to download. The battery life is also under 4 hours play time. Overall, I have been compleatly unsatisfied with my experiance with it.
On: 2003-01-04
I purchased this as a replacement to a card based MP3 player and am very very happy with it. Very cool features like file browsing and being able to swap out the mini cds make life easy. The interface is easy to read and navigate. The display shows the Artist and Album Title, essentially everything that you have in the file name. In MP3 format the songs have 120 seconds of buffer and I have yet to make a song skip, even when jogging on mountain trails. In fact about halfway through a song the CD quits spinning as the songs is already in the buffer. Excellent for battery life. You can store any type of file on the mini-cd as well, the Memorex will skip over any non-MP3 format file. Perfect for bringing some work home or carrying photos that you want to share, the CD can be read on any PC. Very versatile, easy to use, great sound, and practically bulletproof song buffer.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-01-04
I really like the overall audio quality of the product, but the problem is the quantity. Someone here said that you can fit in more music on the pocket CD than a real CD? Please tell me how because I cant figure it out. THe most I can fit in per CD is about 24 minutes worth of songs. Which end sup being about 4 songs. How do you guys copy full albums per these little pocket cds? Someone said they put in about 45 songs? HOW? that would be about 20 of these little cds wouldnt it? How did you fit it in on one? Someone please tell me. My email is Legendv&@aol.com. I keep calling cutomer service but nobody there knows anything about this product.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-12-27
I got the first one, it worked good except the text display didnt show anything. I could move through folders, listen to any song, but I couldnt see what song I was on or how much time had elapsed. So I send it back for a replacement. Same problem. I am very displeased with the product, but think it would be great if the screen worked.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-12-13
Be careful. This will not play normal size CDs. For those of us who dont know the size of a regular CD.....youll be sorry when you get this. You can only play "little cds" on this. It should not be called a CD Player.
I dont know how it works if you wanted it...because I had to send it back.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-12-10
I ordered the Memorex Pocket CD player to carry while walking/jogging. I knew it only used the Pocket CDs. That is exactly what I wanted. I do not understand why the retailers do not carry this product in stores.I convert my CDs to MP3 files on my computer and burn to Pocket CD on my ancient HP 7200 CD burner. No problems. I assume the pause between tracks is the ESP working. It doesnt sound good for albums such as "Abbey Road" by The Beatles, which goes straight from one track to the other. Otherwise, who cares.
I just use this product when jogging/walking anyway. Heck of a lot cheaper than iPod or similar products. I dont know why the pocket cds are not more popular.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-12-05
Small, lightweight, great sound, holds LOTS of music... what more could you ask for? And a great price too! Who wants to pay several hundred dollars for an ipod? Its easy to use, even for the most technologically inept.
YES it is a mini mp3 cd player... for those of us with mostly mp3s this is not a problem. And if you have standard cds you can always convert them to mini cds. You can fit several standard cds on one mini cd. So why not?
Be sure to use Nero instead of Easy CD Creator; I had had problems the first time I burned a cd but it appears the problems were software and not hardware related.
On: 2002-12-03
I am disappointed in this item because it does not state anywhere that it can not play regular cds.... therefore I have to send this back and pay for shipping once again. I would like a refund for shipping please - only because of the mislead info. on this item.
On: 2002-11-28
It does not say anywhere on this page that this is a pocket player. It only plays tiny cds and you cant play regular size cds on it. So if you buy it you have to pay the shipping on it when you return it.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-11-14
The information supplied / advertized does not readily indicate that it only uses mini 3" CD/s. Not what I want! I want my money back, but I slit the package open before realizing this fact so I may be stuck with it. This does not reflect on audio quality, I have never played it.
On: 2002-11-12
I bought this at a electronics store near where I live, and I was estatic about it. After a few days my feelings had changed. First of all, my unit has problems connecting to a AC adaptor. It is very tempermental about when it thinks it is connected to one, and if you move it or the AC adaptor, the whole thing shuts off. Also, on Windows 98, you cannot rip songs from your CDs and put them on a mini cd in MP3 format, so any songs you want to listen to you need to download. The battery life is also under 4 hours play time. Overall, I have been compleatly unsatisfied with my experiance with it.
On: 2002-10-01
After researching mp3 players, reading customer reviews, and watching the net for new models over quite a few months, I was prepared to be somewhat disappointed. Perhaps because of this, I did not want to spend a lot of money. I am completely SATISFIED and HAPPY with the Memorex MPD8081. This is my first mp3 player. My players main function is to let me listen to music without having to run the whole computer. Its connected to my Monsoon MM-702 computer speakers and the combination sounds GREAT!Mini CDs give you the best compromise between low cost, portability, and compatibility with the most widely available devices. This player plays mp3 format files and normal CD-DA (wav files, red book, whatever) only. If there are any mp3 files on a disk, wav files will be ignored. Disks snap onto a spindle which holds them the way a ratchet holds a socket. There is no backlight and the headphone jack does double-duty as the line output. A dial on the side regulates volume and a small switch controls dynamic bass boost. The only other side-mounted control is the sliding latch for the spring-loaded cover. Overall construction is high quality. On my unit, two small places on the side where friction inside the packaging scraped away the paint--very minor. Comes with street style headphones and three blank 210 MB mini CDs. If you use headphones you will probably want another pair. The non-adjustable headphones included may be adequate for some folks. Sound is good and noise level in the electronics is quite low. No specs are given. No software is included. There is a 4.5V input in back but no included AC adaptor. The unit powers ON via the play button on top and OFF via the stop button pressed twice. Turns off after one minute of inactivity to conserve power. No batteries are included. Controls are simple, the manual is clear, functions are intuitive and the unit behaves flawlessly. Mp3 format is the only supported format; the manual says up to 384 Kbps. Also says packet writing and multi-session are supported. I have not tested all of these. Ive made one CD-R with mp3s in five directories and one CD-RW containing only two wav files. Both work just fine. Random function is quite intelligent--on a mp3 disk all files in a directory are shuffled (no-repeat) and played before moving on to the next directory. You can fast-forward and rewind within a track for either mp3s or wavs. For me, so far, startup time has been very short (6 seconds for 54 songs), but the manual warns that it may take up to 30 seconds on a disk containing many mp3 tracks. Only caveats you might consider: A previous reviewer was annoyed by the slight click at the end of a song. I was concerned when I read this but I do not find it to be very annoying. Sometimes (not often) a delay between tracks interrupts the "flow" of a recording and that IS annoying. Side topic: dont purchase a bunch of "extra length" 210 MB cds before testing them with your burner. My first CD-RW burner (Samsung) had trouble using these so I switched to "normal" 185 MB cds. I have not tested this with my newer burner and I suspect newer drives dont have this problem. My review would not have been so long if I wasnt very happy about the product. Amazon has treated me very fairly and I praise them. I do, however, believe that product descriptions here and for other items are somewhat lacking. I highly recommend this product.
(original 01-Oct-2002, additional comment 16-Feb-2003) Addendum
Im still pretty happy with it, but I might give it only four stars now. I found others comments interesting; you have to wonder about the people who didnt realize it only played mini CDs -- perhaps this speaks to Amazons sparse product blurb and single picture. The Memorex web site is woefully lacking in product information, as stated by reviewer "gadget_guy". Battery life is decent; get ten hours from alkalines. I would like for the cover to have less free play--it clacks a bit while buttons are being pressed. Ive noticed some annoying sonic artifacts generated by the players built-in mp3 decoder that do not happen when I listen to the same files with the computer. Im going to re-encode the problem albums using a different bit rate. (One of them is Peter Gabriels "melting face" album which is bizare enough without any help from the decoder.) Software tips: Ive played around with Easy CD and Nero Burning; I prefer Nero. I made the mistake of purchasing the mp3pro plug-in from ahead for $19. What good is mp3pro when hardly any device supports it? I switched to the free program called CDex for ripping audio from CDs. Regarding the inter-song gap created by the player: I began to get very annoyed at this so I searched for a way to rip/encode several tracks into a single giant mp3 file. Long story short, CDex can do the job hassle free. (Wasted a lot of time mucking with the wave editor.) If I had the disk "Abbey Road" I would definitely rip/encode the songs into two or three giant files. Still the best mini-CD player around from what I can tell. Yeah, the iPod is cool, but Id rather have a new motherboard, Pentium 4, DDR-SDRAM, etc.. for the same money.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-09-03
I like this cd player because its mp3 cdr cdrw for a very low price.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-08-28
At about half the size of a traditional portable CD player (actual dimensions 4.1" X 4" X 1.2") this thing is a dream to haul around. There are a few things that arent listed by Amazon that you should know about his product.
1.) This unit has 45 Seconds of Anti Skip Protection in Standard Play Mode. But my guess is that since there are virtually no CDs released on 8 CM Discs that most of you are going to be using this for MP3 Files, in which case due to the compression of MP3s you have 120 seconds of ESP, anti shock protection.
2.) The player does play 8cm/8mm/"Pocket CDs", and will play back CD-R, and CD-RW Discs that have been burned as a normal, un-compressed CD, and/or in a Compressed MP3 Format.
3.) The Player has an MP3 Search Feature that allows you to search by Subject/Title/Artist; it also has a 64 selection memory, and offers a multi-session feature.
4.) The Dot Matrix LCD Display is Large and easy to read and offers 2 Lines of Text.
5.) The player has the standard Track Skip Up/Down, Random Play, and Repeat One/All Feature.
6.) The unit also has a 1 Bit DA Converter.
7.) While I am not a big Ear Bud fan, it does ship with a nice pair that I would rate "better than most" that I have seen on the market.
8.) The buttons and text display are large and well laid out, unlike some of the early units which had text displays that were small and hard to read, with tiny function buttons. They also have marked the Stop/Fast Forward/Reverse/Pause buttons both on the button itself, and off to one side which is handy, I had an older full size CD Player that had the controls marked only on the buttons and eventually the ink wore off the buttons and you couldnt tell what they did anymore. I own a number of Memorex Products and find them to be very feature rich for their price. I have had great luck with all of their products that I have owned, and would recommend them highly as a manufacturer.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-08-23
I bought this player at a local electronics store. It has the features I want (small size, nice display, ability to handle CD-RWs, good battery life) at a reasonable price. The problem is that I hear a slight click or pop in the phones at the end of *every* track. You might or might not notice it while walking on a busy street but its quite obvious in a quiet room. I exchanged the player, but the second unit has exactly the same problem.
On: 2002-06-30
I am not an expert in writing reviews so mine wouldnt be a technical one
I just know that I am enjoying this player very much, it has a very good sound quality and has all the features I need ( plays all kinds of CDS, great search abbility ) and its a very low price as well, in short i recommend it very much
|
|
