Home > Consumer Reviews > Coby 4 GB Flash Video MP3 Player with FM Radio (Black)

I purchased this MP3 player for my son's birthday and I am very disappointed with it. After downloading some songs and charging it overnight the device was stuck in "Setup" mode and was unusable. I phoned Coby technical support and they told me the device was defective. I exchanged the device for another one through Amazon, and within two days they had another shipped out to me. Unfortunately the same thing happened with the second one. Now I know why the iPods are twice the price. Save your self some headaches and don't buy this product!

The Coby 4 GB Flash Video MP3 player enabled me to resist the compelling urge to drop $150 on a video iPod. While the software isn't as elegant as the iPod, the Coby unit includes a simple text reader and an FM radio. It shows up on my iMac desktop as an addressable drive, allowing me to move files in and out of its memory without touching iTunes. It also syncs with Windows Media Player and includes a simple (if imperfect) Windows-only formatting utility for importing video with the proper aspect ratio and file format (.avi.) I have downloaded TV shows and full-length movies (Ben Hur!), etc. and viewed them on the little screen - a very neat trick when ultimate portability is the goal.

The text reader mentioned above accepts .txt files only. This means it is handy for off-line reading of any long document that can be saved in that format, including web contents, Word documents, and most of the free online books. (James Joyce/Ulysses is on there now).

The mp3 functions are comparable to other mp3 players, although I haven't yet bothered to figure out how it assembles playlists, etc. Surprising to me is the inclusion of the FM tuner, something that adds real value by connecting me to the real world instead of isolating me from it.

The touch-screen interface is really quite fun to use, and in principle, trumps Apple's much-vaunted touch wheel. Using my wife's iPod seems so low-tech and old-fashioned to me now. In actual use, the touch screen is a bit too small and sensitive to be ideal - it's just too easy to touch buttons inadvertently. There is a "hold" setting that inactivates the buttons, however, even with "hold" invoked, if the function buttons are touched, the display is interrupted with an on-screen message that tells you that "hold" is turned on. It's an unnecessarily intrusive interruption.

All in all, though, for less than $50, this player is my new best electronic friend and constant companion. I am never without a book to read, music to listen to, or a movie to watch.

Bought this player last week. I have another smaller MP3 player from the same company and it works fine. I wanted this one because is supports playlists.

However, I cannot get playlists to sync or work at all.

I called customer support twice and both times they told me that this play DOES NOT SUPPORT playlists.

They are other reviewers on here who have been able to get playlists to work, so I will try some more, but after three days it has become quite frustrating.

If you have more time than money, then get this player. Otherwise spend the money and get something that costs a lot more and which provides better customer service and a better user interface on the device.


Update 30 June 2009:
Playlists work just fine. Using Windows Media Player, I put the MP3 player on MSC/Manual mode, put the playlists in the sync list, and let WMP sync. The playlists work fine on the MP3 player.

I primarily bought this Coby device to listen to the radio on the go, without having to buy batteries, possibly having it replace my aging Ipod mini. The radio function is good, with decent reception, although the autoscan feature doesn't work well -- it will miss local stations and instead will add presets to static frequencies. It even lasts over seven hours on radio mode, which is great.

The greatest problem is the clunky interface. It takes some getting used to and is not really intuitive. You will be constantly referring to the instruction manual until you have memorized all the special commands, esp. in radio mode. It does not help that the "buttons" disappear after a few seconds of inactivity.

The instruction manual requires special attention. Apparently Coby could not afford to edit the stock warnings to match their company name and the specific product. For example, according to the manual, in bold print, "The cords of the product may contain Lead...Wash hands after touching" (page 2). Warnings aside, the instructions are often functional enough, although they don't give any help with Windows Media Player and creating playlists. This is a major failing -- you are basically on your own with Windows Media or a third party application. I expect a seamless integration with some kind of media organization and transfer software, and this is completely lacking.

Windows Media Player is no Itunes, and while it is simple enough to put music files on the Coby device, creating playlists that remain on the device was not easy at all. I spent a half hour transferring a playlists in Windows Media to the Coby, and while the files themselves transferred, the playlists were lost. After some research, I tried Winamp, which was better but still way more confusing than Itunes. Keep in mind I've been working on PCs for ten years, changing hardware, reformatting and restoring, etc., so this shouldn't be hard for me. The lack of any included software means that I would not be able to gift this device to friends or family simply because it takes too much work to figure out how to get files on it and organize it. It does come with an "Installation CD" but this is a poorly made collection of files, with no autoplay (no automatic menu), and is apparently only for installing the video conversion software.

In conclusion, for a rechargeable portable radio, this is great. But for regular playing of my mp3 collection, it won't be replacing my Ipod due to poor interface and lack of native software. It may look cute like a Ipod Nano, but the functionality is horrible. And Apple certainly does not mar their product with stickers on the rear of the device, which leave sticky residue.

I so wanted to love this product, since it was my first mp3 player. It doesn't deserve any stars. Like many of you, I was influenced by reviews on here and other places.

Pros:

1. cheaper than an Ipod....
2. small and fit in your pocket


Cons:

1. disconnects easily while conjuring files on window media player.
2. erases songs that you have previously transferred
3. hard to turn off
4. even if you use the software that allows you to convert video files...it's still an unknown format.

It'll almost be a week this Saturday, since I purchased it. I'm going to return, and invest in an ipod