Review: Netac A200 1Gb Media Player
Iain Laskey pops Netac's tiny media player in his pocket
| Product | A200 1Gb Media Player |
|---|---|
| Company | Netac |
| Web | www.netac.com |
| Price | £69.99 |
| We like | Sound quality, FM radio and transmitter |
| We don't like | photo ability, small memory |
| Rating | 8/10 |
| Requirements |
Netac are a fairly new name to the UK. Hailing from China, they have produced an interesting variation on the media player theme ready for the anticipated relaxing of rules in the UK regarding FM transmitters.
Currently (September 2006), it is illegal to use devices that transmit FM such as iPod addons that allow you to pick up it's noises via your car FM radio. Netac have combined an MP3 player, FM radio, video player, eBook reader, photo album and recorder in to a tiny form factor not much bigger than a box of matches and then added in an FM transmitter for good measure.
Setting it Up
We were initially flummoxed by Netac's own instructions which advise a trip to the web site to download the drivers and software needed to use the A200. The web site only had the video conversion tool, no sign of anything for downloading music or images. After some trial and error we quickly realised we didn't actually need anything as the device appeared as a new drive on our PC with folders already in place for videos, music and so on. It was simply a matter of copying the files over using Explorer and we were ready to go.
Initial impressions were good. The supplied headphones which whilst not the best looking did delivery a surprisingly punchy but well balanced sound. The screen is bright and easy to read with nice animated cartoon like graphics for most functions. The kit also includes spare ear pads, a neck strap, car charger and USB cable - the latter being very important as the A200 uses a very tiny connector that isn't a common type. The socket has a small rubber cover that pulls to one side to protect it although it's a tight fit when connecting the USB cable making us worry about it's long term survival.
In use the A200 is OK at best. The MP3 track management is pretty rudimentary, hunt through the folders and tracks to select songs and that's about it apart from repeat and shuffle. The controls take a bit of getting used to with just seven buttons handling everything in various combinations.
We then tried the photo function and found a significant number of our test images failed to render on screen. Those that did were as good as they could be on such a small screen but as a way to keep cherished pictures of friends and family on you, it does the job.
The FM Radio uses the headphones as the aerial but still managed to pull in a fair few channels. There was a bit of crackle and background hiss in places but for listening on the move it was quite usable. A major bonus is that you can record whatever you are listening to so if something interesting pops up, you can keep a copy for later. Whilst on the subject of recording, there is also a small built in microphone for recording with too. This could be useful for dictation or keeping notes on something you are working on.
The so called eBook function was rather uninspiring and basically just pages through any text files you throw at it. It works but you wouldn't want to read anything of any length on it.
Videos need to be converted using a utility that can be downloaded from Netac's web site. Once converted, the quality was quite usable although with just 1Gb to play with, this function is more suitable for small clips such as pop videos or snippets from YouTube rather than an episode or two from your favourite TV series. There is a 2Gb model for not much more which may be better if video is your thing.
The Netac A200's real trump comes in the form of its FM transmitter. By default our unit came tuned to the same frequency as Radio 1 resulting in a patchy and somewhat distorted performance until we realised what was going on. After retuning it was considerably better. We tried it on a long car journey and after several hours use was deemed to be perfectly usable once we'd found a frequency that was sufficiently far away from any existing stations out there.
In conclusion
Whilst the Netac A200 has a lot of functionality under its belt, we feel it's best to consider it a workmanlike MP3 player/FM Radio with FM transmitter capabilities that has a few bonus functions rather than a fully fledged media player.
As an MP3 player it makes some very pleasant noises and in the car, the FM transmitter works well making it a great device for carrying your music with you. We could quibble about the small capacity at 1Gb but then for the price it would be churlish to expect much more. The manual needs some work to explain things in more detail and to show how to copy files over without the mythical tool that users are supposed to have access to. On balance though we feel there is much here to like as long as you can live with the 1Gb storage space.
