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If you're out for a walk, or a drive in the car, you'll always want music on
the move. However, most people are limited to a walkman which plays back
tapes or CDs, or you could spend a fair whack on an in-car CD player.
Others may have an MP3 player, the format which the music industry isn't
so fond of because of its propensity to take a music track and cut it down to
around a tenth of the original size, with no loss of noticeable quality
on almost every track converted. The minus point with these is that such
devices tend to cost anything up to £230 and initially hold 64Mb of
memory, or around an hour's worth of music, unless you purchase additional
upgrades.
Thus, we now have the Creative Digital Audio Player (D.A.P.) Jukebox),
which costs around £100 more than that, but has a capacity of 6 Gigabytes,
or around 100 hours worth of music if all of it's recorded as an MP3 file at an average
bitrate of 128kb/s. Have a look at any music-sharing website such as
Napster and
Audiognome
and you'll find many of the tracks on there are encoded this way, although
many can also be found at 192kb/s, with a few more at 256kb/s. However, 128kb/s
is perfectly acceptable in most cases.
The unit can also make use of WAVs and WMA (Windows Media Audio)
files, the latter of which I'm led to believe sound as good at 96kb/s as an
MP3 file does at 128kb/s, which expands your capacity further.
How to get the music onto the Creative DAP Jukebox though? With the Creative
Playcenter 2 software that it comes supplied with on CD, not only is it a piece
of cake to transfer files from your hard drive to the unit via the USB
connection, but you can bypass the hard drive step by placing a CD in your
CD-ROM drive and transferring direct to the Jukebox, or even using the
line-in input for direct stereo audio recording in WAV format from external
devices.
Although I don't mind singular tracks appearing in any order on the DAP Jukebox
since I'll play these back in random order - there are options to play tracks
once, on repeat, in random or shuffle order, the latter giving you the option
to play all the requested tracks once through before repeating any of them.
I had a bit of trouble transferring whole albums whilst retaining the track
order, but got advice on that which was to transfer them across and indicating
the artist, album title and genre, as opposed to letting each track's
self-contained information do the talking.
Any tracks you transfer onto it will be added to those already there, which
largely consists of copyright-free classical music and a few other styles.
These can be easily managed in the in-built library system which lists the
tracks as Albums, Artists and Genres, plus a Playlists
option which allows you to put together your own selections.
Looking at the unit, it's a stylish piece of kit that weighs just 14 ounces
and is smaller than a personal CD-player.
The main functions are the transport controls: the PLAY button also doubles
up as RECORD, presumably for the direct line-in input, but I haven't tried
this function. It's also the button you use to switch the device on by holding
it down for two seconds. Similarly, the STOP button is used first to pause a
track, then stop it and finally to switch it off when you've finished.
With the latest software it is also possible to cue through a track, whether
it's to skip past the first part of a song, or for very long pieces, for
example if I was to record a 3-hour radio show from the internet for playback
later. I certainly couldn't listen to all of it in one sitting - and would
certainly like to fast-forward past the adverts within.
There are up/down controls which work exactly as you'd expect, a LIB (library)
button which takes you back and forth from the library to the 'Active Queue
List', your playback playground for what you want to hear. The EAX button
is so-called because it's based on the Creative EAX sound effects functions
that enable you to tweak the sound by altering the bass and treble, sound
spatialisation for headphone use, speed the music up and apply various sound
effects, to name but four of its many uses. Users of sound cards like the
Creative Soundblaster Live 1024 will have extended versions of these functions
installed on their PC if using its supplied software.
Three other small buttons are aligned in a row which are for use within the
respective menus, whether it's for navigation purposes, or to show the details
of a particular track.
On the left-hand side of the unit is a LOCK switch. This is especially handy
if you've taken a trip somewhere and still want to use the remainder of the
supplied rechargeable batteries for your return journey. When I would use a
standard walkman with a tape player I would remove the batteries when not in
use because otherwise the device would inadvertently get knocked about and the
PLAY button pressed, thus draining the power. Try to switch it on when the
lock switch is in use and it'll switch off after a few seconds when checking
for this.
On the right is a head-phone socket and volume control, while the top has
access for a 12V input to power the unit from the mains, the requisite
USB port, the aforementioned line-in port and two line-outs. There are two
of the latter so you can either hear the same thing from them, if powering
two separate devices with the same music to be emitted from each, or to have
the second line-out deliver surround sound information, if using two separate
sets of speakers.
There's also a sensor at the front of the DAP Jukebox which is for an
infra-red remote control, not currently available but coming soon.
So, after detailing all the good points, are there any bad? Just a couple of
niggles.
When I first wrote this review I spotted a slight gap between the tracks.
It won't be noticeable if listening to most albums or singular tracks as it was
very small, but play an album by The Orb, Pink Floyd, or anything where
the individual ones merge together and it became very obvious. However, the
latest version of the software cuts this down to the most minute length such
that gaps between separate tracks appear non-existent and in the case of the
ones that merge together you'll only spot the gap when you're listening out
for it.
Either way, it's something I can put up with
for the massive other benefits that the DAP Jukebox provides, but an alternative
would be to rip the CD as a single .WAV file and then convert that to MP3.
Yes, that means that the album will be recorded as one track but then that's
how you'd listen to it anyway and if you put the album on the DAP Jukebox via
both methods then you'll have the best of both worlds.
Also, the unit doesn't like you playing a song in Playcenter2 while
transferring the same or others, otherwise the transferred file shows up on
the DAP Jukebox in your selected playlist as a spare file that can't be deleted
and won't show up in CP2 making it a bit of a pain to have to create a new
Playlist and build from scratch. Once you've realised your mistake, though,
I doubt you'll do it again.
Then again, one of the beauties of this product is that future versions of
the software will be released and the unit can be upgraded to accommodate
these, so there's no reason why the above niggles can't be solved.
As I've said earlier, the hard drive inside is 6Gb which can hold around
100 hours or up to 150 albums of choice, but if you visit a website like
Tom's Hardware.com
you'll find that upgrades of up to 30Gb are possible, given that the hard
drive used doesn't exceed 9.5mm in height.
And if that doesn't quench your musical thirst, especially given the fact that
when future versions of the DAP Jukebox's software become available you'll be
able to use the sound format AAC (sorry, don't know this acronym)
which, like WMA files, will take up even less space than MP3 files but with
the same quality.
Copyright issues
aside, when you're young there was always the want to tape your favourite
tunes from the Top 40 onto a tape so you could listen to them while out and
about. These days, you no longer have to put up with Mark Goodier. Just work
out what you want to hear, download it from the aforementioned music search
sites and organise it as you like with the Creative Playcenter 2 software.
For those who haven't enjoyed the delights of them though,
Napster, which
seemed to get the ball rolling, has been forced to block many of the songs
that can be accessed. Their CEO claims the total number available has dropped
from 400 million to 100 million, but this usually means that, for example, the
word "Madonna" is blocked, so users try other variations like
"Madddonnaaaa", etc, although you'll find it's easier to search for
part of the track name. Don't always type in the full track name because there's
also the chance that a lot of people out there with music on their hard drives
can't actually spel propperly. :)
I'd recommend
Audiognome
though, mainly because it's possible to resume transfers if there's a break
in downloading, which often happens because most UK ISPs which offer an
unlimited internet service for a fixed monthly charge cut you off after
around two hours.
I'd also recommend you limit yourself to tracks from users using Cable,
DSL, T1 or T3 connections. They will be faster than standard modems, which
will be hard pushed to get a few songs delivered within the two-hour period.
Thanks to Stewart Watson not only
for the aforementioned info about the use of the front sensor and the quality
of WMA files, but also that
HiFi.com
has the Playdock PD200 made by Cambridge Soundworks, a custom-built
accessory for the unit that gives a portable 3 speaker system and extends
battery life up to 10 hours (tell them you saw their site mention on
DVDfever.co.uk !); and that the newsgroup
c.products.nomad
contains info on all things related to the DAP. Note that "Nomad Jukebox"
is the American name for the DAP and you'll see the American alternative on
the Creative Playcenter 2 software.
Many Creative products are in development for use with the DAP Jukebox,
but one which is available now is the car kit for connecting up to give you
music on the move.
The DAP Jukebox comes supplied with a USB connector cable, an AC power adapter,
4 rechargable NiMH AA batteries, headphones, a carrying pouch, the installation
CD and an MP3 content CD. I didn't receive the latter but the device came
with more than enough installed anyway. The instructions included were very
sparse, but more can be found online and if you're looking to use such a unit
regularly anyway, you'll tend to be adept at using your common sense to make it
do what you want.
Overall, I'm incredibly impressed with the DAP Jukebox and despite the slight
niggles, which I'm sure can be overcome with software updates, it's easily
worth full marks.
This product was tested on a PC with the following spec:
Intel PIII 600Mhz, 128Mb RAM (133 Mhz), Voodoo 3 3000 AGP, Soundblaster
Live! 1024, attached to a Sony STR-DB930 Dolby Digital/DTS amplifier
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
