Hands-on review: the NHJ MPM-202 personal media player

We had a chance to spend some time with the NHJ MPM-202 portable media player. It's a 60GB PMP that doubles the capacity of its predecessor, the MPM-201, and shares most of its features. Overall we found the device incredibly easy to use and great value for the price, particularly as compared to its competitors. Read on for the full review.

First impressions

The unit is solid. It may lack a certain sex appeal, but there is nothing flimsy or cheap about the feel of the device in your hand. The design is straightforward and intuitive: volume control scrollwheel plus play and stop buttons on the right, 4-way selector plus menu and back buttons on the left. The positioning of the controls on either side of the screen makes it easy to hold the device in both hands and control it with the thumbs. There is nothing awkward about the way the controls work ? the interface is easy to use and each command does exactly what you?d expect it to do. The only disappointing aspect of the interface is the virtual keyboard entry system, which fares slightly better than the keyboard input of the PSP as you don?t have to be T9-ing the thing, but it?s still just one of those inconvenient scroll-to-key-press-enter, repeat x15 and twelve hours later, your movie is renamed. But it?s not like there are many non-keyboard-bearing devices that really make this easy.

The included A/V dock is nice ? it?s sturdy, and it comes with separate cables whereas its main competitor, the Archos AV420, comes with a dock that has integrated cables that looks akin to an unwieldy octopus. The MPM-202 comes with a ?record? button built into the dock, and it would be hard to imagine simplifying the process of recording new content any further than cuing up a source and pressing record. It was refreshingly dead easy.

Some other things we noticed right off the bat: there?s a cute little kick-stand built right into the back of the unit. It means you can prop the device up on a desk to watch it, which is more handy than you realize.

The internal stereo speakers have a lot of horsepower for a portable unit. You can get some decent volume out of them with very little distortion until you?re all the way at the highest setting. For listening to music, they?re a bit too treble-heavy to make anyone really happy, but for watching movies they?re nice because you can get away with not being tethered to headphones or external speakers. It?s also handy to have slots for both CF and SD media.

Features

The NHJ MPM-202 is the beefier sibling of the MPM-201 ? they share the same featureset, but the MPM-202 has 60GB worth of storage to the MPM-201?s 30GB. It?s got a 3.5-inch screen, CF type II and SD memory slots, internal stereo speakers, TV-tuner in the dock, internal microphone (records in WAV), AV-output, image display (JPG), and of course, and and video recording and playback. The unit ships with a cradle and IR remote, mini to RCA cable, USB cable, S-video cable, AC adapter, carrying pouch, headphones, manual, and CD-ROM with Music Match and Dr. Divx video conversion software. As distributed by TightSystems in the U.S. (which, although currently in litigation with Macromedia, still offers the MPM-202 through the separately owned and operated DVG Store retail outlet accessible via the TightSystems website), the unit is now shipping for $449 which includes a free extra battery and free shipping.

Size comparisons:

Top and bottom of unit:

Transferring content

The NHJ MPM-202 connects to Windows or Mac machines via USB 2.0, and shows up as a Mass Storage Device, which means it just looks like an external hard drive connected to your machine. Unless you?re running Windows 98 or Mac OS 8 (yikes!), you shouldn?t have to install the drivers that come on the installation CD-ROM. From there, you just drag and drop the files into their appropriate locations in the file structure of the unit?s hard drive ? or vice versa, if you?ve recorded something you want to copy to your computer.

You can also transfer files from storage media to the MPM?s internal hard drive. This is pretty handy for photographers, who?ll be able to use this unit as portable storage. Setting up the transfer is fairly straightforward in the File Manager. Just select a folder of images, select copy, then choose the appropriate destination.

Recording content

Movies

Pop the unit in the dock, hook up your source, and select ?TV mode? from the main menu. You can choose one of three quality levels: QVGA, VGA, and VGA Fine. For playback just on the unit itself, QVGA does the job admirably. For something that will be watched primarily on a TV, you?ll want to go with at least VGA and VGA Fine if you have enough space. Scroll up to ?Video in? and select where your video source is coming from: the TV tuner, component in or S-video in.

You should then see your source show up on the MPM?s screen ? from here, just press the record button the dock to get going. If you?re recording a bunch of things at once you can then dispense with all the setup steps and just hit the record button to start, stop button to stop. If you?re recording a source for more than an hour, the MPM will automagically split your recording into multiple files; when you play them back, they?ll be stitched together so you won?t notice the separation (other than a tiny flicker at the moment of changeover).

Recording from the TV tuner is really no different. You just select ?TV in? as your source and start recording the