MP5 Player review

There are gadgets in the Malaysian electronics stores that you just don't see in Australia. Perhaps for good reason.

I picked up an 8Gb pocket video player labelled "MP5 High Clarity portable DV camera MP5 player" for AU$138.

The screen is about two inches in diameter, although the box says three.

When plugged in to a computer via the MicroUSB socket, it mounts as a storage device and you simply drag files over. There's also a socket for adding extra microSD storage.

The sliding switch is for power.

On top there's a rocker switch used for "go forward" and mode selection.

On the back is the camera and a tiny speaker said to be "Hi Fi".

The quality of the camera isn't great, here's a shot of the excellent Hartamas Regency 2 pool from my room:

This gadget has amazing functionality, badly implemented. Here's a feature list:

• Screen 960 x 480


• Plays Audio: mp3, wma, Real


• Plays Video: AVI, divx, MP4, Real


• Photo viewer


• eBook reader: just text but supports bookmarks


• Still camera: 2048 x 1536


• Video camera: records xvid


• Stopwatch


• FM Radio


• Tetris


• Audio recorder


• File explorer

Operation is obtuse at times, some functions are accessed by pressing and holding one of the buttons for a few seconds.

Battery life looks like it would play about 1.5 hours of video, certainly not enough for a movie on a flight but enough to watch a couple of TV shows.

The screen is one of those with a very narrow viewing angle side to side. The irritating thing about it is that each of your eyes sees a different version and when you go right off line the image goes negative.

I marvel at the ability of talented local manufacturers to create these devices and wonder would could be achieved if they partnered with some decent user interface engineers.

Can't tell who made it, there's no brand as I know it other than "IsMy" on the back. A bit of searching and it looks like it's from Kingdig Industrial (Shenzhen) CO.,LTD. Model Number : KD-MP4-045.

Turns out it's a Rockchip RK2708 running firmware version 2.2.

As the box goes on to say "The story continues, expand your life colourful your day with your digital player" - how could I resist.