Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox review (30GB)

Music lovers who want the iPod's style but would rather stick to something compatible with Windows Media Player and Windows Media DRM 10 should give some consideration to Philips's $300 ($280 on the street) GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox, a sexy black portable that offers 30GB of storage, photo viewing on a bright, clear screen, and even a few tricks that the iPod hasn't learned. While the snazzy touch-sensitive interface isn't for everybody, this Windows Media DRM 10-compatible player is a nice step forward for Philips MP3 players, which have suffered from performance issues in the past. Although we have heard some reports of the HDD6330 suffering from processor slowness--including one from a CNET employee who has used the device--our tester didn't experience any major problems. The Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox resembles the new black iPod, although at 2.5 by 4.1 by 0.7 inches, it's noticeably thicker (the 30GB iPod is 0.4 inch thick and 4.8 ounces), and it weighs more at 5.3 ounces. But its elegant design does have a similar sleekness and gee-whiz factor, something we can't say about most WMA-compatible players. The player's smooth black face doesn't show any controls or buttons at first. When you power it up, backlit-blue buttons appear to show you your touch-sensitive input options. You'll get only the buttons that work with the menu you're on--so if you've scrolled all the way to the right, you won't get the Move Forward button, for example--which is a clever design and is reminiscent of the iRiver U10 and the Olympus M:robe series. It has three Playback buttons on the top, Forward and Back buttons on the sides, a scroll bar in the middle, and the Menu button on the lower left.

The Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox's design has drawbacks, though. The controls are so spread out--besides the already mentioned buttons, there are dedicated volume buttons on the right side, as well as a power and a hold slider button on the left--that it's hard to operate the player with one hand, as you can do with an iPod. The buttons on the face are touch-sensitive but don't have any mechanical parts, so there's no tactile response when you press them. That makes them too easy to click by mistake--or not to click when you think you're tapping them. Plus, the glossy front is a magnet for skin oil and fingerprints, and it starts to look messy after only a little use.

The Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox has a bright 2-inch TFT screen capable of 65,000 colors and eight lines of text. It's not as big as the 5G iPod's 2.5-inch screen, but it still does a good job of showing off album art, photos, and even slide shows with music and transitions. It can't store and play video, though, like the new iPod or Cowon's iAudio X5.

The Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox comes with a pair of black headphones that have a rubbery coating, making them tangle prone and quick to catch on jacket zippers. They sounded great in our testing, producing an even, rich tone with enough bass, although they leak sound so that music at higher volumes can easily be heard by others.

The package also comes with a cloth slipcase, though you can't control the player while it's in the case, so you'll constantly be removing it. When you're ready to expand, Philips has a small line of compatible accessories, including a carrying case with a carabiner clip, a docking cradle for connecting to your stereo or TV, and a camera cable for loading photos from your camera without a PC.

The Philips GoGear HDD6330 Jukebox features a simple side-scrolling interface, with all the different areas arranged on the right side of the main screen: Music, Pictures, Radio, Recordings, Settings, and Now Playing. Clicking the Menu button on any screen brings up contextual commands, such as assigning presets in the radio section. We're happy to see the voice recorder and the FM radio tuner/recorder, since all are missing from Apple's iPod. Unfortunately, you won't be able to record line-in sources unless you have the optional dock. When playing music, you can select from 10 preset equalizer settings, manually adjust the five-band equalizer, and turn on the SRS Wow bass enhancer. The player can handle MP3, protected WMA, and WAV tracks but will connect only with Windows XP PCs.