Sonic Impact Video 55 review

All in all, it's a well-designed device with convenient slots and port placement, but we do have a couple of gripes. The first is that the shiny black coating on the inside shell attracts a lot of fingerprints and smudges. Also, considering the size and price of the unit, we'd like to see a larger display--there's about an inch all the way around it to accommodate more screen real estate. That said, we appreciate the quality of the screen; the cheaper Memorex iFlip has a larger display, but videos don't look as good on it.

Performance in general on the Video 55 proved pretty good during testing. Videos lacked the color saturation that was visible on those that we played on our computer, but that's to be expected. Overall, movies and TV shows played back in clear detail with no artifacts, pixilation, or screen-door effect. Viewing angles were excellent; at least three people could comfortably watch at the same time. And the stereo sound was great. It wouldn't be a stretch to use the Video 55 for music on the go, though it's not at the level of $300 speaker sets. The unit is rated for just three hours of video playback, which is about on a par for the original 5G iPod, but might not last up to the updated version.