Went ahead and bought the gumstick today. At the shop I thought I was hearing a definite difference, as did my brothers who came along...
When I went home though, I realized that the "rock" eq preset was probably on. Whenever I turn the gumstick off and on, it will reset the eq back to "rock". Annoying. On normal setting, I THINK I am hearing a difference, but it's very slight. Sounds slightly brighter than my sony phone and E005. I think. Maybe it's placebo. My brother says the difference to him is huge, but if I wasn't comparing them side by side, and you randomly plugged in one for me to listen, if it wasn't for the hiss on the E005, I don't think I'd be able to name the player. For example, I can hear a much bigger difference from my computer's headphone out than any difference between my gumstick, E005 or phone. It's also possible I've lost a lot of hearing going to loud gigs when I was younger. Will you be reviewing the gumstick's SQ ClieOS? I hope you do one
EQ
The custom EQ is pretty good, 5band, goes to +/-12db for each band - nice. The very weird thing about the EQ tho, is custom settings when all set to zero is softer than the "normal" preset.
Hiss
No hiss! Hooray. Improvement over the E005. Playing a silent track, I only start to hear some soft crackling with the volume at 26/31. Normal listening for me is between 12/31 to 15/31, so it's not an issue at all.
Buttons
You're right about the buttons david1978jp. Not so much flimsy, but compared to my E005, not as responsive, especially the play button. The hippo also needs to be powered on and off, which isn't as convenient as the E005 (pressing pause effectively turns the player off, and turns on instantly when you press play).
Navigation
I can't figure out the folder arrangement. It's not listing them alphabetically, neither is it listing them by transfer date. Seems totally random?? Any idea ClieOS?
Compared to the E005, skipping albums is easier on the E005, and the nav system seems more intuitive. But the Hippo has shortcut button to EQ, so if you get used to it, navigation might get faster than E005 if you like to tinker settings.
BBE
The instruction paper (note I didn't say booklet
) says it has BBE settings, but I found none.
Transfer speed - very fast.
Overall, starting to feel it was a bit of an impulse buy. If I could reset today, I wouldn't have bought it, but not regretting it too much either. I don't think the upgrade is big enough to warrant getting a new player, but I feel its still an upgrade. If I didn't already have an mp3 player, at the price I think it's a good buy despite its flaws. Maybe the clip would have been better, but I won't bother testing it out now.
edit: Hope this doesn't sound too negative. I don't have any big headphones to test out, and I guess the major feature of the hippo gumstick is its ability to power headphones w/o an amp, so others may find it more useful than I have.
My perfect mp3 player would be a souped up (or more bare bones) version of the E005. No radio, no recording, no lyrics, no ebook reader, no transfer software required, no video, no touch pad, no need to switch player on/off. Good SQ, simple navigation and cheap price is all I ask for.
edit: After more playing around with, it seems the player remembers the last eq setting used (for the sound coming out), but the display always resets to "rock".