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Performance
In
the performance section, I comment on everything from the interface to its
durability and sound quality. There's not much to go over because this
player lacks quite a number of features. However, I would like to get
started with the GUI and Navigation because this is where I discovered some
issues.
Interface & Navigation
Navigating the interface is a breeze. The GUI itself doesn't offer you
very much so getting to where you want to be is very easy. I love the
simple, yet high-tech look of the interface. It blends in quite nicely
with this player.
I
did encounter a problem with this player and after extensive testing, can
only blame it on the firmware itself. It is very picky about the media
being transferred to the player. For example, as shown in the
shot above, it will list an artist more than once on occasion. What
was very interesting is that when transferring via their software, it would
list the same artist multiple times, even if the spelling was right.
Transferring the whole collection using WMP 11 did help, but I still
encountered this issue with a number of tracks or artists. It was highly annoying
and I could not find a way to correct it. Hopefully a firmware update
will fix this. Regardless, keep that in mind if you are looking to
purchase this player. I've been building my collection very very
slowly over many years
and my ID3 Tags are extremely accurate. There are no mistakes,
case-sensitive differences or
missing information. It simply appears to be quite
finicky with files and if you have bad tags, the problem could be much worse.
Most people don't actually like touch
sensitive controls. I happen to be one that does. The less
moving parts, the less likely it is prone to breaking after extensive use. Fortunately,
the control pad on this player is highly responsive and navigating was not
an issue at all. In fact, its responsiveness was highly accurate and
much better than those found in other similar products.
Audio Playback
Unfortunately, this is the main area where I find this player fails to
impress. What you see above is all you'll get in terms of playback
features. Some very basic sound effects can be enabled and you can set
the player to either repeat or shuffle tracks. Most importantly, note
that this player lacks on-the-fly playlists...a BIG no-no in my book!
Instead, you have to resort to their "My Album" feature in their software or
load playlists from WMP 11 on the player. Again, very basic features
and I was not impressed at all with any of them.
Picture Viewing
Forget about using this player for picture
viewing. The display would not render quality images very well at all.
Also, you'll encounter some serious performance issues when attempting to
browse or load images. I loaded a variety of images including those
taken with a 2.1, 3.0, 4.1 and quality 7.1 megapixel camera. All were
uncompressed JPG images directly from the camera. This player
struggles with high megapixel images and loading a 7.1 megapixel image can
take in excess of 6 seconds. Others loaded quicker, but if you have
large high quality images in the thumbnail view, it will be quite sluggish
and there's a huge delay before it will show you the thumbnails.
Picture viewing is completely pointless with this player and you'll
definitely not want to waste your time or space on it. Just my honest
advice after my experience with it all.
FM Tuner
Now, I had very high expectations here because
I've read some reviews on its bigger brother (YP-K5) and some have claimed
that the quality was very impressive and among the best they've heard on
such a product. Unfortunately, that's not the case with the new YP-K3.
I was not impressed at all with the reception of the FM tuner and there was
plenty of static when moving the player around while listening.
Setting the FM sensitivity to "Low" as shown above did actually help quite a
bit but no station came in crystal clear. Also, note that you will not
be able to record from it either as this player lacks any kind of
recording capabilities.
Sound Quality
The YP-K3 comes bundled with Samsung branded
earbuds model EP-370. Like a majority of bundled earbuds, the sound
quality is not great. With that said, sound quality was primarily
tested using both the Sennheiser MX-300 and the
Razer Pro-Tones MX100.
Unlike the bundled earbuds, both of these are quality in-ear style buds that
do offer some very decent sound.
Unfortunately, I wasn't too impressed with its
sound quality either. It was tested with a 1.52GB MP3 music collection
encoded in 192kbps that consisted of a variety of genres. The somewhat
poor sound quality was almost instantly noticed and a majority of tracks
sounded as if the treble was up way too high. Enabling the Bass Boost
in the playback options didn't seem to help at all. In fact, it made
some tracks sound muffled. The absolute best sound I was able to get
was when I enabled the "3D Sound" option. However, this
option was not for all genres though and I had to resort to setting it back
to "Normal" for best sound.
I was just not
impressed at all from the beginning. Also, I found myself having to
pump the volume up almost to its max at times. Based on what I could
find, I believe its signal-to-noise ratio is only 88dB. Bottom line is
that there are certainly better sounding players out there. In fact,
the diminutive Cube 2 blows this player away in overall sound quality.
Battery Life
Battery life was very impressive. Note though that some documentation
may be a bit misleading. Some documentation from Samsung states up to
20hrs of playback. However some detailed specs on its manual state up
to 25hrs of playback. Battery life was tested with the following
settings on the player:
Display Timeout - 30secs
Graphic EQ - On
Play Mode - Normal
With moderate interaction with its touch controls, I was able to achieve a
high playback time of just over 22 hours. Keep in mind that this was
with a collection encoded in 192Kbps as opposed to the 128kbps ratings in
its specs.
Durability
With a player this thin, it is obvious that some care will need to be taken.
While it feels extremely solid, you probably don't want to stick it in your
back pocket. Also, while the matte black finish on the back looks
quite durable and not prone to scratch easily, I can't say the same about
the front. Its glass-like finish can indeed scratch easily and you'll
probably want to find a front screen protector for this player.
Overall, I was very impressed with its build quality. I own plenty of
Samsung products and I'm actually quite fond of the company. This one
happens to be yet other quality one that will impress.
Accessories
The YP-K3 is not an Ipod so don't expect a
high number of companies releasing accessories for this new player.
There are some cases out there, some of which are bulky and would defeat the
purpose of owning such a slim device in the first place. However,
there are some silicone skins available for the player to help maintain its
ultra-slim profile. I'm not sure how much of an impact these
will have on the touch sensitive controls though. My recommendation is
to wait until ShieldZone
releases a front or full body shield for this player or have a custom one
requested from them. That is really
all you'll need for peace of mind. Finally, after some extensive
searching, I found a Korean Website that appears to offer a housing that
features an external speaker, offering some of the unique features found in
its larger sibling. Based on the pictures, it does appear to add quite
a bit of bulk though and I'm not sure this will be a product most would be
interested in.
Samsung hasn't released any
accessories for this player that I know of. Considering the USB
connector is on the bottom of the player, a docking station would be nice at
least. This player took a while to hit the US market and just recently
became available. We'll just have to wait an see if some companies
will support it.
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