New Grip Design For Active Use. Mp3 Playback. Digital Tuner Built In. 20 Digital Presets. Carbon Fiber Top Design. Includes Remote Control & Back Banded Headphone. Joggable. Hyper Bass Sound. 20-hr Playback. 510-sec Asp-ex Memory. Includes Grip Band.
Keep the tunes rolling wherever life takes you with the JVC XL-PR3 portable CD player. This slim unit features a stylish carbon fiber finish casing and is compatible with all your CD, CD-R and CD-RW media, plus it plays MP3 CDs, so you can create your own discs for your day out. Effortlessly switch tracks with the included 6-button in-line remote control while listening on comfortable backband-style headphones (also included).
Other features include a built-in digital FM tuner that allows you to preset 20 of your favorite stations and 175-second anti-shock protection (426 seconds for MP3 CDs) keeps the music playing, even when the going gets rough. The XL-PR3 boasts 20-hours of battery life on two AA alkaline batteries (not included), so the enjoyment lasts and lasts. JVC's proprietary Hyper-bass system expands the low ranges of your favorite music for a richer listening experience. Finally, you can use the unit's LCD display to program up to 64 tracks, or skip through folders of MP3s, so you can play music in the order of your choice.
What's in the Box
JVC XL-PR3 Portable CD Player, headphones, remote, user manual
1 Poor sound quality, no EQ
This player has it all: FM radio, MP3 playback, a remote, and it's joggable with a special hand strap. The earphones, by the way, are excellent! What this device suffers from is poor sound quality, with meager means of customization. You have two options when it comes to sound processing: Bass boost on (which makes the music sound blown out and distorted) or bass boost off. Overall, music sounds unpronounced and muffled. I've tried using the player with a few different sets of earphones, all with the same effect. This device towers over others, especially at price-point, on functionality. I mean, it does it all. But unfortunately, sound quality suffers on this device. If that's not important to you, this might be a good player for you. If you want to hear high quality playback, this isn't for you. I really think that if JVC had included more options for equalization (EQ), the sound playback issues wouldn't be so overshadowingly bad.
2 Don't bother...
Really, you deserve better. Battery life isn't good, 20 hours at most just doesn't cut it for me. Sound quality is pretty good, but if you plug in your headphones diectly to the player without using the remote, you can definately hear that annoying little hissing sound. When using the remote the cord is too long and tangles easliy. The unit itself is rather bulky and thick. My friends cd players are practically half the thickness of this one. The controls are easy to use, especially the skip album one which is useful if you dont want to press the skip button over and over again when you use an mp3 disc. Speaking of mp3's, it plays them well but all the songs get put in alphabetical order which is pretty annoying unless you just use random. One nice little feature is the handstrap which makes it easy to use while jogging. However, of course, the cord is way too long while you're jogging with the remote attached. Just recently it started skipping occasionally, even though it usually had very good anti-skip protection, and sometimes it would restart itself when it was jostled too much, making it useless for jogging. It was very tempramental like this for a week or two until it finally just broke down and died on me a few days ago. The radio still works but whenever I try to play any cd, all it says is "OPEN" when it's clearly closed. The radio's decent, nothing special though. In conclusion, don't waste your money on this thing, go for a player designed more for workouts or even a flash mp3 player if you've got the cash for one.
3 Poor battery perfomance
Poor battery performance and the difficulty of making sure the unit is completely turned off have spoiled my satisfaction with this CD player. All too often, I have tried to play a CD only to find that the unit has mysteriously changed to the FM mode (I never listen to the radio so I never turn that mode on) and exhausted the batteries. Although the unit will turn itself off if accidentally left on while playing CDs, this does not apply to the FM mode. It will play until the batteries are exhausted, and with only 20 hours battery playtime to begin with, this means FREQUENT battery changes. There should be an AC adaptor readily available for this player with the other available accessories, as this is the only way I am going to be able to afford to use it.
4 Slim-body? I don't think so!
I bought this cd player a couple of weeks ago, it has good fm reception, nice quality audio, the headphones are great. The cd player look better in the pictures than it really is, is kinda big, the carbon finish is lame. About the remote, it can't change between preset stations, only does seeking but it changes between tracks though. Well, it still a nice cd player but I recommend the use of a carry case and the screen could be better. It works for me, cause it was cheap, good for the price I paid.
