- The small and sturdy GoGear Vibe MP3 Player hits the right notes with Philips FullSound to bring your music to life
- Philips GoGear MP3 Player Vibe 8GB SA3VBE08K/37
- Philips Product. Plus, soft rubber earbuds ensure comfy music enjoyment
- Songbird for endless music discovery and easy synchronization. Plus, soft rubber earbuds ensure comfy music enjoyment
- The small and sturdy GoGear Vibe MP3 Player hits the right notes with Philips FullSound to bring your music to life and
- Songbird for endless music discovery and easy synchronization.
Pros
+ Superb sound quality.
+ Comfortable and soft rubber ear buds.
+ Excellent auto-preset FM Tuner.
+ Perfect dimensions for an on the go mp3 player. As another review said it's about the size of a credit card and the depth of a Hershey bar.
+ Custom equalizer.
+ Free and optional install of Songbird software.
+ Plays video.
Cons
Ear bud cord could be a bit longer. An additional 6" would have been better.
No Audio Recording capability even though it's advertised as such. There's what appears to be microphone hole on the top of the device but no recording options available. This is the main reason I knocked off a star as I would have really used this option.
Limited video format support.
Small video screen and along with that comes rather poor quality/resolution (expected for the price). Hopefully most people don't plan on watching a lot of video with this player.
User interface could use some tweaking as it's a bit confusing at first.
Volume buttons are a bit too recessed for larger fingers.
Unfortunately the Songbird software consistantly crashes without reason despite repeated software updates.
All things considered this is a good deal for a low end MP3 player. For the price it's difficult to go wrong with this device. Is it perfect? No. Could there be improvements? Absolutely. As I mentioned earlier, my biggest disappointment was the lack of the audio recorder. I'm guessing this probably won't be an issue for most people however. Other than that I'm very satisfied with the Philips GoGear Vibe. Satisfied enough to consider purchasing the 16GB GoGear Muse.
Buy Philips GoGear Vibe 8GB MP3 Player SA3VBE08K/37 Now
The specific model I am reviewing is the SA3VBE04K/37 which is important because all of the documentation I can find referring to the 4gb GoGear Vibe mentions audio recording capability which this specific model apparently cannot do. There is no built in microphone, hence, no ability to record audio EVEN THOUGH RECORDING AUDIO IS LISTED AS A FEATURE OF THIS UNIT. The manuals I've found show a different configuration (microphone hole on top) than this particular unit. If you're looking to record classroom lectures (I was looking forward to testing the quality of that) you just can't do it. This also raises into question the capabilities of the other Vibes. Which ones have this feature and which ones don't? Hopefully the Philips folks will fix their documentation and advertising and this won't be an issue.Otherwise, this is a solid, pretty standard MP3 player. As advertised, it takes about 2-3 hours to charge the built-in, non-replaceable battery. I actually prefer non-replaceables since I don't spend all my time hunting for AAA or AA or button batteries, but you may prefer otherwise. I've had it running overnight and it still has a good charge, but that should be the case with any new battery. If it turns out this unit's battery has a short life-span (less than 1 year?) I'll add an update to this review.
The sound is solid, the interface is decent, the software is all pretty standard. At least, standard for a portable MP3 player not built by a certain company that starts with an "A." In fact, my most recent experience is with a second generation Apple Shuffle (postage stamp sized, no screen) and I prefer this GoGear Vibe to the smaller Shuffle for a couple of reasons. A lesser reason is the Vibe's screen which has a nice visible menu system and pretty easy to use controls. The second is more important to me: the built-in FM radio. I've had no problems using it to tune in to the local NPR station which I prefer listening to, rather than music, during my 2 mile walk to my bus stop. Personally, this is my favorite feature.
The size and weight are good, about half the size of a current Hershey's 1.55 Ounce Milk Chocolate Bar and about as thick as one candy bar. Check the comparative size photo I uploaded for this review. It does fit nicely in the pocket. The earphones are pretty decent for ear buds both in comfort and sound quality and I see no reason to replace them. It doesn't have a clip, nor did it come with a lanyard neither is a deal killer, but either would be nice!
The picture and audio/video display works as good as you would expect with the 1.8 inch display. Videos have to be in the MJPEG format, and are displayed on a 160 x 128 pixel format. The display is legible and clear, but this is a small screen. Because of the memory limitations of the specific unit I'm reviewing (4 GB) I wouldn't use it for video in any case. Pictures? Maybe. But we're still talking about pictures a little bit bigger than a postage stamp (albeit, a larger, commemorative US postage stamp).
Read the specifications carefully and make sure you know what you're getting (with the caveat that the specifications could be in error as noted at the outset of this review). This is, overall, a nice little unit, but nothing about it really rises above the fact that it's pretty much just a standard entry into the non-Apple MP3 Player arena.
UPDATE 22 MAY 2012 (over a year after acquisition): Durability is excellent. For the last year I've been constantly letting this rattle around in my car's glove box and in my pocket. Works just as good as when it was new over a year ago. It has some wear marks (what you'd expect) but has physically held up perfectly.
Read Best Reviews of Philips GoGear Vibe 8GB MP3 Player SA3VBE08K/37 Here
(2008 HOLIDAY TEAM) Although Apple has set the industry standard for portable digital music with its iPod line, not everyone wants to pay the price or use iTunes to manage music. This little GoGear Vibe is a good choice for people who want a relatively inexpensive MP3 player that's about twice the size of the Nano but much smaller than Apple's other offerings. NOTE: I'm reviewing the 4GB version. The 8GB version comes with voice recording but this smaller capacity one does not.This MP3 player is designed exclusively for Windows PCs because its Songbird music managing program does not work with Macs, even though there is a Songbird for Mac program available for free download. That said, I was able to download Amazon MP3s to the device, using it the way I'd use a flash drive by dropping files directly onto the GoGear. It worked perfectly, but I couldn't fill it with songs from my Mac's iTunes library, even when I located the files for them. The songs transferred but wouldn't play, suggesting that the GoGear Songbird converts the file kinds to be compatible with the device. When I connected it to a Windows machine, that version of Songbird immediately asked if I wanted to import my music from iTunes, so the GoGear can indeed do it, just not with a Mac.
The controls are relatively easy to use -once I found them. The black-on-black face, with little supplied documentation, made its use trial-and-error at first. The small screen is large enough to display an album cover but lousy for photos and videos. Some of the other models in the GoGear line have bigger screens, so if you want to display photos or video, you might want to investigate them.
The sound is slightly different than the iPod for the same songs played through the same set of earbuds. I can't say whether one was better or worse; the iPod has warmer tones, but the GoGear has crisp, clean notes.
The earbuds are comfortable, and they stay in place. Battery life is so-so, the one area of the GoGear that I didn't like. I took it on a trip with me, and more than once I'd go to listen to it, only to find the battery drained. I suppose I've been spoiled by the long life of my iPod battery. And the 4 GB capacity is too small for those of us who like to carry around a huge music library to enable a listening decision on the fly. I don't like Philips assumption that Mac users won't want to use a non-Apple product for music listening.
I also am not a fan of Songbird. Although it has some of the features of iTunes, I found its navigation to be somewhat clumsy. I didn't take any points away because of it, however, since it may be that I'm so used to iTunes that I expect other programs to approach it in ease-of-use.
The GoGear deserves five stars just for its value, but it falls far short of the more expensive iPod Classic and Touch. If you don't want to support Apple (and many people don't) or if you want a budget, solid-state player, then the 4GB GoGear Vibe is something you should consider. Otherwise, I recommend looking at the higher end products in the Philips line or at Apple's.
-Debbie Lee Wesselmann
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I very carefully studied the reviews of several mp3 players when my first one died suddenly. I had a player with a 2.8" screen but decided that it wasn't really necessary as I never used it to watch video. I had downloaded a few things when I first got it as it was a "new toy" but then as time passed, used it solely to listen to music. However, it was important to me to be able to view album art as I had spent hours downloading that for my songs ripped from cd's. So thank you to previous reviewers who mentioned that functionality in their reviews.The Philips Songbird software was easy to use. It synced up with my music files immediately and downloaded everything flawlessly. Since the initial sync though, I prefer to just drag and drop any new songs I add instead of going through the syncing process. I have several songs that I don't want to transfer every time (for example, my husband's favorites and Christmas music). But it was an easy way to get started. Everything is organized by artist, album, and genre and I like the playlist feature. That allowed me to separate my regular music from the Christmas music that I had on the player during the holidays. You can create a playlist on the go, but I haven't used that feature yet.
A really nice feature that I didn't have on my previous player is the delete on the go option. If you find that you have a song you don't really want you don't have to wait to get back to your computer to delete it. You can get rid of it immediately!
I am taking a long trip this weekend and thought it would be nice to have an audio book to listen to along the way. The audible.com site that is listed in the manual charges a monthly fee for their books, so I thought I would see if I could use my local library instead. Worked like a charm! It will accept books in either mp3 or WMA format. My library uses the Overdrive Media software for downloads and it was easy to download the book into that software and then it had a transfer option that recognized the Vibe and transferred the books in seconds! The only negative is that they were downloaded into the music files so they are mixed with my music. To find them, I have to go to artist and then find the author's name. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm guessing that if you were playing random selections from your music file, your book files could be selected to play. But you would just skip to the next song, so shouldn't be a big deal if you want to listen to music while you have a book loaded.
I tried out the FM radio as well and it auto tuned all the stations the first time and does work well in my market as far as tuning in(Bismarck ND). I don't really use this feature though.
Battery life seems good as it shows near full strength after 2 3 hours of play. I haven't played it for such a length of time as to drain the battery fully (it will get its test with the audio book tomorrow as I intend to listen for over 5 hours straight).
Over all, I am very, very pleased with my purchase of the Vibe. If you want an mp3 player that plays music and audiobooks, you won't be disappointed in this one!
