Note: Gateway is currently offering an instant $50 rebate. Use coupon code: 6GBJUKEBOX at checkout. This offer is not valid when purchased with a PC (as of 6/25/2005). Read by: 8549 Visitors After reading this review Let others know if it was informative 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Gateway MP3 Photo Jukebox Review Review by Ron Risman - June 2005 1. Introduction 2. First Impression 3. Transferring Photos 4. Photo Navigation 5. As a Music Player 6. Conclusion 7. Specifications 1. Introduction 2. First Impression 3. Transferring Photos 4. Photo Navigation 5. As a Music Player 6. Conclusion 7. Specifications

As a Music Player

The Gateway Photo Jukebox can either be viewed as a portable photo storage device that does a great job as an MP3 player or a great MP3 player with photo storage ability. Either way, the Gateway unit is an affordable and compact way to do both.

As an MP3 music player, the Gateway MP3 Photo Jukebox is one of the first that I have seen that can compete with the navigation and ease of use that has made the Apple iPod a huge success. No, it doesn't feature the cool and fast click wheel, but the interface and speed of navigation is very fast and for the same price as the iPod Mini, the Gateway unit provides a color screen for increased viewability, camera connectivity and photo playback. It even allows you to play photo slideshows on it's small 1.6" screen - with music.

In subjective testing, the audio quality from the Gateway MP3 Photo Jukebox was superb. I judged the audio side-by-side with my iRiver iHP-120 MP3 player in different settings; in the car using a direct line in to the stereo, at home using a pair of high-quality AIWA headphones, and using the included earbud's. The included earbud's muffled the bass a bit, but overall sound quality was pretty good for a non-name set of earbuds.

The player doesn't have an adjustable EQ, but it does offer no less than 25 presets. The EQ Presets include: Treble, Treble Cut, Soundtrack, Rock, Rock + Bass, R&B, Reggae, Rap, Punk, Pop, Pop+Bass, Metal, Latin, Jazz, Jazz+Bass, Hip Hop, Hard Rock, Gospel, Flat, Dance, Country, Classical, Blues, Bass Boost, and Bass Cut.

The player also has the standard MP3 features such as shuffle play, repeat mode, visual audio meter, and the ability to add songs to a playlist without needing a PC. The 65,000 screen is backlit and transflective, making it easy to read indoors or in direct sunlight. Because the resolution of the screen is very low (128x128 pixels), Gateway went with larger fonts in order to make the screen readable. The large fonts do make the screen easy to see, but some menu items need to scroll in order to display beyond the screen's 14 character line length.

Napster-To-Go Compatible
The Gateway MP3 Photo Jukebox is also compatible with Napster-to-go, giving you access to hundreds of thousands of songs for a flat monthly fee. Instead of paying upwards of a $1.00 per song, the Napster service allows you to pay $14.95 per month, which gives you unlimited access to music on your PC and MP3 player. With this service you don't actually own the music, instead the music can be listened to anytime, as long as you're a current Napster subscriber.

Transferring music from a PC to the Gateway MP3 Photo Jukebox using USB 2.0 was very quick. I was able to transfer 125.7MB worth of music from Microsoft Windows Media 10 in only 45 seconds. Twenty-nine songs (1 hour and 50 minutes worth of music) transfered in under 1 minute. Fast!