Review: HUM MP4 Car Player

At first glance, the Hum MP4 Car Player looks like yet another iPod Nano look-alike. Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery. The Apple iPod is no doubt today’s most popular and best selling digital portable music player, and many generic brands (including Hum) have copied the essence of the iPod Nano design and make it better with more features.

The one feature that makes the Hum MP4 player different from the rest of the pack is its integrated FM transmitter, by plugging an antenna (included) into the earphone jack. This feature simply makes it possible to hear all our songs stored in the portable player over any FM receiver/radio such as via our car cassette/CD player.

For many of us with gigabytes of digital music collections, this could rejuvenate our existing In-Car Entertainment (ICE) without having to invest on a new high-end ICE that could support digital media from USB drives or storage cards. To make this feature even more practical, the package also comes with a car charger to keep the music going on a long journey.

However, the music quality transmitted over the FM frequency is just mediocre and wasn’t as good as when compared to hearing it over an earphone. Over the earphone, the sound quality is remarkably good and is probably limited only to the quality of the encoded MP3s or WMAs stored (the player also supports MP1, MP2, WMV, ASF and WAV).

Here are some technical details of the player:

• Capacity: 1 GB
  [Could store approx. 250 songs]
• Dimension: 80mm (L) x 40mm (W) x 7mm (D)
  [Similar to an iPod Nano]
• Weight: 30g
  [Light weight]
• Screen: 1.5” LCD
  [Bright and sharp]
• Connectivity: Full Speed USB 2.0
  [Slow... should have been a Hi-Speed USB 2.0]
• Battery Life (with FM transmitter off): 8 hours (music), 6 hours (video)
  [Realistically, its only about 6+ hours of music]
• Battery Life (with FM transmitter on): 4 hours (music), 3 hours (video)
  [Realistically, its only about 3 hours of music]
• FM Transmitter Frequency Range: 87.5MHz – 108MHz
  [Can select a frequency that isn't used by radio stations]
• Package Contents: Earphone, antenna car charger, travel charger, USB cable, user’s manual & CD driver
  [A whole lot of goodies included]

Overall, the Hum MP4 Car Player is a good portable music player that would keep listeners satisfied while on-the-go. It offers more features than the popular Apple iPod Nano and yet only cost a fraction of it (RM250 @ ~US$70). Unfortunately, the Hum MP4 Car Player also inherits the not-so-good point of the iPod Nano polished backplane design that is easily scratched or stained with finger prints. Perhaps Hum should’ve made a design that they could proudly call their own instead of being a iPod Nano look-alike.

(Note: Pictured a black version of the player, also available in white)