WHAT'S HOT: This slim unit resembles a large keychain-size USB 1.1 memory drive, such as M-Systems' DiskOnKey, but with a music player and a voice recorder built in. You don't have to sweat it if you tend to forget cables, as the player integrates the USB connector into the device--you simply pull the cap off the end of the unit and then plug the player into your PC. If your computer's USB ports are inconveniently placed, such as on the back panel, you'll find the included USB extension cable handy. The bundled FM transmitter plugs into the headphone jack, and transmits music from the player to an available FM spot on your radio dial.

WHAT'S NOT: The two-line, backlit LCD screen can be difficult to read, depending on your viewing angle; also, in our tests the display had difficulties with some improperly formatted ID3 tags.

WHAT ELSE: The unit runs on a single AAA battery and ships with easy-to-use Digital Audio Manager software for dragging and dropping song titles onto the player in the desired order. Alternatively, since the device is recognized automatically in Windows Me (and later Windows versions) and is automatically assigned a drive letter, you can just plug it into your PC and then drag and drop WMA and MP3 files to it from within Windows Explorer. This flexibility means that the Gruvstick also can store data files, concurrently with music files, making it a great option in case you unexpectedly need to transfer digital photos, a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation, or other important files.

A rocker switch on the top left of the unit lets you move forward and backward; press it in, and you get a menu on the display for choosing between voice recordings, playback options, and the equalizer.

UPSHOT: The Gruvstick MP3+3 is a jack of all trades: a digital music player, a sort of super floppy disk, and a voice recorder. It lacks, however, the expandability/high capacity of other flash players we've seen.