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Samsung Yepp

WHAT'S HOT: Samsung's Yepp distinguishes itself with a silver, sleek design. The 64MB of built-in memory means the player can hold about an hour's worth of songs. A slot holds an additional 32MB as well. The bundled RealJukebox software is intuitive, making drag and drop transfers within the software player's interface hassle free. We prefer the wraparound headphones to the in-ear "bud" variety, and though the Yepp comes with in-ear headphones, they are weightier than most you'll find, which makes them less likely to fall out of your ear when walking or running.

WHAT'S NOT: The unit's LCD doesn't have a backlight. The font size on the LCD is so large that you can see only nine letters of the artist/song title line while the song is playing. (HanGo's Personal Jukebox, by contrast, has a much larger screen size, but doesn't crowd out the track information with a cumbersomely large font size.) Selecting songs to play takes some effort. Other problems plague this unit too. After moving the cursor to the line on which you think the song exists, the scrolling motion takes time, with no way to speed it up this process. Moreover, as you advance tracks from line to line, the song title doubles up for about a second, causing confusion about which song you're about to hear. When changing the preset EQ selections in midsong, the song stops for a second as well.

WHAT ELSE: The unit can store phone numbers and doubles as a minirecorder. The Yepp's parallel port interface makes song transfers slower than USB-based MP3 players. Samsung provides 24-hour, toll-free support, which is more than most vendors offer.

BEST USE: If you want a minirecorder and wouldn't mind listening to some songs, as well.

SUMMARY

Samsung Yepp $229; 64MB of on-board memory, supports MP3 format, parallel port, two AAA batteries, RealJukebox audio software, 1-year warranty, 24-hour, toll-free tech support. Samsung 800/726-7864 www.samsungyepp.com