I did not intentionally run discharge tests on this unit as it was borrowed and I did not think to get express permission to do so. Charging time from near dead was roughly 2 hours so the charge rate is about as fast as possible without really hampering cell life. The battery life was excellent and the little player could handle the pretty much all day listening sessions that are my average work day. A firmware change could easily alter this and would be welcome as I often change songs with a player in my pocket and having to pull it out and make sure the screen was enabled was a definite drawback.

This means that you have to hit the button once to turn on the screen and then a 2nd time to actually make the desired change. If I had one gripe at this stage it is that none of the controls on the main face of the player work when the screen is off. The control layout is very similar to many other players and works reasonably well. The top is devoid of any controls or ports and the bottom contains a 3.5mm jack and the micro-USB port for charging and loading music. The right side of the player has volume up and down buttons also arranged on the top 1/3 of the player. My 256 currently houses roughly 2700 titles so the limit was pretty much immaterial to me, ymmv.

The hardware limit of 15,000 songs really isn’t a problem with only a single SD slot and the use of lossless files. This is great compatibility as I have seen problems with the larger cards on several smaller players. I found that the micro-sd card slot would recognize all of my cards up to and including 2 different manufacturers 256gb cards. The left side of the player has the power button and the Micro-SD card slot arranged from the top. A fifth button in the center of the wheel operates as the primary play/pause control as is very typical for this style of player. The wheel does have 4 distinct buttons at top, bottom, left, and right and does not operate as a scroll wheel. Below the screen is the common 4 button wheel. Graphics are well displayed when album art is enabled. The Screen is large for the size and price point of the player if not super hi-resolution. Build: The player has a nice solid feel with all corners rounded enough to not snag but still very square in shape.

Mini digital portable music mp34 player