Creative Nomad Jukebox

Look and Feel
The Jukebox's display is a dot matrix backlit LCD, with a groovy green illumination. It has three navigation buttons beneath the display which are completely multifunctional depending on the particular context of the screen currently being viewed. Various options are labelled above the buttons in simple text to designate the current function. Besides the fairly obvious play, pause/stop, skip forward/backward keys, there are two keys to control scrolling and two top level menu buttons EAX and LIB.

EAX takes you to system functions like the equaliser and recording. The LIB button takes you to the top level of the music library in the jukebox, whereby you can drill down to cascading levels of the data files from four major headings ALBUM, GENRE, ARTIST or PLAYLIST. The first three headings are of course based on tags within the MP3 files that you easily assign during MP3 conversion time. You can instantly add any album, track, genre or artist (and the entire collection of files associated with it) to the current playlist at any time, and they are simply placed in order of selection from the menu.

A minor gripe is that you cannot switch the placing of a track in the current playlist once it has been added, but with such an excellently powerful yet simple interface you have to expect certain concessions. You can then save the current playlist to disk and name it anything you please, quite easily, even while a track is playing. It seems strange rolling through the alphabet to pick playlist names, but without incorporating a total keyboard this will always be a bit tricky. Naturally these observations are in comparison to full-on PC applications that have nothing like the constraints of such a miniaturised device. It seems in the same league as those applications because it comes close to the most full-featured song management/queuing solutions available, and utterly blows away anything we have ever seen on a portable device. With this system you can be sitting on a bus, and listen to a randomly shuffling selection of the entire box-set of your favourite artist, or a random selection from your entire Funk collection. It really is an mindblowing expansion of your accessibility to your music, stereo based, walkman based, or otherwise.

The software included with the Jukebox incorporates a CD ripper/MP3 conversion package and a data management/transfer suite to control what you have stored on the Jukebox. It is as simple as placing your CD audio disk in the drive, selecting the tracks you want to rip and convert, and pressing go. You can quite easily assign the ALBUM, ARTIST and GENRE tags to the files by selecting them all, and right-clicking on the selection to group-change a particular tag. Doing this ensures the mega-powerful sorting features in the Jukebox are used to best effect.

The Jukebox does have moving parts, so unlike it's Flash ROM siblings, it's music stream is not perfectly shock-proof. However, it has an incredible, overkill-sized, five minute shock absorption buffer that will transmit a crystal, uninterrupted audio stream through anything less violent and lengthy than savage aircraft turbulence or a motorcycle accident off a cliff.

The Jukebox is powered by six Nickel-Metal-Hydride AA rechargeable batteries (included, with a full second set), which can be easily recharged inside the unit. When the AC adaptor is attached, the unit operates on the mains power and simultaneously re-charges the batteries. Charging time is from four to five hours, and the operating time in the field is up to four hours although you could theoretically charge both battery sets and change them over when necessary, giving you eight hours in total. In practise the Jukebox with its out-of-the-box power technology outlasts most Discman CD players in terms of battery time, often by a factor of 4 to 1.

One of the Jukeboxes' best-advised features is the safety-net future proofing of upgradeable firmware. Already supporting MP3 and WMA formats, it will support new formats, including the next generation of personal music asset management and future features with a simple download from the website australia.creative.com and a rudimentary install process when the Jukebox is plugged into the PC.

Probably the coolest particular application the Jukebox will supposedly fulfil in a software upgrade is the usage of it to store a large (read "massive") data file, say, a typical game demo (around 80+ MB), that you downloaded at work, or wherever you happen to have a fast Internet connection. You then take the Jukebox home, offload the file onto your PC, and there you have it, ready for use. It could hardly be any more painless than that, and it certainly beats taking the time and effort to download a huge file through a modem connection.

Another planned feature is an FM transmitter and car cigarette lighter adaptor that will allow the Jukebox to be used as an incredibly powerful, incredibly cool car stereo that can be easily taken away from the vehicle with minimum fuss. Alongside this prospective feature is the as-yet unused IR port in the device, which supposedly will allow remote control or communication with other Jukeboxes or PDA devices.

However as with any "feature in the wings" it is probably wise to wait and see which planned features actually materialise, before rushing out and purchasing. Especially when the unit cost is approaching that of a baseline desktop PC. Or a cheap car, for that matter. However, if you need all of the features that the Jukebox offers, then it will actually save you money.

This value of the jukebox is highlighted by a simple illustration. If you go looking around the net for portable hard disks with USB interfaces, you would be lucky to find anything for less than US$500. Which is a lot of money, in case you aren't aware of the current exchange rate. And it won't play Mp3s, or record CD quality sound. You would have to also purchase a MiniDisc recorder/player, and a basic MP3 player to have even a vaguely similar suite of features as the Jukebox offers. And you would still need a portable PC to transfer the files to and from the hard disk.

Anyone who has recently shopped for a portable hard disk, a Minidisc recorder and a firmware-upgradeable MP3 player will tell you: at an introductory price of AUD$999.00 the Creative Nomad Jukebox is retailing at a superb price for the overwhelming range of high-tech, high-end features it provides.

For the portability-conscious, devices like the Jukebox will replace obsolete items such as vinyl carrying bags and enormous CD racks, while totally smashing the car stereo market into another dimension. We thoroughly recommend it.

Creative Nomad Jukebox
Company: Creative Labs
Ph: 02 9666 6100; Fax: 02 9666 6900
Price: AU$999 until October 31 2000, then AU$1,199.
Rating: 5 Star