1. Looks pretty good for a mini set.

2. Uhhh ...

1. PSU is too weak, makes onboard circuitry freeze.

2. Very average sound for a $150 player, just awful considering it is a $500 player.

3. Cd burning is below acceptable performance. Expensive discs, many failed burning sessions, 2 speed recording (which means waiting 35+ minutes of waiting for a 70 minutes long cd, excluding initializing / finalizing) At the time cd-burners were more expensive than they are now, but I would have been better off buying a separate external one for the pc.

4. Unless it's dimmed the screen looks like Las Vegas at night, many flickering lights to keep you awake at night.

In my teenage years I worked for three weeks at a food processing plant to buy my first cd-player / speaker set. The one I had in mind was the JVC boomblaster. The work was really awful, but I was able to drag myself through it thinking about the future purchase. I worked days of 10 hours and in 3 weeks I made more money than the initial goal... much more than the initial goal. So I changed my mind and went to the store searching for something better.

Instead of the JVC I bought this one, at the time I wasn't able to record cd's on my PC so this seemed to be a great choice. One of my friends owned a Sony stereo set with 2x60W speakers and less than half the price, so this one had to sound twice as good / loud as his player. Very ignorant and uninformed, I know, but at the time I did not have the internet at home so I had to rely on cheap marketing talk of sales people.

I have never been really happy about this purchase, except for the first couple of weeks of enthusiasm, because:

* The sound quality is not that good at all, as a matter of fact, my friend's stereo set sounded better and louder (they advertised with 2x100W while the manual says 2x50W RMS, which the average Joe (like myself at the time I bought it) has no clue about). The vocals really disappear in a blend of noise unless you switch off all equalizer settings and loudness.

* You can only use digital audio cd-r(w) discs which were $2 a piece at the time, not all brands worked and even with philips discs the recording process often failed. When buying a box of 10 cd's of $20, of which on average 5 got successfully recorded, this became an expensive joke.

* There is a problem with the system which is apparently common with the system. At times it will just stop playing and not respond to any button you press until you completely take all power off the system. From what I've been told this is not a mechanical problem, the power supply is just too weak for the system and has to be modified to give the system enough juice to work properly. Ridiculous!


Looking back now I would have bought the JVC back then, because:

1. It's a lot cheaper.

2. Portable.

3. Better!

4. Does not pretend to be good at burning cd's.

5. I would have been able to get a small tv or some playstation games / albums as well.

Similar Products Used:

None, searching for replacement now because I'm sick of it. Now I am informed I will go for separate components of a high grade audio brand (probably Denon or Marantz with B&W speakers). Philips is a good brand, but their audio equipment is not of the same quality as for example their television screens.

Nice graphics Lots of flashing lights sleep timer remote

Overall sound leaves much to be desired especially for the price CD-RW broke twice tuner section doesn't Muddy, inarticulate bass

If this unit did not have CD-R it would sell for much, much less. The CD-RW stopped working after 3 months. Sent for repair- broke again 3 weeks later. The sound quality is what one might expect from a mini-system costing about 150.00. There are 5 EQ settings,bass boost & surround sound, all of which I find useless. Why can't these systems use regular treble & bass controls? As for sound I don't expect audiophile grade sound from a mini-system but I have heard much less expensive units sound much better. The bass, regardless of which EQ setting you choose, is muddy and not defined. It overpowers the midrange & treble. The sound eminating from the speakers sounds boxy (I suspect from lack of internal speaker bracing). The treble and midrange are too far back in the mix even with bass boost off. The tuner section leaves much to be desired. I live in an area where portable radios have adequate reception, yet with the supplied FM wire I couldn't pull in strong, close stations without static & noise. The sleep timer & alarm functions are nice. Attractive graphics- lots of flashing lights! I recently borrowed a JVC MX GT-90 mini-system from a friend which he paid 150.00 less for and it sounded great. If your buying the unit for it's CD-RW capabilities you may want to purchase a seperate recording unit, buy another mini-system w/o CD-R & hookup the seperate to the mini-system's inputs. Save money, buy an inexpensive receiver,CD player and speakers. You will get much better sound and probably pay less.

Similar Products Used:

JVC MX GT-90