Aiwa XP-Z3C Personal CD Player

There are plenty of technologies for MP3 players: HD, flash or CD. HD (hard disk) based jukeboxes have huge capacities, but they tend to be a little bulky and expensive. Flash based players are less expensive, but their capacity is limited by the flash media, which can be expensive if you want to upgrade to >200MB. Standard-size CD based players aree economical because CD-R and CDR/W media are cheap, but such players tend to be too large. Finally, mini CD based MP3 players are just the right size and they use inexpensive CD-R and CD-R/W. I highly recommend CD-R/W media because they can be erased. A 210MB 80mm CD-R/W costs less than $1, compared to about $40 for a 128MB flash card. At $1 per 210MB, you can keep your music on each one without having to erase and rewrite frequently.

I bought the Aiwa XP-Z3C from outpost.com shortly before they ran out of stack at US$79. The player came in a rather big plastic case that is stuffed with everything one will need. Everything is made in Japan in the package!

The package includes the player, a docking/charging station, prismatic NiMH batteries, external attachable battery pack, CD-R disks, wired remote control and in-ear ear buds. Setting up the unit is easy: open the battery compartment and slide in the two prismatic (rectangular) batteries, then put the unit in the cradle. Connect the included transformer to the cradle and that's it. An LED indicates whether the unit is charging. This cradle design is mostly for minimizing circuitry inside the unit to keep it small and light.

There are other 8cm/80mm/3in mini CD/MP3 players out there, but this is the only one that displays information from ID3 tags included in the MP3 files. The unit itself has no display, just the basic play/stop/forward/backward controls. The wired remote control is COOL. It has the backlit LCD display and all of the controls. Aiwa could have made the entire LCD area graphical to display more useful information. The top part is simply a wave to indicate whether the unit is playing or paused.

A button on the wired remote switches the display mode: track/time, filename or ID3 tag. I found ID3 tag is the most useful. A hold sliding switch is also available to prevent accidental pushing of the buttons. Volume control is available on the unit and the wired remote, implemented as two buttons ( and -). One can navigate from one to folder to another easily on the wired remote.

The headphones plug into the wired remote. There is not much to write home about the included headphones. They work, but they are also no match for my Grado Lab headhphones. The shorter cord is intended for use with the wired remote clipped (with its built-in clip) to your clothing.

There is a fabric bag included to carry the unit. It is just a pouch with draw-string for closing. Again, nothing to write home about. Aiwa should have included a belt clip on the main unit for easier personal attachment. On the other hand, because of its small size, you can easily get a third party gadget bag to carry and protect the player.

Burning MP3 CDs is both easy and hard. If you only use Windows (esp. XP), the process is easy. Simply construct a folder structure at the CD-R/W drive, stuff the folders with your MP3 files, then write the content to a 80mm CD-R or CD-RW. The player does want to play the files based on alphabetical order. It is, therefore, helpful to name the files with the intended track numbers, then followed by the songs' name.

It is hard (so far impossible) to burn an MP3 CDs for the Z3C from Linux. I could burn MP3 CDs all day long that are recognized by every player except the Z3C. But this is not a big problem because I do have an XP box in addition to my Linux box. It is just buffling to me...

Once you have the batteries charged (when the LED on the cradle turns off) and CD burned, it is time to test it out! Initially, it takes about 10 to 20 seconds to scan the CD for titles. After that, the player keeps data in memory most of the time, and only spin the disk when the memory buffer is nearly emptied. This is a nice feature because it can maximize play time and reduce tear and wear on mechanical parts.

The sound level is sufficient in a quiet environment. On an airplane, however, you may need to either crank it all the way up or use some other headphones. Closed-air or noise-canceling headphones should improve the signal-to-noise ratio in noisy environments.

After testing the Z3C and growing attached to it, I finally had to give it away as a present to my brother. I was having some real trouble giving it away because Outpost no longer carries it at $80! For $80, it is the BEST deal you can get if you only need to fit about 3 CD's worth of music in a compact MP3 player.