This is a review of Micca Speck 1080p Full HD portable digital media player. http://www.miccastore.com/open-box-...er-for-usb-drives-and-sdsdhc-cards-p-100.html
Quite often I talk in my reviews about smartphones and smartwatches, but not as much about smart tvs. In general, a smart tv will allow you to get access to internet to run Netflix, YouTube, web browsing and other apps. But one basic common smart functionality is to be able to watch movies or to play music or to browse pictures stored on your usb stick or external hard drive or SD card from your camera. Just because you have a flat screen TV it doesn't mean it will be able to decode your digital media from an externally connected source. Or maybe you still have an old big screen tube tv or your flat screen only has one HDMI port already connected to cable box or DVD player and you only have access to A/V component port (red/white + yellow cables). There are a lot of scenarios where you just need a simple way to play your movies or music or pictures, and now you have a very simple solution - Micca Speck. What makes it even cooler, they have an open box sale now where you can get one of these media players for $26.95. As a matter of fact, that's the one I got here to share with you in my review, and even so it was an open box - it arrived brand new packaged with a full warranty. Here is what I found.
The packaging box is very compact and has a lot of useful info about functionality of this digital media player. It covers all the features and supported formats, which is pretty much everything under the sun. Out of the box, you will be surprised how small this device is - literally fits in the palm of your hand. In addition to Speck, you also get all the necessary accessories, such as a full functioning remote control, A/V cable, power adapter, and instruction booklet. It would have been nice to have HDMI cable, but I'm sure everybody has one already. Besides, these are dirt cheap anyway.
The unit itself has a very solid build, not some cheap plastic. On the front it has LED IR port for the remote, usb port to connect usb stick, or external hard drive, or even external CD/DVD-ROM, and SD flash card port. On the back you have a port for a power adapter, HDMI port, and 3.5mm port for A/V splitter cable. This way you are covered for any connection. The remote uses 2x AAA batteries, and has a ton of buttons for every single functionality of this media player. Pretty much, anything you can access from on-screen menu using 4-way control buttons in the middle of the remote, you can also access directly by pushing corresponding function buttons on the remote.
Hook up to TV took literally seconds, and all the menus were self-explanatory and easy to follow. You get a choice of browsing by Folder to look for any stored media, or to look specifically for photos, music, and movies. There was no lag in controls, media playing started instantaneously and the quality of the video and the audio was excellent! No matter what video formats I threw at the Speck - it started playing right away without any buffering, stuttering, or decoding delay.
Overall, I was very pleased with a design and a performance of Micca Speck. If the main focus of making your TV smarter is to add capability to play any digital media (movies, music, or pictures) or if your current TV is running out of USB or HDMI ports and you still have a spare A/V port - this Speck media player is definitely a great gadget for the job. About a year ago I reviewed HDMI to A/V converter that cost about $40 in order to take advantage of A/V port. Here you have a full media player with both HDMI and A/V connection options and a decoder to handle any digital media. This is a great deal for the original $50 Speck price, but considering the current open box sale of $27 - it's truly a bargain.
Here are the pictures.
Quite often I talk in my reviews about smartphones and smartwatches, but not as much about smart tvs. In general, a smart tv will allow you to get access to internet to run Netflix, YouTube, web browsing and other apps. But one basic common smart functionality is to be able to watch movies or to play music or to browse pictures stored on your usb stick or external hard drive or SD card from your camera. Just because you have a flat screen TV it doesn't mean it will be able to decode your digital media from an externally connected source. Or maybe you still have an old big screen tube tv or your flat screen only has one HDMI port already connected to cable box or DVD player and you only have access to A/V component port (red/white + yellow cables). There are a lot of scenarios where you just need a simple way to play your movies or music or pictures, and now you have a very simple solution - Micca Speck. What makes it even cooler, they have an open box sale now where you can get one of these media players for $26.95. As a matter of fact, that's the one I got here to share with you in my review, and even so it was an open box - it arrived brand new packaged with a full warranty. Here is what I found.
The packaging box is very compact and has a lot of useful info about functionality of this digital media player. It covers all the features and supported formats, which is pretty much everything under the sun. Out of the box, you will be surprised how small this device is - literally fits in the palm of your hand. In addition to Speck, you also get all the necessary accessories, such as a full functioning remote control, A/V cable, power adapter, and instruction booklet. It would have been nice to have HDMI cable, but I'm sure everybody has one already. Besides, these are dirt cheap anyway.
The unit itself has a very solid build, not some cheap plastic. On the front it has LED IR port for the remote, usb port to connect usb stick, or external hard drive, or even external CD/DVD-ROM, and SD flash card port. On the back you have a port for a power adapter, HDMI port, and 3.5mm port for A/V splitter cable. This way you are covered for any connection. The remote uses 2x AAA batteries, and has a ton of buttons for every single functionality of this media player. Pretty much, anything you can access from on-screen menu using 4-way control buttons in the middle of the remote, you can also access directly by pushing corresponding function buttons on the remote.
Hook up to TV took literally seconds, and all the menus were self-explanatory and easy to follow. You get a choice of browsing by Folder to look for any stored media, or to look specifically for photos, music, and movies. There was no lag in controls, media playing started instantaneously and the quality of the video and the audio was excellent! No matter what video formats I threw at the Speck - it started playing right away without any buffering, stuttering, or decoding delay.
Overall, I was very pleased with a design and a performance of Micca Speck. If the main focus of making your TV smarter is to add capability to play any digital media (movies, music, or pictures) or if your current TV is running out of USB or HDMI ports and you still have a spare A/V port - this Speck media player is definitely a great gadget for the job. About a year ago I reviewed HDMI to A/V converter that cost about $40 in order to take advantage of A/V port. Here you have a full media player with both HDMI and A/V connection options and a decoder to handle any digital media. This is a great deal for the original $50 Speck price, but considering the current open box sale of $27 - it's truly a bargain.
Here are the pictures.