4. Loading And Playing Songs

After my initial frustration with getting the software installed and the Digital Jukebox recognized, I found using the device simple. Obviously, since Dell wants you to use and buy songs using Musicmatch (there's actually a sticker on the screen that says "Please do not steal music Download music at www.dell4me.com/music" which leads you to the Musicmatch site) this is the first app I tried to use. I had no problems moving songs, playlists and albums to the DJ using Musicmatch (though I didn't buy any songs from them). In the Dell-branded version of Musicmatch Jukebox, you just go to View>Portable Device Manager and the DJ shows up, ready to have songs, playlists and albums copied to or removed from the Digital Jukebox. While the documentation doesn't say that it's compatible with other means of moving files, I also tried copying files to it using Windows Media Player with no trouble. You can also delete files on the Jukebox while it's not connected to your computer

The Dell Digital Jukebox plays music stored in MP3, WMA and WAV formats. Navigation is done via an Internet Explorer type interface where you start out by hitting the "home" button and use the scroll button get to options that include Music Library, where you are given the option of choosing Playlists, Albums, Artists, Genres, or a list of all of the tracks on the device. To get back to the main menu you either hit the home button to the right of the scroll button or the back button to the left. Other home screen options include Now Playing, Play Mode, Voice Recordings, Settings (where you choose things like backlight time, language, screen contrast, language and my favorite, an equalizer) and information, which tells you the firmware version, disc free space, track count, playlist count and album count. You can repeat tracks, shuffle tracks, play albums and choose from playlists you've created. It's pretty easy to navigate and it seems like everything from cell phones to televisions now uses the "forward, back, home" philosophy of Internet Explorer.

As I mentioned, my favorite feature here is EQ. Within this menu option, you can adjust the treble, midrange and bass using four slider bars or pick from presets based on "genres" like disco, new age, jazz and others. I'm not sure how they came up with the settings for the diverse genres they've chosen to offer presets for, but the ability to customize the EQ setting can really make a difference with, say, an MP3 file that sounds too mid range or has too much treble. It would be nice to be able to choose from your own set of five or six EQ settings that you've created and that match your taste for particular types of music.

The Dell branded version of Musicmatch that's installed along with the drivers for the Digital Jukebox.