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 Hardware Review- by David Galindo
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 Joytech Media AmpJoytech - Audio Stand - $29.99 There are tons and tons of speaker stations for the PSP...but the Media Amp really caught my eye. It looked great, had a remote, and a sexy $30 price tag. Upon opening the box, I found it to be very well packaged and felt heavy and solid...not the cheap kind of plasic you would normally find on a budget speaker set like this. The back of the station included, to my surprise, L & R audio jacks and two headphone plugs. It can even run on three AAA batteries for on the go movies and music, which were also included. Heck, it even features SRS surround, which sounds really incredible with the right speakers (try it out in Windows Media Player...it's there!). Unfortunately, everything fell apart once I docked my PSP on the Media Amp.  The PSP fits into the dock at a nearly 90 degree angle, and cannot be changed. This makes viewing the screen while it sits on a table nearly impossible, unless the station is at eye level to you...which is unlikely. The power button on the dock is exactly like the PSP- push it up to turn on, and it snaps back. But the sound is incredibly tinny...there is absolutely zero bass on this stand. Not only that, but it sounds like it's coming through layers and layers of plastic...the sound is horrible. I played a movie on the stand, and the SRS sound is nonexistant...in fact, it only made the sound even more garbled. There is considerable noise coming from the speakers at all times...like scraping against aluminum foil.  When watching a movie from the memory stick, it gets even WORSE. The memory stick, when read (which is every 3 seconds) makes the PSP power back on its battery and has a buzzing sounds to it. My green/orange light was going crazy and the sound was just bad. The stand also turns off when moving from a UMD to the PSP main menu, which is very annoying. Overall, I just can't recommend this for anything. Certainly not for a travel audio stand, since the viewing angle is terrible and the speakers are bad. I can't even recommend using the audio jacks in the back and using it as a station for your MP3s, becuase there is LOTS of noise coming through it. Do NOT buy this product...there are many, many, MANY other choices out there. 
1/5 |