I've never been one to rant and rave in public, but I'm so frustrated that I have to write it down. For Christmas I got my wife a Samsung K5 MP3 player. I liked the built in radio and the speaker features. Before you comment, I skipped Apple products for a variety of reasons, none of which are relevant here.
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I set up her new player with MP3 songs from our (legit) family collection. Everything played fine. She would turn it off but by the next morning the battery had run down. The player appeared to discharge the battery even after turning it "off". Oddly, when I turned it on in the morning, the player immediately played the last song, almost as if it had never stopped.
So I used the online support to try and diagnose the problem. Eventually I sent it in to their repair center in New Jersey. Not unexpectedly I got a refurbished unit back (at least I'm assuming since it didn't have that new player look and feel). I loaded it back up and sure enough, same problem. How hard can it be to turn off? Slide the button until the unit goes dark, right? The player would charge fine but never keep a charge overnight.
Once again to support. This time with a phone call to a Samsung support person which wasn't too bad. He had me try the reset (I had tried it earlier myself with no effect) and recharge but the problem persisted. They had me send the unit in once again and again I get another refurbished unit back. This time I get this note (verbatim):
FOUND SONGS WITH LICENSE FOR THIS REASON YOUR MP3 HAS PROBLEM CHARGING OTHER WISE THOSE FILES WONT PLAY THE MAY FREEZE UP AND WONT CHARGE THE BATTERY
First off, none of the songs on the player had any sort of DRM. Second, the problem wasn't battery charging it would continue to discharge even when the unit was off. Finally, if the unit is plugged in to charge DRM should have no effect. This sounds like a general cop-out and last ditch excuse. But...to be fair, I did one more test. I loaded the latest MP3 player with an NPR podcast and an MP3 track ripped from a CD I own. Everything played fine. Unit fully charged. Turn it off. Next day: battery down. It's been a few days since then and now the battery is completely dead.
Is this merely a bed design? I can't believe I got 3 bad units in a row and I can't believe I don't know how to turn off an MP3 player. So it is now the end of February and my wife still hasn't been able to enjoy her gift. One way or another this thing is leaving my house and it will make me hesitate about Samsung products.
The sad thing is I've great experience with Samsung products in the past. I'm using a 21" Samsung monitor right now which I love. I had high hopes for the K5 but now I'm not so happy. I'm also a little confused. Searching for news and help about this MP3 player I read about reviews and user raves. How did I miss out?
I'll probably give Samsung one more chance, but I'm not optimistic.
