You are also given a DivX registration code that you can use with to download protected content. The settings display allow you to change the automatic power off timer, the LCD brightness, date and time and it also gives you information about the firmware version. m3u playlist file, but the audio application can’t “see” it, so I am not sure how well these playlists are supported… By navigating to their respective folders you can start playing the files sequentially. The screen is very bright but it has a low viewing angle and it’s “slow” (you can see the interlacing lines when playing back video).Įach of the video and audio screens look like the file manager’s view. This XVid video crashed the device though.
The “War of the Worlds” mp4 trailer was 656×352 for example, and its dual-cpu setup played back the trailer without dropping any frames. 3gp though) without a problem, even at resolutions higher than its suggested QVGA one. The 442 played my DivX and mp4 videos (not. Additionally, I found the volume level pretty low compared to my iPod, as I like listening to my dance music pretty loud. The device was able to read all my mp3s, jpegs and bmps I threw at it, but it had problems with a 20 kHz WMA file. I had to manually create the “video”, “music” and “pictures” folder and throw my media files in them as I don’t like putting files on the root of a given filesystem. One peculiar thing was the fact that the device only came with folders called DSC, PVR and VOICE. The user is then presented with a horizontally scrolling interface with options of audio, video playback, photos, microphone recording, files management and PVR. The Neurus 442 loads pretty quickly, about 4 seconds after you press the ON/OFF button. In the package you will find headphones, a USB cable, a owner’s manual, two composite video input/output cables, the installation CD, an AC adapter and a leather carrying case.
Under the device one can find an SD/MMC slot for easy copy of media back and forth. The device has an on/off button, two volume buttons (-/+), a headphone-out, a mini-usb jack that makes the hard drive look like an external drive under any operating system, a line-in, a line-out, a lock button, a 5-way joystick, a “back” button and a menu button. It feels very solid in one’s hands and the weight feels right too. The Neuros 442 has a similar size to the iRiver PMP-120 and the RCA-Lyra RD2780. The internal photo viewer supports JPEG/GIF/BMP on either the 3.6″ internal screen or on an NTSC/PAL TV. The video player is able to playback MPEG4/DivX 3.11/4.0/5.0/WMV v9. The device can playback mp3, WMA (not all kbps ranges are supported) and AAC-LC on its 40 GB hard drive.
And it’s among the few that can also record video from external sources. Much like the Archos, iRiver, Creative (and other Windows Media-based PVRs) and RCA Lyra devices, it can playback both music and video/pictures. The Neurus 442 is a portable media player and recorder.
UPDATE: Firmware upgrade adds timer recording, pause recording and a shuffle option for audio files. Neuros Audio LLC sent us in for a spin their latest versions of their two main products, the Neuros 442 Digital Media Player/Recorder and the Neuros MPEG-4 Recorder 1.