ElectroNext.com

Works with OS X as USB Storage Device (2009-05-27)
Although I'm a rabid Mac fanboy and own several iPods, I have grown weary of waiting for Apple to implement onboard support for the Bluetooth A2DP profile to support wireless stereo headphones. I ordered this MP3 player explicitly because it supports Bluetooth and it works quite well with my Motorola S805 Bluetooth headphones. Note that this player will not work with those dreadfully ugly Bluetooth hands free Borg-style things that hang on one ear.

I am able to connect this MP3 player to my Mac Pro where it mounts as an external storage device, then drag MP3 files to the existing INBOX folder and drop them in. It works. The controls are perhaps not quite as intuitive as an iPod, but still well designed and quite useable.

Note that there are other product listings here on Amazon for similar Philips SA52 players that mention Bluetooth in the description but which do not actually have Bluetooth. Only models that end with BT, such as SA5245BT actually have the Bluetooth chipset. I had to return the first unit I bought from Amazon (8gb version) because it did not actually have Bluetooth.

The sound quality from this player is OK, and the fact that it charges through the same mini-USB connector as used for computer connection is quite convenient.

Excellent Compared to Previous Models (2008-12-29)
Although, this is my first mp3 player, I have read about plenty of issues from previous Philips GoGear models. I have been using this SA5245BT/37 model with bluetooth for about 4 months now, and luckily, I have yet to encounter any problem.

Be warned that the manual claims the player only works with stereo bluetooth headsets. I have not tried the bluetooth connectivity, however.

A strange aspect of the mp3 player is that the battery power icon has 3 levels after a full charge, but it drains down to level 1 (red level) after using the mp3 player for about 10 hours. I thought the battery power was much worst than the ~30 hours advertised play back time for audio, but it turns out the mp3 player lasts for another good 10-15 hours (I do not keep exact count) on the red level. So that totals 20-25 hours for audio play back time after a full charge.

I do not use the included Philips earphones, so I cannot comment on it. However, I have tried it, and it is comfortable, but the sound does not seem to be as good as the Lenntek Sonix earphones that I have.

Anyhow, the mp3 player comes with Philip's patented "Full Sound" equalizer. While it seems to work great and enhances the sound for American songs, it causes crackling and popping sounds when I listen to Asian songs (e.g. about 5 to 7 songs out of ~63 songs by Chinese artist, Jay Chou; Two example songs by Jay Chou that has this problem are "The Orcs" and "Grandfather's Tea"). So I turned the "Full Sound" off and adjusted the equalizer manually.

To put mp3 songs into the player, you can use the recommended Rhapsody software or drag and drop the mp3's directly into the folder in the ~3.67GB storage drive (although, Philips does not recommend it, but I do so anyways). The Rhapsody software did not allow me to move licensed English mp3's into the mp3 player without DRM even though I bought my mp3's from Amazon.com so my mp3's are DRM-free. To get around this, I dragged and dropped these DRM-free English songs directly into the corresponding folder in the storage drive, which is easy to do and works. However, I do use Rhapsody for my Asian DRM-free music, and this works just fine.

The screen displays gorgeous pictures and videos, and the player comes with a software called "Media Converter 2.5" by ArcSoft to convert videos into playable form on the mp3 player. This Media Converter software has worked flawlessly for me.

Again, this is my first mp3 player, so I cannot compare its sound with other brands and models on experience.

Overall, this is a great, solid mp3 player that will most likely not die due to defects (like perhaps, Philips' previous mp3 player models and Creative's mp3 players, which I have read reviews about). The sound is good, and the picture/video quality is excellent.

By the way, I recommend the software, PowerEnc, to rip mp3's from CDs because no quality seems to be loss that way compared to using other mp3 rippers.

P.S. I bought this mp3 player from Dell.com for ~$60 (about 4 months ago), using a 50% off coupon. The total price I paid for it after shipping and tax was ~$71.

Fantastic MP3 player! (2008-11-06)
I was already using old MP3 Player SA6045 from Philips and this is new upgradation in my gadgets!

This is bigger than my previous GoGear SA6045, it has 2.8" display with QVGA, 320x240 pixels, 262K colors. 4GB memory is more than enough.

Main features at glance:

MP3 player includes music, video, and photo playback.
FM radio, voice recording.
Rhapsody subscription music support.
Better earplugs than previous one.
Wireless stereo Bluetooth audio.
Philips' patented "FullSound" technology.
"SuperScroll" for easy speed control while scrolling through large libraries.
880mAh battery, allows up to 30 hours audio or 6 hours video.

Design:

It is similar like old GoGear SA6045 from Philips, black & glossy not much thick. It has large screen, 2.8" which is really good, it has really cool graphic interface. There are three color schemes for display that is good. Menu design is really very good; it shows thumbnail graphics of artwork, movie stills and images.

The Menu option is on right side so it would be very difficult for lefties, very much inconvenience, I guess Philips should produce two models one is for left hander and another is for right hander!

Futures:

Audio:

Unique features of this GoGear are Bluetooth capabilities & it has Rhapsody support for subscription of music. Rhapsody recognizes this device so then user can download music from Rhapsody, once they register with them, all songs will be transfer to GoGear! User can use 30 days free trial subscription purchase with this device. This device support for MP3, WMA & AAC files. ID3 Tag support for Artiste name & title is good.

Video:

GoGear SA5245BT does decent job in video playback. It has big screen, which is really good for viewing videos. One good point I found is that while watching video you can increase/ decrease brightness of screen you do not need to go in Menu to change it, just press up cursor to increase brightness and down to decrease the brightness, be remember this will work in only video mode not in Audio or Radio.

Bluetooth settings are very simple; user can transfer music files to another Bluetooth device.

Equalizer settings are very good. In EQ mode there is one new patented feature from Philips called "FullSound" which I found work very good, it gives very good sound. And in sound Menu I liked one more feature which is called "Volume Limit", you can set limit of your volume so it can't be increased, good feature! FM radio offers really decent sound & reception, and there are 30 presets! And this device has R. D. S feature which is really good. Voice recording function is also available if some one would like to do.

Performance:

Sound quality of GoGear SA5245BT is really good compare to my old GoGear, so there is definitely improvement in that. Maybe this is because of new earplugs or Philips' new patented technology called "FullSound", or maybe I am not sure whether Philips is using Class D amplifier for this device, but sound is really good, you can feel punch definitely!

Video performance is indeed good, the screen is bright & viewing angle is very good! Videos are playing very smoothly. It support WMV & MP4 (AVI), you need to convert your videos before transferring them to your device. Supplied ArcSoft can be use for convert videos in to device, what I found bad is by default it take MPEG4 codec, there is no choice for WMV! What I found is MPEG4 videos looks noise wherein WMV looks very nice! I found this when I dropped some video files from my old Philips MP3 in to this new device; they are looking very much decent. So I use WMV instead of MPEG4 (.AVI). And supplied software has some problem it hangs always I do not know why!

Overall:

I found new GoGear SA5245BT is fantastic device; it has some nice features like Bluetooth, Rhapsody music subscription support, R. D. S in FM radio. It produce really good sound very much better than previous GoGear. It looks very much attractive in black glossy color. Videos in MPEG 4 format looking very noisy if we convert them with supplied ArcSoft software, but if we watch same videos in WMV format then looking very crisp & clear! I guess default settings for MPEG4 are not well, and worst thing is that we can't set higher bit rate for videos when we convert them in ArcSoft! But people can use WMV supported videos instead of MPEG4.

Full marks to Philips for this wonderful device, highly recommended.