Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Those of us who are stubbornly clinging to our CD collections know that in 2013 the most we can ask of a player is that the thing actually works for a couple years. So I am writing this review on the day I bought the player, and I will edit in when it breaks. At least that will provide one anecdotal data point for potential buyers. Sony DEJ011 seems to be the frontrunner for portable CD players in 2013, if only due to brand recognition. I begrudgingly came to see it as a competent CD player despite its flaws. But suddenly the motor started acting up and the player stopped recognizing discs, sometimes in the middle of playback. This Insignia CD player was my replacement. Don't pay exorbitant marketplace seller prices...I got mine for $21 from a ubiquitous retail store. The DEJ011 has one feature which compares favorably to the Insignia: playback resumes at the same position & volume after stopping the disc, EVEN if you remove the disc and change the batteries. No such luck here. "Pause" and "stop" buttons behave as advertised. The other drawback is that the bass boost function distorts the sound quality dramatically. Yet even though it may be worse than other players, it's important to realize that the bass boost function is inherently a form of distortion. I'm of the firm opinion that any music lover should invest in a decent set of head phones which can reproduce bass frequencies as they were recorded. There's no lack of bass response on this player as long as your headphones are up to the task. Otherwise, there are a few features about this player which are superior to Sony's model: *The battery compartment is on the bottom of the player, easy to access. * You can program an arbitrary selection of up to 20 songs. * You can turn off skip protection (without going through some convoluted secret ritual from the manual) * There's a line out jack so you can use the player with external speakers without messing up your headphone volume setting. * The volume control is an analog wheel instead of a pair of buttons. This is good since you can make finer adjustments to the volume than you can with the buttons on the DEJ011. On the other hand, the "hold" function has no effect on the volume control so it's possible you could bump it and blast your ears. Neither player has the capability to display the time remaining in the track or album, which I've gotten used to doing without. But I still miss that functionality which was common 10 years ago. These are the vitals of the player. I will update if I experience any change in performance.