Apple commands 75% of the portable media device market. It makes one wonder why others even try. Of course, the remaining 25% of the market is still quite large, and several companies make a great deal of money filling the gaps which Apple doesn’t. Insignia, a brandname of the Best Buy big box chain of consumer electronics stores, is one of those who fill the gap. They recently shipped me the Pilot, which I’m reviewing here, and a Bluetooth stereo headset which I reviewed earlier. I didn’t like the headset all that much, but the Pilot is a different beast altogether. While I’m an iPod-head, I rather like the Pilot and I’m quite impressed with a number of its capabilities.

The Feature Set

The Pilot has a number of features. I’ll just run through the list here and then move on to some impressions. First, it can handle a number of media formats such as MP3, WMA, WMA Lossless, WMA DRM, WMA Pro, OGG, WAV, Audible, MPEG4 and WMV at 30 fps, and JPEG. It has an integrated FM radio which can handle RDS, the ability for radio stations to deliver station and song data over the FM radio signal. It has the aforementioned Bluetooth radio, a headphone jack, and even a Mic jack for audio recording. It does not, however, have an integrated mic for simple voice recording.

As indicated in the image above, the device is designed to be used in a horizontal orientation. I don’t really like the lack of being able to use it vertically, but its not that big of a deal. You are, however, able to rotate the screen 180 degrees to use it left handed. I’m left handed, but I’ve adapted to right handed operations for many things in life, so either orientation worked for me. Other, more “Left” lefties should appreciate it, though. The lack of the vertical orientation as an option was irksome, though. I guess it would have made it too iPod-like.

General Operation

I’ve used and reviewed an earlier device based on this software, Napster’s 1GB player from mid-2006 and found that interface to be unpleasant to use. I was surprised when I first fired up the Pilot to find a very similar interface, and I realized that it must have been made by the same company. My concerns were quickly washed away, however, because this more recent version is a damn sight better than the one on the Napster unit. Primarily because that disc you see in the picture, it actually works, ala 1st generation iPod. When I first removed it from the box, never having been touched by another reviewer, the wheel clicks were very hard and sharp, but after a little time, it loosened up nicely.

Interestingly enough, you’re not limited to navigating the much cleaner interface by just rotating the wheel. The wheel also clicks, ala the iPod clickwheel. This helps in a lot of cases where there is a grid of icons and not a list. For physical controls there is the aforementioned scroll wheel which has directional click capabilities, and has a Play/Pause button in the center. There is a separate Menu button in the corner. On the “Top” of the unit is a Power slider which incorporates a lock function. There is also a Voting toggle which allows you to apply ratings to tracks, which is somewhat interesting.

The graphical interface is very clean, has nice icons, and is very functional. In some places its a bit dense and it can be a tad confusing as to which control to use to get where you want to go, but its easy to pick up, even without reading the manual. There is an option to use the default circle-type menu or the easier to use matrix type which arranges the menu icons in a grid. You can also change the background image, but only from a list of included images. The Music Library section is packed with tabs which allow you to view what’s on your Pilot in a wide range of modes. One of the more interesting operational choices is that when you select an item, it doesn’t just play it, it asks if you want to play it or add it to a playlist, add it to what’s playing now, or even delete it. That’s either a feature or an annoyance depending on how you look at it.

Overall, its very easy to get around the interface after only a few minutes of fiddling with it. Not all that much different than the first time you touched an iPod. I’d rather there not be a ratcheting feel under the scroll wheel as they cause scrolling to be a tad inaccurate. One nice touch is the blue LED lights which surround the perimeter stick out slightly and make it very easy for your finger to grip the wheel as you turn it. Similarly, the Play/Pause button sticks up slightly so you can find it without looking. Really, the whole control scheme works well without completely emulating the iPod arrangement.

Bluetooth Nirvana And Sound Quality

Its impossible to miss, the large Bluetooth logo on the front of the unit between the controls and the display, and it clearly indicates that this device can handle A2DP connections to compatible stereo headsets. Configuration with the Insignia headset that Best Buy sent me was very simple and it worked out of the box without much fuss at all, something all Bluetooth devices should aspire to. The Pilot does come with a standard pair of earbud speakers, but they honestly sounded like crap, so my next try was the Bluetooth headset. I wasn’t impressed there, either.

My next test was to plug in a pair of Griffin’s excellent TuneBud headphones, designed for isolation audio and offering a clean and clear sound with excellent bass response. This allowed me to get a real sense of what the Pilot can put out. While not as good as Apple’s high quality sound chips in their iPods and personal computers, it sounds quite good. One thing that really peeved me was the EQ controls, which are just plain confusing. There are a number of presets which are easy to select, but there is also a custom EQ which you can tweak. The problem arises when you want to change the settings and then activate them. I spent a good 15 minutes wrangling with the controls to try and get the EQ to take my changes. Insignia needs to fix that, and quick.

Its A Video Player, Too!

Lest we forget, the Pilot is really a little PMP and not just a DAP. First, I had to install the included ArcSoft MediaConverter for Windows. I could easily manually transfer files to the device, but it was easier to allow MediaConverter to convert video and transfer the copy to the device, thereby ensuring that the video files would work. I copied 20 episodes of Invader Zim from a DVD to the device. Conversion time was very fast on my MacBook Pro in Boot Camp mode running Windows Vista Ultimate. Though I don’t recall the exact time, it took around 1 hour and 40 minutes to convert and copy to the Pilot.

I’m quite impressed with the quality of the display. There is no lag or blur and color is clean, if a tad dull. Oddly, Best Buy doesn’t list display resolution, but it is a 2.4″ display and they claim that it is a widescreen form factor. Its certainly wider than 4:3 ratio, but its nowhere near even 16:10. Its somewhere around 5:3 or 6:3 and I’d say that the resolution is probably in the range of 320×240 or so. I’m very pleased with the display and find it very easy to watch just about anything on it, with exception to 72mm print widescreen films. I haven’t tried encoding anything with subtitles yet, but if its 4:3 ratio (like Love Hina or Naruto) then it should be readable.

The Wrap Up

I can’t say I’m truly disappointed with any of the functions of the Pilot. It integrates with various services like Rhapsody, Rhapsody To Go, and the Best Buy Digital Music Store. The FM radio works with the RDS service for additional channel and track details. Battery life is long and strong and the battery is user replaceable. It works with Macs (as old as Mac OS 8.6) and PCs, so I’m sure it would also work with Linux-based systems. Its super light at only 2.1 oz. It has an SD card slot for adding even more storage.

The one thing I would like included would be either a speaker or bundled powered speaker attachment so I could use it to watch videos without having to use headphones. That would make it supremely usable and cool, as well as markedly cheaper than other PMPs which are larger, heavier, and far more expensive. In case you were wondering, after encoding and copying the 20 Invader Zim episodes, I still have 3GB free and the episodes look clean and clear with none of the mosquitoing you often see in badly compressed video files.

The Insignia Pilot comes in 4GB and 8GB versions. We tested the 4GB version, which sells for US$119. The 8GB version sells for US$149, so there’s no real reason to get the 4GB unless you need the extra $30 for lunch and a cab ride.

written by Tyler Regas