C280 First Impressions

Job · 03-29-2007

I just received my C280
Ill write a longer review later on but for now all i can give is some superficial impressions.

the players looks GREAT, stylish and well made. No shaky parts like in the T29

Unfortunately the C280 suffers from the same horrible looking GUI as the T29 and C260 do. The main menu looks great, after that it looks like some badly colored old windows version.
Another thing which seems to be a typical Teclast problem is that when-for example- you select Video in the main menu you get a folder-screen that also shows Music,Photo,Voice etc. of course these folders will turn up empty as they don't contain any video files.
This makes navigation complicated in an unnecessary way. Why show the Mp3, etc folder when I indicate I am looking for Video?
The strange thing seems to be that this is a rather easy problem to fix, all Teclast has to do is look at Meizu or the Ipod and use a more logical menu structure, this would greatly improve their players

The touch interface works fine but has a slight lag. Specially compared to the quick Meizu M6s touchstrip this can be a bit annoying.
To play a file from one of the folders you press the M(menu) button instead of the Play/Pauze button.
Another illogical choice from Teclast

The screen is nice, bright with a good display of video and photo. Similar to the Meizus screen

Haven't been able to test the sound quality yet...this should be THE highlight of the C280 player so ill put it to the test well...

More to come!
my apologies for the messy post, I am short on time

Err0r · 03-29-2007

Please post your impressions on the new games too!

Job · 03-30-2007

Tried the 2 games for a few minutes.
the first game is a vertical shooter game with a plane... controls wells plays kind of fun

The second game is a ship-based turn based bombing game.. unfortunately the ships controls are rather slow making the game less fun

I must say the games look good for an mp3 player game!

SkySports · 04-02-2007

Teclast C280 quick review:

Audio: Great audio – A

After being disappointed with the audio quality of the C260, I assumed that the C280 would follow suit. When I heard that the C280 was going to match the T29 in audio quality, I could not believe my ears. Well, I was wrong. Here is why:

The T29 sounds better than the C260 because of its 3D sound effects, plain and simple. This is made possible by its duo core chip engine. If you own a T29 already and want to get a feel for the sound of the C260, all you have to do is turn off all the effects, and adjust your music with the EQ only. You will notice that using the EQ alone, you will lose some of the punchiness and depth in your music.

Like the T29, The C280 does have additional effects and this makes all the difference in the world. The effects menu is a little difficult to find if you are used to the T29 and C260, but they do exist! Unlike these players, they can not be found in the audio playback mode. Instead the effects are found in the main settings menu. The QBS RDS and Stone 3D effects are replaced by Hardware 3D, Hardware Base, and Hardware Treble effects. These effects may be different in some ways, but by combining them together, you will be able to arrive at the same sound sweet spot as you could with all the T29s effects. On either player, Effects really helps you zero in to the perfect sound.

Volume + Power Output: A

I am also amazed at the sheer output power of the C280. Music that sounds good at volume level 25 on the T29, sounds good at volume level 15 (out of 40) on the C280!
Of course this is only true with a normalized MP3. If you play a low level MP3, it will never sound loud enough, but the C280 sure compensates when you crank up the volume.
I feel like if the volume goes over 30, I will do some real damage to my hearing. I did not feel that way with the T29 until the volume was all the way up. On paper, volume level should be exactly the same on both players though. Maybe I am imagining things.

Video: A

As far as can tell, the video quality is exactly the same as the C260. According to some posts on the Teclast BBS, there is also a way to play the C280 games on the C260. This also leads me to believe that video capability is equal on both the 260 and 280. The same movies I encoded on the C260 play on the C280, both Rockchip devices.

Touch interface: C

The touch interface is greatly improved over the C260, but still needs some work. You still need to touch each button 2 or 3 times to get it to activate. But on the C280 you will have slightly more success than you would on the C260. This is because of that squiggly snaky line running down the middle of the buttons. Guess what!! It serves a very important function! This little line stops your finger from touching two buttons at once, giving you more success than on the C260, although I would take the joystick on the T29 any day over the touchpad. This is why I rate the interface a C. The C260 would get a D from me. The key to successful button presses is to remember to barely touch the button. When you gently touch it, it activates more often than pressing on it forcefully. After playing with your C280 for a while, you figure this out pretty quickly.

SD Slot: F

Guess what… There is no SD slot on the C280. Guess why? This is how they squeezed an additional Wolfsson chip in there, by removing the SD. I guess no player is perfect. This is the only advantage that the C260 has over the C280. If you store movies and music on SDs then this may be very important to you. You might consider the C260.

Games: A+++

The little games on the C280 are nothing short of fantastic! These games may be simple dumbed down freeware type arcade games, but these are the perfect kind of games for a small MP3 player! A dumb little arcade game has no learning curve and can be played very quickly.

Something did surprise me about these games. The little graphics and sound are simply amazing! The key to enjoying great sound from these games is to get the volume level adjusted properly during MP3 playback, and then moving to the game menu because you cannot adjust the volume during game play. The games are actually in stereo! You hear some explosions on the left side and some to the right, for example. All of these games have late 80s early 90s arcade era graphics, which is much better than I would have expected.

Game Reviews:

Thunder Fighter Plane – A - This game has the largest file size of them all so it is also no surprise that it is also the best one. This is a scrolling 3rd person shooter. You are flying in a fighter plane, viewing from above. This game looks like the old arcade classic Xevious. Controlling the little plane is a piece of cake, because you are always firing weapons. All you need to do is use the teclast touchpad to maneuver the little fighter plane in the direction you want it to go.

Caribbean Pirates – C – This game has the smallest file size, and is also the worst of the three. Your ship is on the bottom of the screen and the enemy ship is on the top of the screen. Both ships can only move left and right. The ship fires a volley of cannon balls at the other ship by pressing the M key. You hear the captain screaming “FIRE!” and hear the booming of the cannons, very cool. So you are basically dodging the other ships cannon balls while trying to hit the other ship with yours. The problem is the game is over after the first battle. You cannot progress to additional levels.
Very simple yet very addictive little game.

Think Tanks – B – This game is a 3rd person tank game. There is fixed square grid. Your tank must destroy the other tanks on the screen, very simple. All you need to do is maneuver your tank around the screen and shoot at the other tanks. I rate this game higher than Pirates, because it appears you can progress to additional levels, giving this one a longer possible play time.

Russian Blocks - ? This game is floating around the Teclast BBS, but I have not been able to find it yet.

Err0r · 04-02-2007

These are the best games I've ever seen for MP3 players, EVER!

DimaMP4 · 04-02-2007

Very nice review Skysports!

Err0r · 04-02-2007

Could you add a summary to your review? Cheers.

F3l!x · 04-02-2007

wow thank you for this review!
now i am sure ill buy a c280 =)
but u dont like the touch interface? hmm i own a t29 and really hate the joystick.thats the only bad thing at the player... whats the problem with the touch interface? i think with the time u will get used ti it and it will not be a peoblem any longer...(i hope so

)

CruisinMusic · 04-02-2007

I just found this game/games for the Teclast C280. Tell me if it's a game or games already on the players or if it's a new game/games. It might be the Tetris your looking for.

I uploaded it to rapidshare here is the download link:

http://rapidshare.com/files/23993062/Game.rar

SkySports · 04-02-2007

I think the problem with touch interface may possibly be software related. The touch buttons don't always engage AFTER the hardware accelerators are activated. So. when too many effects were turned on with the T29, you get distortion. On the C280, The touch buttons may stop working when you have too much turned on, usually its only one button. But giving it a couple more presses does the trick. So not a major bug. The point is, at least the joystick is more reliable than touch pad. It happens mostly when you try to add or change effects during a song, when the processor is maxed out. The incredible thing is that it lets you do this at all! You can hear effects changes in real time too. That's gotta tax the memory, but no sacrifice to sound quality. Amazing.
Skysports