After a bunch of its affordable products: DVDs, DVD players and digital photo frames Moserbaer ventured into the PMP market sometime back with the IVO 511i (reviewed in LD March '09). This time we got another PMP from Moserbaer, the MP565-2G.

It's about the size of a stick of gum. Moserbaer has kept the design minimal; a screen displays the track info and next to it is a D-stick which lets you change the track, play/pause a song and adjust volume. Adjacent to the D-stick, on the horizontal edge, is the menu key. Ergonomics are good, but a nav-pad instead of the D-stick would have made it easier to operate.

This player has all the usual trappings of a basic PMP-FM, voice recorder and 2 GB of internal memory. Audio quality was average; loud and clear but nothing impressive-bass and thump could've been better. Replacing the original headphones with a pair from Panasonic helped but not much. Strangely, it couldn't play music encoded at 48 kbps bitrate, which is strange because that's the lowest quality that you can get. Higher bitrates worked fine though. Another issue is with its FM reception. Out of the 10 available FM channels, it could only scan seven. The battery lasted for 3 hours (can vary with screen usage) after a full charge, which is not very good for a small player.

Our verdict? This player looks impressive on paper but misses out on performance. Just shell out Rs 500-600 more and get yourself a Creative MuVo T200 2 GB MP3 Player or a Sandisk Sansa Clip 2GB, both of which are available for around Rs 2k.

Moserbaer MP565-2G (2GB) Rs 1,499	Performance Coolness
Pros Slim, sleek, affordable Cons Poor FM reception & battery life Sold by Moserbaer India, www.moserbaer.com	Specs High contrast LCD, 2 GB built-in memory, plays MP3 and WMA files, FM radio, 3.5mm headphones, built in Li-po battery Verdict