Denon DN-F300 - USB and SD Card Rack Mounted Audio Player

Comments about Denon DN-F300 - USB and SD Card Rack Mounted Audio Player:

Bought this for live gigs to play backing tracks, only trouble though is when it comes to the end of a track, especially in single play mode you hear a click which can be very annoying through a P.A. system. This is disappointing given its "Professional" tag. The sound quality is very good though.
The SD card slot seems to be a little bit slack fitting because when you insert a card it wobbles about a bit and if you accidently touch it while being played it can lose connection, the usb slot works well though.
The power supply unit is a bit flimsy and could get quite easily damaged .
OK for home use but not for live use I'm afraid.

Comments about Denon DN-F300 - USB and SD Card Rack Mounted Audio Player:

In this review, I'll specify when a particular aspect or feature is either a benefit or liability by first stating what I'm attempting to use it for. My purpose is playback for theatrical dance recitals. I will additionally make comments about the general operation of the unit, but the reader will be left to decide whether those are applicable for his or her purposes. Read this review carefully if you're using the unit for live theater. It will tell you everything you need to know.

The unit seems solid, well built and lightweight. I was slightly disappointed the power supply is external as it becomes just another part to be looked after. The plug can be secured to the unit with a tie-down strap but the wall wart still hangs off the unit and could easily have been made internal with, ideally, a common-as-dirt IEC power cord. It's made for permanent installations so that's a minor issue.

Sound files will easily load on an SD/SDHC card or USB memory stick but beware. When using Mac OS-X to do this, it will add a set of .DS_Store files with names identical to your tracks. That means you'll have TWICE as many "sound" files on your menu when you load it into the unit. These files don't contain audio, just meaningless info about icon size, placement and other OS-X housekeeping chores. The unit dutifully lists them but won't allow you to play them. This means you'll have to scroll through every one of them on your way to track #01! It then lists twice as many "sound" files in the counter and if you have 25 tracks in a folder, track #1 becomes track #26. I may find a workaround for this but not as of this writing. If you want to play the tracks in order (as I often do) these are another speed bump on the way. Clearly the unit is designed to be loaded from a Windows/PC computer.

Display of filenames during playback is extremely limited because for exact order playback, you must include the two-digit track number as the first characters in the filename. Since the unit always displays the period and file extension at the end, i.e. .WAV or .MP3, you have only four characters left to name the track. This happens even if you take out the file extension in the filename. You can use longer names, of course, but then the unit will scroll through the entire name endlessly while it's playing. You can't turn off this feature. Personally, I find it annoying.

The front panel controls seem pretty well laid out but navigating to folders on the memory cards and USB sticks involves pressing and turning a knob and that seems a little cumbersome. When locating a track one simply cues it up and it's ready to play. Each time the unit is powered off or you switch folders, you must reset the "info displayed" during playback function (filename, title name, artist, album name, or display off) because it seems to forget this setting. I'd like to display only the filename and leave it there but there doesn't seem to be any way to do that.

Now I will review this unit for use in live event playback. I have two main complaints which I think are significant. First, the unit emits an audible "tick" when transitioning between tracks. This is usually not noticeable but if you're playing individual tracks which have quiet sections where you transition, you'll definitely hear it. Second, the unit doesn't have a silent FF/REW when you're cueing up a specific time in the track. I previously used Minidisk to play back audio for recitals and was able to search inaudibly by simply hitting "Pause" before either Fast Forward or Rewind. Pressing these buttons while playing gave me audible cueing if I wanted it, but doing so over a large PA system can get annoying and distracting so I avoided it. That this unit doesn't offer silent cueing is a potential liability. In addition, when you are cueing audibly from a complete stop, it's easy to cause the unit to repeat a short section at your destination rapidly. That can get really annoying. And you have to recover from it by hitting stop again or pause so you can then play normally by hitting play. Also, when playing back a track and hitting PAUSE or STOP, if you press the |<< (track reverse) button, it takes you to the beginning of the PREVIOUS track not the one you are currently listening to. To get to the beginning of your current track you must press the CUE button rather than STOP or PAUSE. Every other machine I have doesn't do this.

Audio quality seems OK. I'd like to have balanced, transformer-isolated outputs but again, this isn't a deal breaker for me. I wouldn't recommend using MP3 files for serious live playback as they sound very thin and distorted through a high-power, full-range PA system. Because SD/SDHC cards and USB memory sticks are currently so inexpensive, using full-resolution WAV files makes the most sense. It wouldn't take much to add support for AIFF files (or Pro-Tools friendly SDII files for that matter) because they are identical to WAV file encoding except for the header at the top of the file that tells the machine what they are. You can convert between them endlessly with no change whatsoever to the audio quality or encoding.

I find most of the other functions, particularly the Mic input, useless but I understand why they're there. Pitch Control and optional Tempo Lock are not functions I'd use but I'm sure there are many professional and amateur dance companies who'd like to adjust those parameters on the fly. I was able to change the pitch of a classical piece but was not able to lock the tempo. I think these functions are better suited to music with an audible beat as they seem to fail with symphonic music. Again, not a function I'd use.

The remote control is quite small but feels good in my hand. I don't like that it takes button cell batteries because they are much harder to find as there are so many sizes and types. I guess I'm used to the AA my Sony Minidisk remote takes. Nevertheless, the remote has most, but not all, the functions you'll use during a typical show.

My wish list for this unit is, in order of desirability:

- Silent transition between tracks.
- Silent cueing capability from either pause or stop modes.
- Having the unit ignore .DS_Store files in the menu.
- Having the unit cue to the beginning of the current track from STOP or PAUSE rather than the beginning of the previous track.
- Getting rid of the .WAV or .MP3 file extension from the filename display.
- Adding support for AIFF and SDII file types.
- Having the unit stay in "filename display" mode unless changed manually.
- An internal mounted power supply with IEC power cable.
- Professional, balanced, Line-Level XLR outputs.

Most of these changes would probably only take a firmware upgrade. The others are simply practical. I will use this unit as the plusses outweigh the minuses. And it seems to be a good value for the money. I'm not at all disappointed that I bought it.