3.5-Inch Digital TV (Black)

The media could not be loaded. Tivax 3.5" Digital TV / B003N18O88Note: Before you watch the video (which shows you how to setup and use the Tivax, should you purchase one), you will probably want to read further - I couldn't fit all this information into the 10 minute video time frame. (I also apologize for the lack of focus in the video - I'm afraid my camera had trouble with the Tivax screen.)I received this little handheld TV through Amazon Vine and tried to put it through the paces. This is the first handheld TV I've had much of a chance to sample, but after my time with Tivax, I have to feel that there must be something better out there.First, the basics. This television captures free-to-air digital TV signals, so there's no subscription and you can supposedly watch TV anywhere, anytime. This unit just includes basic "watching" functionality, so if you're spoiled by TiVo-style record, rewind, and fast-forward options, you may find it jarring to go back to old-school TV watching.Pros first: The lack of options (and buttons!) makes the TV relatively simple to set up. I've included a video showcasing basic setup, but the device is easy to use and some impressively thick paperwork came with it, in case you get stuck. In fact, the menus were so easy to navigate, that I managed to set up closed captions almost immediately, even before I started to look for them - that's user friendliness I wish most large sized TVs came with. And once the channels are set up, the actual visual screen is quite lovely - crisp, clear, and clean, as long as the reception is good and the unit is held stationary.Which brings me all too quickly to the cons. This is such a cute unit with such a pretty screen that I almost hate to beat on it, but there's a lot that goes wrong with this great idea. Firstly, and I understand this might be true for all digital TVs, you either have a stellar image or pretty much no image at all - there's none of the old "you can see the screen but it's covered over in a thin layer of static" stuff from the analog days. And while Tivax can hardly be blamed, I couldn't help but notice that there's very little to actually *watch* on free-to-air digital TV - of the 25 stations that were sensed in my area, several had terrible reception (i.e., a constant black screen), and once I weeded out the televangelist channels and the shopping channels and the weather channels, I was left with about a dozen channels total: half in English and half in Spanish.When you find something to watch, you'll then be faced with the problem that the audio is pretty poor - staticky and crackly. I first thought this was the fault of the reception, or the TV channels themselves, but when I was testing the Micro SD functionality and loaded one of my MP3s on the device, the song scratched and warbled in strong contrast to my MP3 player - an issue which put to rest any thoughts I had on using this to carry music around with me. (Also, the music player goes into a weird, colorful "screensaver" mode, which is odd because I'd rather the screen stay blank to save battery power.)I couldn't, incidentally, test the claims that video can be loaded and watched via the Micro SD functionality, because the device doesn't seem to recognize or support MP4 videos. To me, that's a *HUGE* flaw - I don't even own an iPod, and yet the popular "iPod video format" of MP4 is practically the entirety of my video library! My two-year-old Sony Walkman can play MP4s, so I'm not sure what Tivax's excuse for this issue could be - hopefully they can fix the issue via a software update in the future?I'm choosing to believe that this isn't a terrible product IF you're the target audience for this device. The target audience, in my opinion, would be someone who is used to and regularly watches free-to-air TV already (and won't be jarred by the lack of channels and lack of viewing/recording options), and who is just looking for a small device to take with them to events where battery power is necessary - a tailgate party, or camping. Someone who doesn't care about the non-functioning bells and whistles (video and MP3 functionality), and someone who won't care too much that the audio quality is rather poor and the video requires you to stay fairly stationary at all times. The problem is, in a world of satellite TV, TiVo, smart phones, and computer tablets, I don't know anyone personally who fits into that audience.~ Ana Mardoll

This product has potential, but the quality seems pretty lacking. I received this as part of the Vine program, so some of the issues might be due to me getting a pre-production item - but perhaps not.Build Quality/Design:The materials used aren't too bad in general (e.g. the case feels solid), but I'm not very impressed by the quality control on this unit. Mine has finger prints _underneath_ the glass cover on the screen (which is not removable) that are pretty disappointing. So, they didn't check if the main viewing area was clean before installing it - that's poor control. Also, the port on the player for connecting the supplied external antenna is poorly designed. I installed the antenna, but then could not get it detached. I might not be a mechanic, but I know how to connect/disconnect antennas. The company's customer service verified that I was doing the right thing to disconnect it. The external antenna has a long cord on it, which is nice for reception but annoying when it won't detach from a portable player. After hours, I eventually just pulled it out with pliers, broke it in the process, and wrote off ever connecting it again.Menus/Screen:Using this is pretty intuitive, so kids could certainly use it. The start up screen takes longer to load than I would expect or like, but it's easy to navigate the menus. The screen is nice - I'll give it that. It's got a nice picture to it. It's bright and has good color.TV Viewing:Reception is decent given the limitations of the supplied antennas, but be sure to consider those limitations. These antennas are small. If you're planning to use it as a TV, consider what kind of reception you'll get where you want to use it. I knew going in that reception at my house is limited, and this TV does pull in the same two stations that I get with a _small_ antenna on my other TVs. A larger antenna gets me several more, but there's no obvious way of connecting a different antenna to this product (and would defeat the purpose, as it's supposed to be portable). Because of the poor design on the antenna jack that I mentioned above, I'm stuck using the extendable antenna that doesn't pull much in at all where I live.Media Viewing:I can't speak to this, as I don't have a microSD card to plug into it. Perhaps those are common these days, so I won't judge their choice for that. The reported list of supported formats is extensive, though. It would be nice if it had some internal memory to store something.Overall, I wouldn't recommend this product for the price.