Gadgetell Exclusive Hands on: DLO iPod Home Dock

I got my hands on the new DLO Home Dock,Announced last Wed, and am ready to report in.

The good: works as advertised, if not better. It can mimic your ipod or use now playing mode. Sound quality is good, as is fit and finish.

The bad: Can’t search by album, only artist and song. Scrolling to “Z” is a bit tedious even though they tried to speed it up. Remote goes to sleep after an hour or two and has to be “woken up”, a re-sync fixed it.

Overall Score: 9/10 Excellent

The kits comes with all you need (unless you want to hook it to the TV or to your computer) for music listening, which is nice. Too many companies today are getting stingy with cables and my overstock is getting thin. The base has a holder for the remote and the iPod (with an optional helper stand for the pod) and can be used to sync with iTunes.. Fit is good, everything clicks into place nicely.

The remote is small, nicely sized in my opinion with only the basic iPod-looking controls on it. The remote has rechargeable battery and has its own home in the dock, very sleek.

Hooking it up, I had an “out of range” message on the small remote. After checking the troubleshooting guide and trial and error; I found that it was my speaker wire. Reinstalled and it worked fine. I had to use the hard-wired cable running out of my speaker and it is the culprit, not the DLO supplied cable. I was unable to repeat the issue with the included cables.

Upon starting off, the remote uploads your titles (under 30 seconds for my 4gb from my Mini). The 3 line screen is bright and clear. 4 lines in two colors isn’t that bad. Range for the RF remote was more than necessary, no problems on all 3 floors of my testing lab. and over 150 ft down the street. No interference from Wifi, Microwave, Cell phone or Steve Job’s Great Idea Sucker Beam (c’mon Steve, you know the iPod was mine).

There are two main ways of using this Now Playing mode and iPod mode. Now Playing mode allows you to see the title, navigate around rather easily. The other mode, iPod mode allows the remote to double as the iPod music controls; the iPod itself will show now playing and album art… To pause music in iPod mode, hit the center button once; in Now Playing mode you’ve got to hit it twice.

In use, it is pretty easy to figure out the UI. It takes a bit to get from A to Z of your artists or playlist names and is my only real gripe (but I would probably complain if it went too fast as well, it is a fine line of personal preference I suppose). The scrolling appears to get any faster as I held the down button but the list doesn’t loop (you can’t go up from A to get directly to Z). Apple kind of danced around this by allowing you to slide your finger on click-wheel faster, then by letter (with the update).

Also handy is the Home Dock’s ability to hook up for video to TV. This you allows to remain spoiled and sit on your couch and pause for a snack break. This also makes me realize having two docks would be ace as moving the dock around is a lot to ask from this lazy tester… While this worked fine, the DLO Home Dock Deluxe looks better suited for full video/audio playback.

DLO was very pleasant when I called in check tech support. The friendly Sally Comollo, Executive Director of Communications expects this unit to sell very well and lead the category in sales.

The Home Dock worked well in my testing. Functionality was great and I’ve no real beef. So what keeps it from 10/10? Well, it relies on the iPod functionality, without upping the ante. I’d like to be able to scroll to “Z” faster. I’d like the response time from the remote after a period of non-use. Other than that, this is a great effort and worthy of the price (which is the lowest for a remote with screen).

Be on the lookout for my exclusive head-to-head comparison of iPod remote units.