Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Posted Thursday, August 21, 2008 1:57 PM by Nathan Zaugg

Thumbs Down!I don't normally do product reviews on my blog but recently I have come across some really poor electronics and have had such a bad experience I want to warn any potential buyer -- These products are beyond poor, they are unacceptable!  So I have decided that at least for the time being I would share my experiences online. 

There are all kinds of new electronics out there to buy.  Flat screen TV's, iPods, iPhones, HD Radio's, BluRay, etc.. However, I personally feel that there are some companies who's business model is to produce junk and sell it as these new style electronics.  In the case of both of these products it is obvious that they rushed to market in such a way that makes them completely worthless!  This is much reminiscent of the late 90's where computer manufacturers were pushing out components before they were ready resulting in very unstable PC's!

Another thing to note is that I am a little more savvy than the average consumer.  Not to tout too much my credentials as a "product test guy" but I did used to work for a service company called Service West and I would fix electronics.  When you see the guts of some electronics you really see the difference between brands!  You could (at least then) really tell the difference between a Sony and a JVC!  The Sony was eloquent and beautiful inside and I never saw many of them!  Some of the JVC's I worked on I had to de-solder wires just to get the unit open to perform a simple mechanical adjustment and they were always in there because the user tried to do two things at once (like change disks and press play in rapid succession).  In short, you get what you pay for.  Unlike computers where you buy a Dell for the name or cereal where you pay a lot more for the little improvement in quality; electronics are a little different.  If you can make a cheaper brand electronics component work for you then that's great but it is not going to be as good as quality as a better brand.

Westinghouse 32H570D Flat Panel TV

When we first purchased this TV we loved it!  The best feature was the DVD player, it is built in such a way that you can pop a DVD into the front of the TV (front loading) and it will turn the TV on and start playing the DVD.  How they were able to do a front-loading DVD slot and keep the TV so low profile I'll never know.  I bought this from Target back in April 2008 and returned it exactly 90 days later.  I was hoping to find something else to replace it with but we're going to be doing a lot more homework before trying that again. 

Westinghouse TV

The Pro's:

  • Front loading DVD slot!
  • The price
  • Very low profile
  • Great picture
  • Easy to play DVD's

 

The Con's:

  • The TV would hang every one in a while.  Not an innocent "the picture is frozen" but it completely LOCKED UP!  You would have to get up, un plug it, and plug it back in!  You can't even power it off with the remote!  Yes, there was adequate ventilation and the TV did not appear to be hot.
  • The audio inputs did not work!  I spent literally DAYS trying to get audio from my computer (where we would watch online content) to the TV!  Getting the audio from the laptop speakers was not desirable! 
  • The HD tuner was clumsily laid out.  You could literally take a full 20 seconds just to flip past channel 7!
  • The remote was nothing special!  It had a poor layout as well and did not have buttons for things you would do often.
  • The menu did not have a lot in the way of customization & function.  This may be part of the "easy to use" but I was unable to select an audio source.

 

I would not recommend this unit to a friend!  It's possible they fix the "bugs" and will have a good product in the future, but from other reviews their technical support was very poor and sending the TV for repair is very expensive.  I can not recommend this brand to a friend either.

Jensen HD5112

This radio supposedly had it all!  Literally!  HD Radio, MP3/WMA playback on CD/CD-R/CD-RW, SD Memory, USB.  IPod link, Aux input, pre-outs, Satellite ready, EVERYTHING!  The problem? None of it worked! (more below)  I really wanted this product to work for me -- epically since these puppies aren't easy to install! Plus it was pretty inexpensive and I knew that anything else wouldn't have as many features.  I thought that if I can just find 1 brand of product compatible with the SD reader or USB, or CD ROM then I would be fine.  I couldn't find any combination that worked!  I purchased this from WalMart in August 2008 and returned it days later.

HD5112

The Pro's:

  • Very Featureful (on the surface)
  • Price is right!
  • I really liked the HD radio.  It seems like the Satellite radio companies are fighting very hard to limit the number of units with this feature so it was nice to find one.  HD Radio is pretty cool and one of the main reasons for buying this unit.
  • I didn't get to try the iPod link (as I do not yet have an iPod and would probably opt for a Zune)
  • Once I got the correct dash kit (don't say that you support *any* Pontiac when you don't stupid first dash kit!) installation was pretty easy.  The wires were ISO compliant so I just had to match colors with my GM/Pontiac pigtail.
  • The unit seemed to have pretty good power.  It went much louder than my stock radio.

The Con's:

  • I could not install it without removing the "warranty void if removed" sticker!  It was right over where the sleeve slid over.  You slide it over that spot more than twice (which is usually required) that sticker is gone man!
  • The installation instructions couldn't be accessed.  They are usually provided online through a 3rd party.  You enter your serial number and it will let you download installation instructions for your vehicle.  I suspect I was the N'th person to buy this particular unit and so it wouldn't let me download the instructions!
  • I tried 6 different SD cards in this unit and could not get any of them to read.  I tried formatting these every which way possible and even tried a number of different MP3 formats just in case it was not capable of playing VBR.  I tried renaming the files to have as few as possible chars. I never got this feature working!
  • I tried 15 different CD brands! Nothing would play.  Though in defense (if you can call it that) this unit must have been defective because the CD playback didn't work with a regular music CD (CDDA) that came straight from the store. That's right, I couldn't play my Blink 182 album!
  • I tried all 6 thumb drives I had and it wouldn't read any of them so I bought a new one, and it wouldn't read that either!  Reading other reviews these last three are common.  One guy could only get 1 thing to work and that was a SD card reader to work in the USB slot.  I believe he described it as "an abomination sticking out of my dash!" and that a sudden stop would snap his card reader & radio like a twig!
  • The clock looked weird and it would never display the information I wanted. 
  • The aux port worked but only if the faceplate was not open (expected but still annoying)
  • The faceplate didn't detach or attach without a fight! 
  • The snaps that hold the radio to the sleeve weren't great.  After I installed it I couldn't get the right side to snap into place.
  • The product manual was very poor!  The website had few answers.

I would not recommend this unit to a friend.  Based on the whole number of poorly implemented features I could not buy this brand of electronics again.

I have bought the XOVision DVD player for my car to replace this CD Player.  It should get here in the next week so look for a review on that.

Filed under:

Comments

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Thursday, August 28, 2008 8:43 PM by Nathan Zaugg

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Monday, September 22, 2008 6:54 AM by Kendall

I recently purchased the Jensen HD5112. So far I have not had any problems.

I will cross my fingers, but I have had a CD-R & 2 8GB flash drives that perform as expected.

I agree with the warranty void if removed sticker being in a bad spot since it goes into a sleeve.

I have not tried the SD input or the I-Pod cable (but I will now)

I am hoping you just got a bad one.

Good Luck,

Kendall

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Friday, October 17, 2008 12:30 PM by Phil Gilmore

Shnikeys!  Production of a product as faulty as that Jensen deck would be an outright crime!  Hope you just got a bad one... but if that deck passed QA, I have to reconsider any Jensen purchase.

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Thursday, November 06, 2008 12:22 AM by eric tjeleander

I just installed this {by flashlight} this evening- read the online owners manual VERY carefully..

there are strict ``naming conventions`` that MUST be adhered to, (depending on how you burned it to disc, etc..) in order for the deck to recognize the tracks either on a

thumbdrive,

CD / CD-R,

OR SD card-

Go one character beyond the limit for that file type (as described in the manual) and the deck wont see/play it...

That sucks BUT its pretty much duplicated on many other devices-

You also must adhere to limits of the Mp3 Khz that you burn.. once again thats pretty much the same for all devices, although some are more forgiving.

LASTLY- the manual describes how the folder structure is recognized by the deck, and if you try to go to amny folders deep, or disregard the required folder structure, OR load a thumbdrive with 1000 songs on it, when the maximum allowable is 999 (once again per the manual) you are not going to get any playback becasue that one extra song tipped you past the limits of the device...

Read the manual and try one LONE song first, on the media you are trying out which is-

of the allowable KHZ,

folder structure,

AND naming/number of title characters,  

on the removable medium you are trying out, because that is the only way you are going to know your Mp3`s are not at fault, and that the media itself is not readable by the device-

I suspect in a lot of cases, its not a deck malfunction-

its people NOT reading the manual, AND people who are using a SD card / thumbdrive that contains a thousand songs,

all differently file/folder-structured / named / burned, that they downloaded from hundreds of different people who originally created them, and they are now trying to get all these files to play from this deck which is limited in how amny characters you can even place in the filename- for some file types the limit is eleven characters, which means a lot of renaming has to be done-

if you are trying to listen to a song titles `black sabbath` it isnt going to play in some cases because the character limit for some filetypes has already been exceeded by 1 just in the bands name,...

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Thursday, November 06, 2008 10:23 AM by Nathan Zaugg

Eric,

I guess I got the "short" manual.  I read that thing cover to cover half a dozen times and it never had any kind of specifics like that.  No one wanted this to work more than me! I looked on-line for hours to try to find information like that but never found anything.

In regards to your specific feedback I tried all of the suggestions you mentioned.  I don't have any of the specifics but I did at one point I did put a single file on my thumb drive named 1.mp3 in the root directory and that wouldn't play.  I was real careful in selecting the mp3 to make sure it was a common bit-rate (128 & 192).

Besides trying this for about 16 hours of my time it isn't much good if a simple thing like having a song where the filename is too long or having a directory structure different than the required means you don't really have MP3 capability so much as a hack that was included with the radio that will allow you to play an MP3 file so long as you are willing to spend the time.

Nathan Zaugg

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Friday, November 07, 2008 12:58 PM by eric tjeleander

UPDATE- for Nathan and others;

I have now tried my 5112 with-

1) a ``DANE-ELC 2 Gb SD card`` ,

www.target.com/.../181-6341221-2998642

$12.99 on sale at Target-

it works perfectly in the 5112, and it played all my random Mp3 files I threw on it- it almost instantaneous, and is MUCH faster to load/play/change tracks than my USB drive.

I did not even format the card before use / loading of Mp3 files on it.

2) a `Lexar 1 Gb USB ``FireFly`` flash drive`, cost me about $8.99 back when I bought it a year ago-

www.lexar.com/.../jd_firefly.html

I threw 36 random Mp3 files on it, did not format or do any preparation, and it plays all the MP3 files.

(I cannot confirm any other flash drives working, as the lexar firefly is the only one I have, and it works fine.)

3) built-in cd player- I grabbed eight discs and tried all 8 in the 5112.

The 5112 played 6 of the eight with no problem and gave an ``error 2`` on two of them, which did not play.

Both of the `error 2` discs were somewhat scratched, dirty, and well-used.  I cleaned both off (on my pants)and one of the two played fine after rubbing it on my pants.  A run through a proper disc cleaning macnine on dirty/used discs that have been toted around outside of their jewel cases, and I have no doubt the 8th disc will play also.

I did the deck install myself, but it may be difficult to remove, return, and reinstall your own radio for some buyers,

so if you are having problems with media in your 5112, you may want to stick to `DaneElec` SD cards and `Lexar Firefly` USB drives as they are CONFIRMED working fine in the unit (at least the 2gb or less madels that I have).

I have nothing to try the AUX cable or Ipod cable with, so I dont have a review of those features.

The HD radio works OK but like all the technology I have heard, it does sometimes momentarily revert back and forth from regular to HD as you drive around for some reason.

Hope this helps-

If you are just having trouble getting removable media to work then all you need to do is get a (super-cheap) DaneElec SD and Lexar Firefly USB drive, both available at ANY target, and you are all set.  

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Friday, November 07, 2008 1:06 PM by eric tjeleander

The PDF owners manual online may have more info than the one with your deck-

its the one I downloaded and it gives specifications for what filetypes/naming conventions/KHZ limits/file structure/burning formats are supported-

It is all in the below manual on Page 20 under ``Mp3/WMA Operation`` section.

   mobile.jensen.com/.../JensenProductDetail.do

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Wednesday, December 31, 2008 2:17 PM by dw

i just purchased a jensen 5112,i wish i had read this article first as the sd reader just says SDerror and it only has 136 mp3 songs on it,the jump drive reader will not read , it just says error. mine is being returned friday when i return home,thanks for the info its just a little late but that is my fault. do you have any sugestions on a different radio with a SDcard reader.they take up sooooo much less room thanks again DW

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Tuesday, February 24, 2009 4:59 PM by Shawn

If you have a 2Gig or smaller card, you should have no problems.  The SDHD cards won't work.  Keep the cards below 4 gig, and they should all work fine.  I have had both my 5112s, one in each vehicle, and love them both.  Enough features to keep me happy, price was just right.  Plus, I can control my iPhone with the remote, which happens to hold most of my MP3s.

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Tuesday, February 24, 2009 7:05 PM by Nathan Zaugg

Well, I did use a 512MB card, a 1GB card and a 2GB card, all low density, otherwise it woulden't work in my iPaq. Though I am glad to hear that it works for someone and that they are happy with it.  The deck I got to replace it (different brand) is a little better but I guess it's too much to ask for real quality.  I'd go for better brand and/or more expensive but I believe this is the only deck with this specific feature set.

# re: Product Reviews: Westinghouse 32H570D & Jensen HD5112

Monday, April 13, 2009 11:29 AM by TF

... and here I was hoping I just got a bad one. Then I found this review with all the same problems mine had: SD ERR , USB ERR, CD ERR, faceplate is a joke and add to that, the unit's "frame" (around the faceplate when it's on) wouldn't stay on after install.

I called and the tech acted surprised.  

Anyway, bought it 3 days ago because I was wanting one with SD capabilities and the HD radio was a nice plus. Walmart is getting it back today.

I knew Jensen was a low end product but what i didn't know is that Jensen is also Audiovox.  Had I known this I would have avoided.

# Jensen 5112 | Monaschilling

Saturday, May 19, 2012 11:35 AM by Jensen 5112 | Monaschilling

Pingback from  Jensen 5112 | Monaschilling