The hard disk module is small enough to fit under a seat. The ultra-thin controller easily mounts on your dash.

The car hardware has two main components: a hard disk drive player, and a controller. The player measures about 7-3/4" x 6" x 2" and has a slot on one side; that's where the removable hard disk drive plugs in. The player also has two USB ports and a socket for a connecting cable. In this case, the player can be installed in the back of an SUV, the trunk of a sedan, or even under a seat. It's small enough to go almost anywhere, and it simply screws to the floor. Just make sure the top cooling fan is ventilated, and you can get the removable drive in and out.

The hard disk module has a connection for the 13-pin control cable and two USB ports.

The player's cable (about 16 feet) connects to a small hideaway module; it has a fuse, two RCA jacks for analog stereo output, four leads for battery, ignition, ground, and illumination, and an output socket. This socket connects to another cable (about 10 feet) and it connects to the controller. The face of this unit (1-7/8" x 6-3/4" x 1") looks like a standard size DIN head unit. But since it is so thin, it can be mounted on the surface of a dash, or simply used as a hand-held unit. If you decide to mount it, you can use a supplied bracket, and you can also hit an Eject button to release the controller from the bracket so you can take it with you for security reasons. The last step in the installation is to connect the module's stereo outputs to your audio system's auxiliary inputs. If you don't have auxiliary inputs, you can purchase an optional FM modulator and play signals through your radio, but this decreases sound quality.

After installation is complete, the fun can begin. Simply insert the removable hard drive into the player. You can now access all of the songs on the drive, and listen to them over your car's sound system. The controller is very simple to use. Its blue, back-lit, 3-line display shows you the album and song titles, and it's easy to scroll through the listings using a big scroll knob. Even better, there are menu buttons for Artist, Album, Genre and Favorites; if you hit the "Artist" button, for example, the titles are listed by artist names. That makes it easy to find the desired selection, even if your drive has hundreds of albums. Actual playback is done with typical transport controls such as Play and Pause. Also, you can bookmark a song, then later access the Muze web site to download artist and album information.

It's pretty cool to have an entire music library at your fingertips. But, a library isn't much good if the sound quality is poor. Anyone who has listened to MP3 or WMA files knows that sound quality can range from very good to very bad. To cram as many songs as possible into their memory or drive, some people use very low bitrates; this is a mistake because they will always sound poor.