Dexim AV Dock Station Review

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When Anthony mailed the Dexim dock to me, I wasn’t particularly enthusiastic, I’ll admit. Considering I already owned an Apple TV, I wondered how I could find this new device useful. I’ve seen 3rd party ‘integrated solutions’ many times before, and more often than not, I’m let down by them, be it through poor design, shoddy workmanship, or a system that just isn’t ‘Apple enough’. So it was with a certain sense of trepidation that I took the packaging apart and started sorting through the contents. It’s a comprehensive setup, to say the least.

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Dexim ships the Dock Station with the unit itself, a remote control, the AV leads needed, power adaptor, and 8 different dock inserts that cover just about every iPod with video ever made. (and yes, the iPhone 3G). The finish on the dock adaptor is a gun metal grey and glossy black, and actually does a decent job of fitting in with its surroundings. You connect the dock to power, and then the AV leads into your television, and you’re done. That’s about as hard as it gets.

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The dock has support for both firewire iPods (classics) and USB, (iPhone, iPod Touch, Nano), so it never pops up the ‘This device is unsupported’ message <em>nice</em>. I chose the iPhone connector, clicked it in, and then docked the Jesus Phone. It started charging immediately, and I retired to my parlor's lounge in my smoking jacket. The included remote lets you jump navigate your content, and select what to play. (also volume control and playback control).

For my testing I used the latest bond film, quantum of solace (I hadn’t seen it), encoded under Visual Hub [sadly deceased software] in iPhone mode, with H264 encoding. The TV is a 42” 720p Samsung Plasma panel. I enabled widescreen mode and PAL for the output on the iPhone, and was really impressed with the results. The picture is quite crisp, good colour rendition, and the sound output was above my expectations. I watched the whole film from start to finish, and it never skipped a beat. In fact it charged my iPhone the whole time, which is kinda cool. I won’t lie, if you’re expecting HD quality, you’re not going to find it here, but it’s comfortable enough for your solitary geek evenings, in on the couch.

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The question however, is does it have a place in the gene pool of iPod accesories. At one end of the shallow, crap filled waters is a simple AV lead, and at the other is the Apple TV (or a Mini, if you want). For my money I’d say somewhere in the middle. It’s got the price factor on its side ($150RRP) versus $349 for an Apple TV, or $900+ for a mini but it only delivers essentially SD quality picture. It’s more useful than just an AV cable, as it charges your device and also has a remote control. In my opinion, the dock is perfectly suited to your bedroom TV. Or your study, where you still want to be able to watch content, but it’s not something that you’re overly obsessed with. If you had a standard def set, it’d be brilliant. It’s also a great companion product for the stay at a relatives, who’s idea of a great night in is reminiscing over the numerous summers spent weeding their back lawns.

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I didn’t think I’d be recommending a dock to anyone really, but the convenience of having a charger &amp; a remote is really cool, and means one of these will be taking up permanent residence in my house hold.

A massive thanks to iWorld Australia for letting us test the dock and AV cables.*

<em>www.</em><strong><em>iworldaustralia</em></strong><em>.com.au/</em>

Join us next week as we take the OCZ Solid State drives for a spin, and revisit Targus and their bluetooth mouse, and we might even fire up the video camera.

-Pete