Just want so say this is a great starter player. You get usb 2.0 (front), 2 aux-input (rear) & iPod (rear). I connected my 30gb portable notebook hdd via usb and it detected just fine. although it can only memorize the first 512 files so if you have a thousand files you can only listen to half of it.
Radio reception much better compared to my previous old alpine 9821r. Sound quality pretty much the same (both 1-bit dac). Output power almost as loud as alpine therefore I'd recommend an external amp for this player to get satisfying output (it still sounds good without amp but I have to crank volume >= 50).
My only small gripes are the white light on middle front of CD slot, lack additional buttons on remote, LED display hard to read on dylight, doesn't have a pause button and cannot permanently display clock. But all those are forgivable.