It’s almost that time of the year when work slowly grinds down ahead of the festive season, when you look back in dismay and look ahead with optimism. More importantly perhaps, it is the month of the end-of-year office party.
Most businesses in the UAE will secure a night of good food, drinks and dancing at one of the country’s many hotel resorts. But while all good parties involve a song and a dance, great parties involve karaoke.
Instead of the pre-planned, pre-staged, pre-same-as-always shindig, why not invest in a karaoke machine for the office parties instead? You can take them along to the hotel or keep things simple this year and stage an Arab Idol-esque party in the boardroom with finger food. Either way, there is fun to be had.
MediaCom, a Dubai-based electronics company recently launched its MCI 6200-TW Premium Karaoke player which comes with a prepacked song list of English, Arabic, Tagalog and Hindi songs as well as a host of others that I had previously never heard of. What’s even better is that users can download more songs from the internet, and save them on to the SD card and sing the lesser- known karaoke favourites.
Each box comes equipped with two wireless microphones and a stand. There is a remote control, AV and USB cable as well as an HDMI cable. Connecting to the TV set via HDMI provides the most clarity, but unless you have separate speakers, you will have an audioless experience. The traditional AV cable provides less clarity but you get the sound with it.
On screen, the melodies are accompanied by shots of heavenly islands, diving sea turtles and combusting jungle fruit. The images will liven up any performance, along with the scoring system which marks each performance out of 100.
You can choose 150 favourite songs to stop you from having to look up each song every time you want to make a selection.
The biggest downside for me was the absence of Backstreet Boys' I Want it That Way.
The device is available to buy at most electronics outlets and is priced at Dh1,195.
thamid@thenational.ae
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