Interesting news/reviews/deals from the portable audio market
Review: SanDisk Sansa e270: I had high hopes for this player (first presented at CES 2006) and I’m not really disappointed. CNET’s giving it an “excellent” nod along with a 8/10 rating. Drawbacks: buttons surrounding the scrollwheel are a bit difficult to use, low system noice be heard through headphones at low volume levels (?!), [...]
The Gmini XS 100 gets a color 1.5-inch OLED display and a 4GB hard drive. The miniscule player (measures 9.1×4.3×1.4 cm.—weighs 80 gr.) sports a 14-hour battery life and features support for music subscription services. It is expected in May for $150, according to the company’s press release. [Photo credit and tip to Generation MP3.]
David Pogue reviews the Samsung YP-Z5 for the NYT: if you ignore the man’s lame attempt to sound funny by coming up with supposedly witty acronyms such as MMS-MMS, it’s a well written piece touching on all the steps Samsung did right and wrong with this player. The consensus is that it’s good (excellent in [...]
How-to: rip your DVDs so they’re properly reproduced on the Zen Vision:M: “This guide uses DVD Decrypter and AutoGK which is free open source software so it will cost you nothing.” Read our presentation of the Zen Vision:M. From the wicked cool department—How-to: turn your wireless mouse into an iTunes remote: this is great. Using [...]
Samsung YP-Z5: an overall positive impression on this iPod nano competitor. There’s not too many extras here to brag about, but the iPod dogma is all about offering less, right? The device looks and feels great, the UI is a joy to use. The amp could use a little more power, but hey, if you’re [...]
Music swapping through the mail: La la Media plans to set up a platform where users pay $1.49 to swap compact discs with each other (a buck goes to La la Media and the rest covers shipping). Expect to hear from RIAA’s lawyers soon. Michael Arrington has a bit more. [via] Rundfunker, the WLAN radio: [...]
First impressions: Stello DA100 USB DAC: comparing this $695 DAC with the $13K Chord Blu to check what it’s really worth, yielded some pleasant results: For 13 grand, there should be a significant difference. But switching between the Stello and the Chord, it was just amazing just how good the Stello was.
A short preview of Windows Media Player 11: comes with a cleaner, but still ugly UI. Features tighter integration with PlaysForSure devices. Have a look at the slide show. [via]
Review: Ultimate Ears Super.fi 3 Studio: ”[these] deliver accurate sound for a reasonable price [...] should be your top choice in the $100 price range.” You may want to read the previous review we’ve covered, that found them a bit lacking in the bass department. Amazon has them for $99 in black and white. And [...]
As the rumor sites had managed to tip us, Apple went ahead with presenting an iPod boombox by the name of “iPod Hi-Fi”. CNET’s hosting the presentation video (and ironically, the videos are sponsored by Microsoft). The double-walled white-plastic enclosure houses two 80mm wide-range cones (set in dedicated chambers and isolated on the fron plate) [...]