Looking for a new mp3 player as my Zen V Plus died, was quite fond of it and the only downside was its mere 4GB and limited format support (mp3/wma)
So I was looking for a replacement and the Cowon iAudio 7 looks quite promising. It even lists linux support on the page which is nice to know since there isn’t one in the openSUSE HCL yet.
I’ve never heard of the brand before yet and although all the reviews I’ve read so far are (very) positive I’m still curious to know if someone has one yet and if it would live up to my expectations. (Good audio quality / long battery life)
On Thu, 2009-05-21 at 00:36 +0000, Axeia wrote:
> Looking for a new mp3 player as my Zen V Plus died, was quite fond of it
> and the only downside was its mere 4GB and limited format support
> (mp3/wma)
>
> So I was looking for a replacement and the ’ Cowon iAudio 7’
> (http://www.cowonglobal.com/product_wide/product_i7_spec.php) looks
> quite promising. It even lists linux support on the page which is nice
> to know since there isn’t one in the openSUSE HCL yet.
> I’ve never heard of the brand before yet and although all the reviews
> I’ve read so far are (very) positive I’m still curious to know if
> someone has one yet and if it would live up to my expectations. (Good
> audio quality / long battery life)
I don’t have an i7. I do have several Cowon A2’s and recommend that one
highly (since it actually runs Linux). If I had to recommend a nice
player today, it’s the Insignia Pilot (Best Buy’s product). It handles
mp3, ogg and Xvid video. Works well with Linux. It has good battery
life, it is small, it is flash based and supports a totally inside SDHC
add on, so you can bring the 8G model up to 40G (which is what I do).
Cowon is NOT a Linux loving company (btw). They just happened to have a
few players that used Linux, but NOT because they are Linux people. In
fact, you’ll see a general lack of interest on adding features to any of
their Linux line (sad but true).
The Pilot I mentioned above, does NOT run Linux as it’s OS (but it’s not
Windows either). If you shop around, you can get a Pilot 4G for around
$35USD and the 8G for around $45USD… sometimes they are used, but I
have bought several that were in pristine condition (I give these away
as door prizes at LUGs).
I guess you live in America then? Cause it looks like the a2 is an American product, can’t find it in any dutch webshop and first google result is for cowonamerica.com (and well the A as the first letter…)
Has to big a screen for me anyways, need buttons not a huge screen.
Doesn’t look like there is any best buy around here either.
Did some more research on the i7 and it does seem to be a very good player, though the controls are apparently hard to learn and the file transfers are slow.
But for 60 hours of playtime of a single charge and audio quality on par with creatives products I can overlook a few flaws.
It running linux really isn’t a requirement for me, as long as it works with linux… as I don’t want to reboot to windows just to put music on the **** thing. Looks like cowon is doing it right and it just shows up as an usb stick (which is the same as my old MuVo and I loved it like that), Zen V Plus required mtp… but amarok handled that pretty well much prefer the ‘usb stick’ way though.
On Fri, 2009-05-22 at 21:56 +0000, Axeia wrote:
> I guess you live in America then? Cause it looks like the a2 is an
> American product, can’t find it in any dutch webshop and first google
> result is for cowonamerica.com (and well the A as the first letter…)
A2 isn’t made anymore. A3 should be available though… but it’s an
expensive product with (IMHO) minor upgrades and much shorter battery
life than its predecessor… and it is big (as you noted).
>
> Has to big a screen for me anyways, need buttons not a huge screen.
> Doesn’t look like there is any best buy around here either.
You have to get the Insignia Pilot through used markets mainly.
Probably means purchasing internationally too for you (oops).
>
> Did some more research on the i7 and it does seem to be a very good
> player, though the controls are apparently hard to learn and the file
> transfers are slow.
> But for 60 hours of playtime of a single charge and audio quality on
> par with creatives products I can overlook a few flaws.
>
> It running linux really isn’t a requirement for me, as long as it works
> with linux… as I don’t want to reboot to windows just to put music on
> the **** thing. Looks like cowon is doing it right and it just shows up
> as an usb stick (which is the same as my old MuVo and I loved it like
> that), Zen V Plus required mtp… but amarok handled that pretty well
> much prefer the ‘usb stick’ way though.
I think you’ll probably like the i7. Surprised somebody hasn’t chimed
in directly about it.
I have an iAudio7 and it works like a charm. Lots of features and almost endless battery-life But surprisingly the headphone output is a little bit dull to my ears if everything is set to flat…but maybe my needs as a sound engineer are a little bit high for a portable music player. Don’t misunderstand this. It’s nothing the built-in EQ can’t fix.
But surprisingly the headphone output is a little bit dull to my ears if everything is set to flat…but maybe my needs as a sound engineer are a little bit high for a portable music player. Don’t misunderstand this. It’s nothing the built-in EQ can’t fix.