If iRiver nailed the interface of the SPINN, they seem to have come undone with that of the P20. The hard-drive based player is big, blunt-edged and the controls manage to make it look rather like an analog FM radio. Dual scroll-wheels – one horizontal, one vertical – coupled with a separate ‘OK’ button and a touchscreen that’s inset slightly too far for comfort make it a tricky PMP to navigate.
iRiver’s SPINN PMP keeps pulling in the kudos, and our hands-on at IFA 2008 didn’t do anything to make us doubt it. Even a strange leather flip-case that looked like it was held on with medical tape couldn’t disguise a casing that, arguably, is more attractive than that of the iPod touch. It’s the interface, though, which makes the SPINN such a joy, and a lot of that is down to the incredibly tactile scroll wheel.
While those of us not in the UK or Korea look on enviously, Crave UK have been busy playing with iRiver’s SPINN PMP. Though it’s merely a preliminary hands-on, for the moment it sounds like everything we thought about the SPINN is true: the AMOLED display really is that crisp, colorful and lovely; the wheel controller is a good addition to the touchscreen; and yes, not having expandable memory (beyond the max 16GB installed) is frustrating.
iRiver’s SPINN PMP was first spotted back in January, but only now has been tipped for release by the company. Available in Korea now, with a UK launch in August, the flash-based media player features a 3.3-inch AMOLED touchscreen, DMB mobile TV and, of course, the analogue control wheel that gives the SPINN its name.
iRiver is no stranger to sleek designed portable media player, and today iRiver unveiled yet another small and sleek player, the Lplayer Multifunctional MP4 Player. The player features iRiver’s unique D-Click control, 2.0-inch TFT Wide LCD screen, and FM tuner.
When we first saw iRiver’s Lplayer PMP back in May, we described it as “quite a standard PMP” except for one feature: its nifty transparent speaker-stand that gave the whole thing the look of some tiny cathode ray tube. PC Mag have just reviewed the player but, strangely, there’s no mention of the speaker accessory; could it be that it’s a Korea-only add-on?
After not being particularly impressed with the storage offered by iRiver’s P10 PMP the other day, criticising it not so much for using a traditional hard-drive but for picking such a small one, the iRiver LPlayer seems a little more interesting. Now on sale in Korea, the LPlayer is, on its own, quite a standard PMP for the company; it has the clever d-click UI, in which the whole face of the device doubles as the directional controls, a choice of (again not huge) 2GB, 4GB and 8GB sizes and has a compact 2-inch display. What makes it clever is the transparent speaker-dock, shown here, into which the LPlayer slots and which works as both a speaker and a stand.
Having first seen the iRiver P10 PMP back at CES 2008, it’s been pretty much all-quiet on the news front regarding the slick touchscreen media player. Happily we’ve now got some more information, and while it’s perhaps more of a niche product than, say, the iPod Touch, that’s not to say it’s a slouch. Based on a heavily-disguised Windows CE core, the P10 has a 33GB hard-drive, 4-inch 800 x 480 touchscreen and optional DMB.
This isn’t your standard MP3 player, its packing stereo speakers, FM radio, a microSD card slot, line-in, and a new D-Click system. On top of all that it has a large 2.4-inch TFT LCD screen.
SlashGear Japan
