Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Advice for a mobile media newbie.

Regarding MP4 nation
Scratch that. Not worth posting a link of a company I am not fully informed on.

No I did not do a lot, but it seems very similar to the iPhone/Touch. I don't do a huge amount of surfing on my iPhone because I find that there are specific iphone apps that perform similar tasks in a better way on the small screen. It's tough to surf w/o a real keyboard IMHO. But that doesn't mean you can't do it. You just have change your habit a bit. I do recommend using a multiplatform bookmark syncing client so you can use the same bookmarks from any machine/browser. On my iPhone/Macs, I use MobileMe to accomplish that. With Firefox, I use Xmarks. I do this because when I surf, it's usually to the same sites (like here) so the bookmarks rarely change.

I also use NetNewswire with Google Reader to peruse my RSS feeds. That actually tends to cut down on my voracious web surfing on my iPhone. It's not really the best app, but one I'm most comfortable with.

Yes, the iPad/iPhone don't support flash, only HTML5. It remains to be seen whether Jobs made the right call there. A coworker made an interesting point. Some sites, as of Sunday, have started to revamp their sites to allow surfing from the iPad w/o Flash. That tells you the power of this iPad movement. Flash isn't the end all be all, it's requires a lot of CPU/GPU horsepower. You can play still YouTube on an iPhone app. But if you want to play Farmville on Facebook, then you're out of luck. But I have to imagine someone's trying to rectify that.

BTW, MP3s are not reencoded or anything by iTunes. They're just synced to the iPod/Pad/Phone/WhateverTheyDoNextWithStupidInterCaps. No need to copy them over by hand in hard disk mode.

Thanks for all the feedback it’s helping me much better target what I think I’ll be wanting in a portable media player. I think I’ve come to the conclusion I’m going to need 3-4 separated devices in the long run.

First I’ll need a new car stereo but I’ll start another thread on that one.

Second I’ll need a portable media player.

Third I’ll need a full laptop. (just doesn’t look like anything even netbooks really do portable computing and portable media well) Point me in the right direction if I’m wrong.

Third and a half (might come before a laptop) mobile phone.


For the portable media players I’m now concentrating on:

Archos 7 320 GB Internet Media Tablet

+ screen size
+battery life
+removable battery
+storage capacity
+good PQ and SQ

-very mixed reviews
-touchpad sluggish???
-pay extra for full media support

Apple iPad

+screen size
+external battery???
+will likely have lots of apps

-USB charge doesn’t work on all computers
-shortest battery life
-still don’t understand the whole iTunes thing???

Cowon S9 32 GB Video MP3 Player with Touchscreen

+Battery life
+media support
+excellent PQ and SQ
+regular firmware updates

-small screen
-problems with playlists and tagging on imported mp3

Can anyone add to the possible pros/cons of any of those players or suggest a player I’ve missed that would be similar to those while hitting more of the pros than the cons.

Just for reference some of the competing advice I’m hearing from 2 people at work one a confirmed mobile tech geek and the other an airline pilot who uses mobile media a lot are to stay away from “i” anything because of having to use iTunes to import media and all accessories being proprietary but from what I’m seeing the proprietary accessory thing seems to apply to most players. The other thing is that the large screen is the way to go especially if I will be mostly watching things, which I will be.

With the feature list you are looking at, multiple devices is the best approach.

Cowon offers great support for the S9 from tweaking, guides, firmware updates, Q & A, troubleshooting, acessories etc. If interested in this PMP, head over to this link and start going through every subforum. Plenty of valuable information available to help you make an informed decision on this product.

http://iaudiophile.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=bebaf3a51bbee10feed012d85491ac17&f=90

Thanks for that link I guess it’s time to start looking at the dirty little details of theses things before finding out about them myself. I hope to see discussion of a larger screen. If they offered a larger screen version I would probably get one right now and forget about the other two.

Stopped by the closest BB and tried out a couple players the Archos 5 and ZuneHD.

What they both had in common was that they had no internet connectivity so I couldn’t see how they browed the web. Both powered on instantaneously, nice.

Archos 5 - Unfortunately the Archos 5 didn’t have anything on it. No music, video or pictures and wasn’t connected to the internet or picking up FM radio so about all I could do was check the interface. Not impressed. It was set up like a computer desktop with icons and also icon based menu options were available. I liked the larger 5” screen better than the ZuneHD but that’s all. The touchpad interface was very sluggish. The “Home” feature didn’t work. It kept getting confused about what orientation it was in while switching screens. It would pop back to the correct one but it was annoying. Another annoyance was after trying to connect to the FM radio and failing ever minute or so a dialog popped up asking if I wanted to try connecting again even after telling it “no” and powering it off and back on again.

ZuneHD - screen size was just to small I think the 5” screen is going to be a minimum for me. The interface was responsive and more intuitive but seemed it would be more limited as it was just a list of menus. Had a “hard” button which jumped back to the top of the menu hierarchy.

I listened to some demo material including symphonic metal which sounded good on the Sennheiser headphones (forget the model). While this combo was loud enough for general listening and normal commuting it wouldn’t be loud enough for a military cargo aircraft w/o noise canceling.

Listened to some FM radio which sounded ok but nothing special. However, not bad at all for something w/o and antenna and indoors made me wonder if the store had a repeater or something.

Watched a demo video which looked sharp and colourful but was just to small to enjoy watching.

I had already eliminated the ZuneHD and others based on screen size which using one confirmed. My experience with the Archos seems to bear out what half the owners are saying that the interface is sluggish and it’s buggy. If I find another one I certainly try it but if it fairs as badly then it’s out, teetering on the edge already.

Unfortunately that BB didn’t have the iPad so I could give it a try. Looks like I’m going to have to find a Cowon s9 and iPad to look at. At 3.3” I’m not sure the s9’s screen is going to be big enough for me but I will have a look before deciding that.

I got a chance to use a coworkers Cowen S9 last week. Seemed very comparable to the Zune HD in PQ and SQ though it was not a side by side comparison. If I had to choose between one of these it would be a real coin toss as the Zune has more functionality especially WiFi while the S9 has a longer battery life.

However, both now lose the screen war since I’ve had a chance to really watch one. The 3.3” screen is just too small. Cowen has released the V5, still no WiFi, and I’ll likely revisit the Archos 5 and 7 to see if it was just the display model that was so buggy.

I’ve now had a chance to use a Zune HD, Archos 5, Cowen s9 and an iPad. I’ve decided what I want is a Zune for video quality an Archos size screen with Cowen Sound Quality and an iPad interface. Is it that much to ask for one company to get it right, how about 3 out of 4 or even 2/4.

The last thing I tried was an iPad and must say I was quite impressed. It just plain worked. Never touched one before and with one push of the Youtube app and a few fat-fingered keystrokes and I was watching my favorite Oreskaband video. Cool thing was I turned it off and then back on again and it came up exactly where I left off. Did the same for a movie I also checked out. Does anyone know if any other players can do that? Also the interface was the most responsive of the 4.

Based on my experience with other computing devices I find that those devices and programs that just work and are user friendly get used more often so despite my aversion to iTunes and not the longest battery life or best SQ the i-devices are definitely in the running.

Heh... as far as battery life, the iPad ought to have the others beat--most of that thing IS battery!