Cowon 16 GB Portable Multimedia Player (Black)

Cowon Sounds Excellent With The Right Earphones.

Overall, I find the D2 fairly easy to use with pretty good logic. However, the Jet Audio "skin" or software that comes with it for PC or laptop use with the D2 could be better. Perhaps I haven't studied on how to exactly use it right away (my lack of patience?). Personally, I think that the WMA or Windows Media Player (i.e. Vista O/S) is much more friendly and easier to use. Particularly for say, ripping/syncing music from CD's onto the D2. Anyway, for music listening pleasure, this very portable (no larger than a single playing cards deck) you should be happy with. My suggestion is to heavily consider pairing it with the costlier Shure SE 530PTH ear bud headphones (stellar sound). The bass is pretty darn good either the louder you listen OR the "Jet Effect" setting, Mach3 bass. Although, the FM tuner stereo sound is ok but not as great. Not as good as the other sounding music you'll put onto it. Although, there are five preset equalizer settings or custom ones that suit you and set/save yourself. If you wanted to spend less, then consider the other Shure's ear bud headphones ([...], comfortable in ears with the black foam sleeves). If you just can't stand things stuck in your ears, then look at a higher quality over the ear headphone set like Bose or Sennheiser models. I think that this MP3 is very worthy overall to be closely looked at. 16 MB's is a fairly good amount of listening music memory. Battery life is also great. You won't be sorry. This little unit does a lot of other stuff like putting your digital pictures on it.

Current Best Offer: $176.10

Great sound, video, battery life, size, touchscreen, & file handling; avi, wma & mp3.

Pros: Great video (.avi) & sound (.wma & .mp3). Battery seems to last forever - longer than its competitors. Light and an easy pocket size especially for 32G total capacity flash device. Menu system easy to use and well designed. Touchscreen with fingernail or attached stylus. Easy to handle files. Basically an open platform, i.e. unlike iTunes or microsoft designs, the Cowon is not designed for potential big-brother corporate strategy DRM control limitations (e.g., possible duration-of-use expiration on user-purchased content). For those who think independently from mass-media-influenced herd, quality bang for the buck.

Cons: Since ipod has so-far easiest fastest user interface patented/locked up, this is next best thing and bang for the buck (better sound quality, IMHO, anyway). But if you organize your files well you won't have to look at and tinker with it so often to have it playing the tunes you feel like at the moment.

Details/Pros:
I did a lot of research before buying this. I'm still happy with it. Only reason I haven't given it 5 stars is the good user interface (which is only because ipod has patent on the fastest-to-use [user presentation] interface)... But the user interface is very good, and overall, this thing is great. Very easy to use. Sound is superior to ipod, zune, creative, etc. competitors, as is battery life even with videos playing. (Use decent quality headphones or earbuds, please.) You can mount the device via its USB cable to your PC like a regular drive to move files around the 16G main memory and/or up to a 16G SDHC flash extension memory card. Plays .wma's, .mp3's, and .avi videos just great... good screen resolution & motion on videos. You can use the screen with the supplied stylus (has a string) or with your fingernail - tap or drag like a mouse... Cowon also has on/off and sound controls via physical buttons on top edge.

Sound capability: I listen to trance, progressive and alt rock mostly, but a sprinkling of newage, classical, older classic & other rock, world/ethnic remix dance music, regular world music, and fusion jazz as well. This player handles all types of music with great bass, midranges and high tones accurately represented. There are preset and custom equalizer settings in the control menu as well if you want to tinker.

It has bookmark and playlist features as well, which my friends have used on it, but I haven't much used yet because I have my content well-organized in folders for my typical uses/wants.

Comes with conversion software (JetAudio, easy to use, & documentation available) or you can use any freeware to convert files to these formats. Since it's designed with no requirement to use DRM software for populating the device with your songs & videos, if you are ripping from your own non-DRM downloads or CD's, you won't ever be affected by arbitrary business-driven changes to DRM policies by online music content vendors. Most people are unaware of that angle - they just use iTunes and ipods because it's what everyone else uses... DUH!... So you have more freedom if you avoid iPod or other DRM-content controlled vendor product strategies. I feel that if I paid for the content, I should have rights to use it on my own devices forever as with legitimate use of CDs - i.e. not subject to someone else's potential business changes.

You can mount the SDHC card (purchase a large capacity card separately; I recommend Kingston or SanDisk) to handle files independent of the Cowon, or move files to/from it while in the Cowon.

Recharges quickly. Files transfer speed is average - neither very fast nor terribly slow. Also check out the multimedia (larger size, screen & capacity) Cowon, equally well rated for sound, video quality and flexibility by users at forums.

I got an aftermarket "armor" rubbery sleeve for it (yes available, e.g. JAVOskins, & I recommend such for any expensive device). Relatively sturdy flash device, however. Be sure to apply a LCD screen protector (comes with armor, usually) - like all such screens this will prevent scratches.

Minor Cons:
Found that the font size is fine for younger folks but a bit small for over-40 eyes, even after I set them to be a tad larger (only 2 choices); OK but wish there was a larger one. Discovered that it doesn't recognize video files on the memory stick - have to put those in the main memory area... so most of my huge music collection is on the memory stick in folders by type of content... so I have 16 G of videos and some music on the main memory, and another almost 16G of music on the stick. But it's all easy and quick to get to.

(It doesn't have the proprietary Apple-type user interfaces so) you have to go thru 1 or 3 menu levels to change music folders (depending upon whether what you want at the moment is on the main memory or the extended storage card). Unlike Apple iPods with iTunes, however, you are free to organize everything easily by mounting it via USB to your PC and using your file utility to make or change folders, move files around, etc.

You can figure how to use this device pretty easily without documentation; it comes with some but isn't the best. Searching online forums is helpful supplement, and there's one or more show-n-tell items on youtube as well. Cowon's JetAudio software documentation is decent, however.

PS tangental comment:
Kudos to S.Korea for their competitive products for the world consumer market these days - not just fine consumer electronics like music players, cellphones and flat-panel tv's... Check out, for example, their historical drama tv series (subtitled available here at amazon or yesasia, and broadcast on cable/satellite tv), or if you can find import stores run by and selling for american ethnic koreans, you will find that korean-made modern or traditional quilts, synthetic plush blankets, and decor seating cushions are generally superior and better-priced than other retail stuff found in US stores.

Current Best Offer: $176.10

Excelentes bajos y fácil de manejar

Este reproductor de mp3 / ogg / videos es un sueño hecho realidad. Le puedes colocar adicionalmente una memoria SDHC la cual le da aun mas capacidad de almacenamiento y su sencilla interfaz gráfica permite una navegación y búsqueda de opciones simple y útil.
Puedes encontrar en el mercado otras opciones de marcas "conocidas" pero no con la cálida de sonido, los increíbles bajos y el menú de fácil acceso que tiene este Cowon.
Te recomiendo eso si unos audífonos de mejor calidad a los que vienen de fabrica para apreciar el rango de sonido. Esta es una muy buena compra.

Current Best Offer: $176.10

Almost a great product

What I wanted was an mp3 player that played FLAC, and many other lossless codecs as well as sorts by ID3 tags. Plus I wanted great audio quality.

When this player works it is fantastic. However the firmware is buggy. The D2 database gets corrupted very easily. It seems to be especially sensitive to which version of ID3 tag you are using. So if you have lots of music that you have had for a while some might be in a version that the D2 doesn't like. Also the database seems to get corrupted when you transfer a lot of music at one time to the native memory.

So long as you only load two or three albums at a time, then check the machine to make sure the data base didn't get corrupted (and if it did remove the files) you will be ok.

If you do this you will be pretty happy with the D2. The ability to load 16gb sd cards into the machine giving you 32 GB of storage is a big win. It sounds great (much better than and ipod)and can drive my not totally efficient pair of cans nicely. And it plays FLAC files which means i get a lot more lossless music in less mememory than wav or apple lossless.

If cowon fixes the firmware bugs this would be a 5 star player.

Current Best Offer: $176.10

caution

The D2 sounds fantastic and is very solid-the touch screen is a problem for playing tracks it is too small and hard to read unless one is stationary. I returned it for a refund because it would not play tracks in the proper order i.e. 1,2,3,... it would only play in alpha mode. It took me three days to get through to Cowon tech support and I spent almost two hours in two sessions typing to the support staff. The whole matter could have been dealt with in 15 minutes by phone but OH NO we have to sit and type-must be a geek thing but it sure as hell isn't an efficient way to deliver service. Cowon suggested that my existing mp3 files were not properly tagged however they work just fine on an iPod and two different iRiver players. Bottom line I spent over twenty hours trying different tagging programs to get the files to play in order on the D2 and finally said the hell with it and sent it back. I will miss the sound but Cowon needs to create firmware that can handle various id tags-right now it is a geek's toy. Buy with caution and buy where you can return it.

Current Best Offer: $176.10