Saturday, December 17, 2005

Zen Neeon?

Well, just as my roommate picked himself up a new iPod Nano, my 6 month old iPod shuffle died entirely on me.

I'm in the process of sending it back to Apple for replacement, and in the meantime started looking around again for a PlaysForSure device that meets my needs.

Finally, it looks like one is coming! The new Creative Zen Neeon 512/1GB/2GB is small, flash-based, rechargeable - albeit via cable and not direct connector (the old ones took AAAs), has an FM tuner for those TVs at the gym, a display, and 32 hours of playback time!

It still doesn't look as sexy as the Nano, and doesn't do pictures/video, but the FM tuner has really become a key feature that the iPods lack. And maybe when I have a device that isn't locked to 1 music store, I'll start buying music online (I still buy and rip CDs -- not a fan of lock-in).

Anyhow, it looks like the flash Neeon isn't being sold just yet. Has anyone had a chance to play with one?

Now, off to the company holiday party I go!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Try out www.allofmp3.com $0.02 a megabyte for music. It's a Russian site. I've spent $70 already there to get high quality custom encoded music. The drawback is that the library can be a little bit lacking and lag releases by a month in some cases.

adamjh said...

Another drawback is that the legality is questionable. ;-)

Summerrainx said...

Hey there... I see Zen Neeons like.. everyday lol. The latest ones (dual OLED) are much nicer, flash based etc. But I don't think they'll reach USA that soon, they launch in Singapore and Asia first. HTH!