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| Home >> Handheld & PDA Reviews: Cowon iAUDIO 7 Portable 8 GB MP3 Player (Red) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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User Submitted Cowon iAUDIO 7 Portable 8 GB MP3 Player (Red) Reviews (cont...)Date: 2008-03-26 Amazing mp3 player that is exactly what I was looking for I have a 20gb iAudio x5 that I was using for all of my portable music listening, but it's battery life was a bit aggravating; I decided to look into a COWON flash-based player that would give me good sound and be able to last longer on battery life. When I saw the iAudio 7, I knew that it was what I wanted. It is very small, and although it is thicker than an iPod nano (first or second generation) it is around the same width and height and the thickness does not bother me at all. It still fits in my pocket. Well, after a couple tests I have found that the battery life is about 60 hours. Yes, 60. I was amazed when I accidently left it running for two days and found it still playing, after I had played it on and off for the past few days before I forgot to turn it off. This is while using the equalizer, the BBE, and the bass boost (more on these next). The sound quality is great. There is a built in customizable equalizer, a digital bass boost, and BBE (a sound enhancing technology), just like in my iAudio x5. In fact, the interface is very similar to that of my x5, but had a few changes that made it look better. COWON always has great sound. The music was very easy to get on, I just plugged it into my computer and dragged it into the music file on the drive. This was after a firmware upgrade, which I did before I did anything else with it; I suggest getting the new firmware right away if you do get this. The player has FM radio, picture/video support, voice recording, and text support, but the screen is pretty small, so the video, pictures, and text is probably not the reasons to buy this. I use it for only music and am perfectly happy with it. I will highly recommend this to anyone who wants an alternative to an iPod and wants good sound and battery life. Date: 2008-03-18 Best on the market In my opinion this is the best portable media player on the market. I took CNET's recommendation and gave the iAudio 7 a try and was simply amazed. It has superior sound quality to any iPod I've ever heard and as gimmicky as it may initially seem the FM receiver has amazing reception. I'd read that some people had some trouble getting used to the Swing Touch interface, but I didn't have any troubles and actually found the controls very intuitive. And the file support! Need I say anything about all the different files this thing will play? And as odd as it may seem, a handy feature for me has also been the flash memory: forgot your thumb drive? need to store some data? got your iAudio and a generic cable nearby? Problem solved. I have been very pleased with my purchase and given the price range of the iAudio 7, I'm not sure why you would buy anything else. Yes, the screen is a little small for watching videos, but you can still do so if you like. It hasn't affected me much because that's not what I got it for, I'm here for the music. My biggest annoyance has probably been that there seems to be a lack of 3rd party accessories, but then again, when everyone and their brother has an over-priced, cheaply made iPod, of course companies are going to focus on that market instead of other quality products. Conclusion: If you're looking for better sound quality, longer battery life, a better price and all around better substitution for your iPod, then this is definitely the PMP for you. Date: 2008-03-11 What Cowon iAudio7 will do for you I've done research on mp3 player for about a year before I bought this one. It boiled down between Sony's NW-S706FV 4GB Walkman, iAudio7 8GB, and Cowon's D2 4GB. The main factor that made me consider these were the fact that all these mp3 players are flash based(giving great stability & durability while exercising) and also their incredibly long battery life of 50~60hours play back time. Most only played for 25hours. iRiver had a removable battery like cell phone, but I never like the aesthetics, maybe because it looked like an old clonky cell phone. Ultimately I grabbed iAudio because they had the highest flash storage capacity at the time, now up to 16GB. And I don't ever plan on watching movies on a tiny screen. So, I went on a trip to the desert for 2weeks, I listened to it, plugged it into my friend's boombox, had a tone of fun, and it still played tunes on the way back. If this unit could have a removable flash card I could have brought more tunes out, even categorized music better, Pros: Long play time 60h great for extended trips, No skipping, durable flash drive based, low energy consumption, high quality sound & eq options, BBE, bright OLED screen, it's not another iPod, radio options, radio/voice recording. Cons: Too small for big manly hands :) , not enough play list options, records at 128k WMA, supplied ear bud doesn't do justice to what it's capable instead get a better pair of ear buds, or head phone to get te most out of it. Neutral Facts: (neither good or bad, it depends on your preference/needs) The AC charger($9~12) is optional, instead it comes with USB transfer cable that you can transfer files, and charge from your computer, The size is smaller than a credit card with thickness of an Altoid mint tin, it'll feel small if you have big hands, big if you're used to waffer thin nanos/shuffle but then you probably care about different things like having nice colorful pouch to put it in, or earning that "cool" status like the billboard guy... in that case definitely move along. Swing touch interface take a while to get used to it took me a couple days. Cowon seems to have take off since their release of D2 & iAudio7. Date: 2008-03-04 Good looks, great sound I chose this model based on several reviews - I was looking for a flash memory player for music. Never mind video, solid sound reproduction was my aim. Also, portability and ease to use. The player delivers all I was looking for. So far I managed to use only about half its 8 GB with music encoded in ~256 kbps VBR. The sound is far superior than what I got with the old Sansa. The boot time is a lot less too - the Sansa had a 2GB SD card attached. Controls are quite sensitive to touch but it's easy to get used to. Just don't forget to lock them when listening. The screen is small, but crisp and easy to read. And despite being a bit thick, it fits pretty comfortably in any pocket. Software is not that straightforward and reading the manual does help. But after some time it gets going. Battery seems to last forever. Sound level is loud enough for noisy environments. Connection is through a USB cable - straightforward and fast. Very easy to re-encode my collection from APE lossless format to MP3 or WMA using MediaMonkey and send it directly to the player. In summary, strongly recommended. Date: 2008-02-16 Love it This is a wonderful mp3 player. I can't imagine purchasing an iPod instead of this. FM tuner, video, shuffle, FLAC files, voice recorder, mic input, long battery life... its got it all. The buttons are a little sensitive, but believe me, you get used to it, plus you can adjust the button sensitivity, so its really a non-issue. You won't regret this purchase.
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