Kenwood's latest flash Media Kegs: same guts, no glory

Zoinks, Kenwood just loosed yet another Media Keg design into Japan. Two in fact, each sharing the same guts: the sophisticatedly-smarmy GD55 and whimsically-chintzy GD50. Both feature up to 2GB of flash, a 4-line OLED display, a USB mass storage mode and support for MP3 or DRM'd WMA audio with up to 21 hours of MP3 playback before needing a recharge. Yours in Japan starting next month for ¥15,000 or about $130 for the full 2GB treatment.

[Via Impress]

[nih @ Sep 28th 2007 6:43AM]

If you're going to price yourself in a similar fashion to the most well-known musical device in existence, it might pay to try to compete on features or storage instead of completely failing at both.

[Michael @ Sep 28th 2007 6:44AM]

Wow! I'm incredibly unimpressed. I'd be amazed if anyone bought one.

[apeguero @ Sep 28th 2007 7:21AM]

Remember how you used to get a free bowl of soup with your haircuts long ago? Well, they should give you one of these instead from now on.

[PJK @ Sep 28th 2007 7:23AM]

I never knew you could polish a turd to such a gleaming shine.

[Steven @ Sep 28th 2007 7:52AM]

So if this 2GB is a "Media Keg," wouldn't that make the 160GB iPod a "Media Distillery?"

[Natedog @ Sep 28th 2007 10:11AM]

It would be much more fitting to call this the "Media Shot Glass".

[PenaltyKillah @ Sep 28th 2007 9:48PM]

Oh god... the best designers and marketersa multinational can buy...

And they came up with this? Imitating the Walkman's old persona, I see. Bleh!

[tekdroid @ Sep 29th 2007 2:41AM]

hehe.
ok but how does it SOUND?

If it sounds better than the competition, they might attract a niche. A very small niche who love their mp3s and wma to sound better.

[tim marshall @ Sep 29th 2007 11:43PM]

think youll find that owners of these players are those that get them included with their kenwood micro systems.

The sound of kenwoods is pretty up there so they do have a niche' and they have always been more expensive than sony or panasonic.

Similar to some toshiba, jvc's and panasonics they japanese mp3 producers phocus their mp3 players on playing mp3's. That is large battery life and good integration with the matching micro-systems.

People rent their CD's from Tsutaya, load them into their micro systems (which has a hd) and then download them onto these small players. They have cellphones with 1seg etc for movies...

just an opinion - however if you go to kataku.com youll see that the ipod is still the killer...