Cowon's iAudio U5 heads to America

Don't feel bad if the iAudio U5 hasn't creeped into your mind since it "debuted" at IFA last September -- it's not like Cowon's doled out any sort of marketing blitz to keep us intrigued. Nevertheless, this somewhat stylish little DAP is apparently making its way to the US of A for those who like to avoid the me-too crowd. Specs wise, you'll find a 1.8-inch 160 x 128 resolution LCD, up to a full day of battery life, 4GB / 8GB of internal memory, MP3 / WMA / WAV playback, a built-in FM radio and voice recorder, user adjustable five-band EQ and USB connectivity. Good enough for you? Cough up $149.99 / $109.99 to snag one in 8GB or 4GB, respectively.

[tekdroid @ Jan 11th 2008 4:29PM]

http://www.cowonglobal.com/product_wide/product_U5_spec.php

According to this, FLAC support is missing. Seems pretty "me too" to me.

...aside from the fact it's not tied exclusively to a one-way-transfer restrictive RIAA-approved application like certain other brands we can mention.

[Baba Booey @ Jan 11th 2008 4:34PM]

Beats the sh*t out of the Zune 4 and 8...

[mac @ Jan 11th 2008 5:21PM]

Price-wise, maybe. This isn't really (read: remotely) Cowon's best offering- the U2 (which came out in 2004) offered this much audio support, and the U3 (which came out 2 years ago) offered more audio support than this thing. When it was first discussed, most couldn't help but to laugh at it.

If it retains Cowon's characteristically good sound quality and comes in at those prices, then it will be a pretty good bargain.

[Bob @ Jan 11th 2008 6:25PM]

I don't think it beats the crap out of the Zune, but it's definitely a step in the right direction: a simple mp3 player. I don't need video... I just want kickass audio in a small, portable shell.

It doesn't support AAC... that's about my only complaint. It uses a standard mini-USB port, will use Windows Media Player 11 to transfer songs/playlists and is pretty affordable.

[telepheedian @ Jan 11th 2008 8:56PM]

How? I have used the aforementioned U2 and I think that it's a great player, but this player doesn't look nearly as good as the old U2, let alone the Zune 4/8. If you were going for a simple MP3 player, there are plenty of cheap options under $100 available now, this thing just seems to fit in at a weird price/feature/storage range.

[bcollinstex @ Jan 11th 2008 5:36PM]

X5 light.

I'm still waiting for an updated X5.

[mac @ Jan 11th 2008 7:39PM]

You know waiting for an X5 successor could be akin to waiting for Godot...

(hint: both might not show up)

[Kelvin @ Jan 11th 2008 9:31PM]

Okay, so there's no video or photo viewing according to what I can (or can't) find in the specs and manual. Those in themselves are not a big problem, but I really don't get what's the point of paying the premium for such a huge screen if just to look at what track I'm listening to. I really think they bombed big time on this one, in their rush to cash in on the trend toward large screens in DAPs but totally ignoring their purpose!

[Jeebus @ Jan 11th 2008 11:00PM]

Cowon, you're losing it. FLAC support completely gone? Not good.

[IceHand @ Feb 22nd 2008 6:19AM]

You can get FLAC and Ogg Vorbis support when installing Firmware v.2.10 -- you'll lose DRM support for some reason though.
I've ordered an iAudio U5 8GB btw, let's see how good the m3u support is, a feature that is lacking from the other Cowon flash players.

[Can @ Jan 12th 2008 4:14PM]

Well, I wish there was FLAC support, but how many FLAC files can you really fit on a 8 GB anyway?

[Jeebus @ Jan 16th 2008 7:57PM]

About 20 CDs worth.