@Backlin Isn't that just a semitone?

*sorry, meant 6 hours video - still good enough for me

Why does everyone assume that if it doesn't have a touch screen it's not worth buying?

For media players that aren't big, buttons are much more preferable in my opinion. I can control my mp3 player from my pocket, i couldn't do that if it had a touch screen and pocket control is a must purely because most players don't have an inline headphone remote that doesn't force you to buy lousy headphones.

It's a bit like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut, as the saying goes. If all you're doing is watching films, the only buttons i want are play/pause, skip chapter and fast forward/rewind (along with stop and menu buttons). A touch screen would be a bit unwieldy and would likely drive up the cost.

People are mentioning WiFi too. Why? Again, there is an obsession with "all in one" devices. I'd rather have three separate gizmos that do certain functions very well than a jack of all trades, master of none combo. By now it should be clear that generally web browsers on these kind of sizes aren't worth using (i say generally!). It would be better to get a full featured internet tablet that can support things like Flash and full AJAX (some browsers do javascript, but not to the extent where you can do things like google maps). As for the screen size, the only thing i'd be using WiFi for is web browsing (don't care about POP, i check on websites and then download all my mail on my desktop/laptop using thunderbird) and it'd need to be a bit larger to make that work for me.

$129 or about 80 quid here sounds like a very good deal for 12 hours of video playback - never mind audio. 4.3 inches is respectable, i would be happy to buy one if the UI is good. Which raises one final point. If they put a touch panel in, and WiFi and hell, why not GPS too while they're at it, i would bet fair amount that the user interface would be rubbish and cumbersome and it'd get slated for trying to do too much.

Why can't you buy bezel-less monitors easily :(

Have they actually upped the resolution or is it just the same but larger screen?

I'll stick with my DS Lite for now... at least i can still run the OLD Golden Suns!

As a student i can pick it up for £30/$50 ish separately and it's fully blown Home Premium. Worth the extra $20 in my opinion!

I bet this'd scare the crap out of the people at customs...

Hitting 2 gees at the moment. Someone's going to be gutted when MS release this for $350 in a few months :)

By the looks of their website, it hasn't been seriously put out to consumers because it's not meant for them. On zii.com it seems to imply that it's an OEM product that other manufacturers can take, fiddle with and then mass produce.

"Focus on the big idea, leave the nitty gritty to us. Showcase your innovation on an industry-certified open template. With a market-ready platform, enterprising developers can make quick profits, thanks to speedy time-to-market advantage."

So i assume they'll release a version to the public, but it sounds like they're basically selling it as a vanilla model that developers can customise for their own needs. Given the feature set, it should be awesome and unfortunately expensive...

As for battery, it's got a 1200mAh in it, so if someone would care to guestimate the current draw it should be pretty easy to work out how long it'll last with say 80% efficiency?

But.. who's driving the truck?