Cowon's gotten
some rather mixed reviews in the past for their line of
iAudio
DAPs, but the outlook seems mostly positive for the upcoming hard drive-based
iAudio6, with Anything But iPod
finding very few flaws in the diminutive player's design, features, or performance. Especially impressive is the
1.3-inch OLED screen, which gets high marks for both color depth and clarity -- ABi calls it "simply
brilliant" -- and makes watching XviD-encoded movies almost bearable on such a small display. The iAudio6, which
we first spotted at CES, can handle
up to 4GB of MP3, WMA, OGG, FLAC, or WAV-encoded tracks on its .85-inch drive, but it's the drive that leads to one of
the few knocks on this model, which is a noticeable lag time between operations. Other nice features include USB host
capability for device-to-device file transfer with other UMS-enabled hardware, software that automatically tags certain
tunes with the corresponding lyrics, line-in and voice recording, and surprisingly powerful output that can drive even
large headphones. If you don't mind a bit of a delay when recording or changing tracks, or a bit of eye strain when
watching your flicks, then the iAudio6 sounds like it'll make for a solid purchase whenever it becomes available
Stateside.
[Thanks, James]
