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Cowon A3 review
When we actually stopped to think about it, we realized that we've waited an awful long time for Cowon's A3 to finally make its way into our grubby paws, and while you've been teased before with unboxing shots and the like, we figured it prudent to snatch one of our own and decide if it really was worth the wait. On paper, this multimedia powerhouse has just about everything you could ask for given it's sub-$400 price tag, but if you've been hesitant to pull the trigger before someone else gave you the low down, head on past the break for all the deets you crave.
Cowon price drops abound
Call it fate or call it luck, but regardless of what you deem it, the latest wave of Cowon price drops will certainly save you a few bucks. Judging by listings at JetMall, Cowon has slashed dollars off of price tags attached to a variety of its devices, including $50 off of the luscious Q5W, $20 from the A3 30GB and some $90 from the 16GB iAUDIO 7. What's more, the entire Q5W lineup now comes with a free GPS cradle and a warm fuzzy feeling to boot. So if you've been holding off on treating yourself to a new Cowon, we'd say now would be a fairly decent time to pull the trigger and indulge.[Via CNET]
Newman intros ManMan PMPs, versions A3 through A6
It's not often that we applaud a foreign media player manufacturer for its choice of naming nomenclature, but Newman's done a swell job with its latest line of ManMans. The A3, A4, A4+, A5 and A6 PMPs all feature lots of glossy, plenty of screen real estate and interfaces not in our native tongue. Granted, there are some notable additions -- including support for PlayFX, the 120GB hard drive within the A6 and a blatant rip of the iTunes logo -- but otherwise, these seem to be fairly middle-of-the-road. Hit the read link for details on each, but don't count on any of 'em heading stateside in the near future.
Cowon A3 unboxed
Although Archos may have stolen some of its thunder with the less-expensive, arguably more full-featured 605 WiFi, Cowon is still hoping to ride the wave of buzz that followed its A3 PMP's launch at CES, as the first players are finally finding their way into consumers' hands almost a year later. Gadgetaholic's already got its hands on the 30GB version of this 4-inch device, and has posted some nice unboxing photos along with a few shots of the interface. Keep reading to check out the icon-based home screen, and then hit up the Read link for the full gallery plus some brief impressions....
Cowon A3 US launch details revealed
Cowon's been teasing us with its A3 personal media player for some time now, and it looks like the whole charade is now finally nearing a close, as the company has just announced the long-awaited US launch details for the PMP. According to Crave, the player will start shipping in early December, with it setting you back $349 and $399 for the 30GB and 60GB variations, respectively. If you've got a bit more money to spend, however, you may do well to consider Cowon's just-released Q5W player, which adds some WiFi to the equation, among other things.[Thanks, Justin]
Cowon's all singing all dancing A3: November 14th
Rumored forever before its CES debut in January, Cowon is finally releasing their A3 personal media player. So tell us oh gentle reader, was the DaVinci chipset; 4-inch, 16M color, 480x272 800 x 480 (!!) pixel display; USB host; FM radio and recorder; MPEG-4 video recorder; 1280 x 720 HD output; and vast codec support including DivX, FLAC, OGG, and wide variety of lossless audio worth the wait? Available November 14th in 30GB and 60GB flavors for ???349,000 (about $387) and ???419,000 (about $465), respectively. %Gallery-9884%[Via AVING]
Cowon A3 in the wild at last
Cowon's been pretty shy about its A2 followup, which was announced at CES this January, so it's nice to finally see someone putting the A3 through its paces. GenerationMP3 got a hold of the unit at IFA, and while it's a bit chunky for a modern player, there's no denying the capabilities -- or the sheer wonder of that 4-inch 800 x 480 screen. Apparently DMB only comes as a €100 option ($137 US), which is a bit of a low blow, given the €449 pricetag for the 30GB player, and €499 for 60GB ($615, $684 US), and there's still no exact word on release date, but we're sure the A3's hefty codec support and extensive features will win over few fans. Video is after the break.[Via dapreview.net]
Toshiba third-gen HD DVD players at CEDIA, 2nd gen 1080p24 firmware update
The constant stream of Toshiba news continues to flow in, and this go 'round its focused on the firm's newest generation of HD DVD players. After Amazon revealed most of the deets on these units, Toshiba seemed pressured to release the official details sooner than they wanted to. As expected, Toshiba is showing all three new models at CEDIA, like the low-end A3 that only supports 1080i, and the latter two that handle 1080p24 and CE-Link, but all three will reportedly be "approximately 1/4-inch slimmer than second generation models," which Tosh isn't forgetting about, as the long-awaited 1080p24 firmware update for the HD-XA2 and HD-A20 models is also going live, and it should be rolled out in "mid-September."
mobiBLU shows off A3 / A5 DAPs at CeBIT
mobiBLU's latest portable media players aren't cube shaped per se, but they do sport an ultrathin design similar to a few of its prior offerings. Shown at CeBIT, the 40-gram A3 and A5 (pictured after the break) players aren't too hard to differentiate at first glance, considering the A5's 1.8-inch screen is a hair larger than the 1.5-inch variety found on the A3, but aside from the LCD size, the units are reportedly identical. Under the hood you'll find 4GB of internal storage, a microSD slot, FM radio tuner, microphone, seven-band equalizer, USB 2.0, and the ability to handle MP3, WMA, MTV, and JPEG files. As you can probably imagine, the 74.5- x 37- x 11-millimeter devices don't have a price or release date attached to them just yet, but they sure are pretty, eh?
Hands-on with Pentax's A30, M30, T30, and W30
We didn't get our fill drooling over the 645 Digital so we hit up Pentax to show us their new line of compacts, the A30, M30, T30, and W30. We could have been a bit more impressed by the lot, although the T30, with its massive, bright touchscreen and slender body, was definitely the eye-catcher of the bunch. Collect 'em all!%Gallery-2039%
Cowon's upcoming A3 and Q5 PMPs are fit as fiddles and ready for love
While we'll miss our sexy, chest hair-free modeling friend, it's nice to finally see Cowon's new A3 PMP (top), a followup to the lovable A2, up close and personal. As expected, the 4-inch 480 x 272 player now includes a DMB receiver, plus a spiffy new "DaVinci" video processing chip from Texas Instruments to improve playback in some indeterminate way. Cowon's Q5 does it all one better, however, with a 5-inch touchscreen, GPS support of some kind, DMB, WinCE 5.0 and an external HSDPA module. No word on screen res, but there's plenty of hawterness to be getting along with already. These two players and plenty more from Cowon will be on display at CES -- specifically, the D2, N2, U3, T2, F2 and X5, for any model number junkies out there -- so we'll be sure to drop kick a few and let you know what's what.[Via dapreview]
Is this the Cowon A3?
We don't know much about this guy, or what he's holding (or why the hell he was hired to make people like us want to buy Cowon devices), but he's the same dude we saw earlier modeling (with) their new N3, and the device he's holding sure looks a helluva lot more likely to be the followup to the A2 than that not-quite-a-UMPC. We'll keep you posted, but not before we too get prep and throw our head back with abandon.[Via iAudiophile]
