Another iPod Competitor

rael9real writes "NOMAD has intoduced a new player. It has USB 2 and FireWire (finally), and supports WMA and MP3. It has a 20GB drive like the high-end iPod, and supposedly holds more music because it supports WMA (though why someone would want to use WMA is beyond me). It *is* cheaper than the iPod, though. Looks like a definite competitor. Maybe it'll drive iPod pricing down." Update: 10/14 21:21 GMT by T : Note that the listed specs for the player mention only "USB," not USB 2.

20 GB hard drive?

[gpinzone]

One of the nice things about the iPod was the fact that it is essentially a firewire hard drive. You can put anything on it. It also has a very weak system to prevent music from being copied from the iPod back to the computer. How about this player? Will I be able to jockey files back and forth between my friend's computer and my own?

Shock absorbtion?

[ccano]

I wonder how shock absorbent this guy is -- if I take it running and shake it around a lot, how long is this thing going to last before I mess up the hard drive or something?

Embellished

[Anonymous Coward]

The poster took artistic license and "upgraded" this device to USB 2.0 status, or they simply failed to mention that anywhere on the site..

Copy Apple...

[djcatnip]

that's all anyone ever does. Gateway with their commercial of their computer jumping over imacs, ms copying apple's switcher ads, everyone comparing their MP3 players to an ipod... if nothing else, apple innovates ...

USB power??

[psycht]

"You can charge the NOMAD Jukebox Zen via the USB port too!"

hmm. is this a wise thing?
Aside from that, if it IS cheaper than iPOD, then i'm game.

Umm

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm - did anyone notice that it does not have USB 2.0? So really how useful is it to the hoards of people who don't have firewire? Not very is the right answer. Transferring music over USB 1.1 would take like a day to fill the player.

lot's o room there

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would you need to carry around ~20 gigs of music? The battery would run out before the music would... Is it for the better music selection or quality?
Would it be possible to modify it to use it as a portable hard drive? That would be a whole lot more useful than those 1.44 meg disks or burning a cd.You wouldn't have to worry about having a zip drive or whatnot either.

Confusing

[dachshund]

I don't want an FM tuner and I don't want recording capability. Apple got it just right on that score.

I can't figure out whether this unit features those features, because they're both listed, but "require an optional remote control". Does that mean that the features are built in (and therefore I'm paying for them in terms of extra hardware costs and weight), but can only get to them by buying a stupid remote? Or is the actual functionality built into the remote?

Thanks for ignoring me qjkx

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok everyone wants Ogg because we're all libertarians here. I'm all for Ogg, but what about lossless audio? Do any players now play plain old raw bitstream files like .wav?

Zen 58% larger

[bobdotorg]

Comparing the volume of the 20GB offering from each company gives:
iPod: 132 cc
Zen: 209 cc

The Zen is 58% larger.

Given the overall dimensions, I suspect that the Zen is using a 2.5" HD vs. the iPod's 1.8"

On another note, after almost a year of heavy use / abuse, my 5GB iPod's battery life sucked - only about 3-4 hours, and it would be dead if left unplugged for a few days. I brought it to my local (Schaumburg, IL) Apple store and they swapped it out for a new (?) unit which has a kickass 11 hours of playtime. I have no experience with Creative Labs, but I wonder what level of warranty, and in my case out of warranty, support they give.

Re:Ipods are the only way :)

[eXtro]

I bought my iPod on Saturday. It's the best designed device I've ever seen I was a little anxious about putting down 500 bucks for an mp3 player, especially after putting down over 200 a few months ago (RCA Lyra2, I bought it because I wanted something that would use compact flash cards which I have many of - unfortunately it doesn't really use the MP3 format, and if your source MP3 isn't 128 kbps the sound quality is miserable)

I'll second your opinion of Ephpod as well, I haven't used it under Windows, but it runs excellently under WINE.

Hard Drive

[LostSinner]

it may just be me, but does this thing look like they just slapped a screen and some hookups onto an old hard drive casing? part of the attractiveness of the ipod is, well... it's attractiveness.

SB1394?

[Sierran]

Although it appears to be the same spec, 'SB1394 FireWire' is really just a fairly weak attempt to hijack recognition of the spec and attach it to the 'SoundBlaster' line. From Creative's website:

--What is the purpose of the SB1394 Certification Program?
There are differences among IEEE-1394 connectivity relative to performance and overall ease of use. Creative engineers developed the SB1394 Certification Program to ensure optimal performance and usability of SB1394 connectivity for digital entertainment consumers.

--How does SB1394 Certification Program benefit my product?
A SB1394-certified device is eligible for joint promotional opportunities, such as in-box cross-promotion, joint soft bundle channel opportunities, e-mail campaigns, on-line exposure, joint presence at selected trade shows, and much more. That is, an SB1394-cetified device has the opportunity to tap into the huge Sound Blaster installed base, leverage the strength of the powerful Sound Blaster brand, and expand market reach in the PC marketplace.

--cut-- ...in other words, they think it'd be neat if the sheep associate FireWire with them, and they claim that the oh-so-powerful brand recognition of the Creative and SoundBlaster brands will serve as an advantage.

Sigh.

On a more technical note, while it may be handy to have both USB and 1394 on the box, it does involve additional hardware and (most important) additional plugs. I have found through my history of players (Original Nomad Jukebox, 64MB flash player, iPod 5GB) that the common point of failure during daily use has been with the plug integrity itself as well as with the entry of dirt, lint, etc. into the plugs. One of the attractions of the iPod is that it only has two ports - one headphone and one FireWire - and both (along with the only edge-mounted control, the lock switch) share the top edge of the unit. this means that only that one side need be carefully protected from FOD and etc.

The primary advantage of this unit seems to be the ability to create and edit playlists on the machine itself. While this is a nice feature, I can say from my two years with the Nomad Jukebox that the art of UI design is SEVERELY LACKING in Creative's hardware dept. Although one could edit and manupulate lists on that player, it would usually take around 4 or 5 menus to add a single track...

Nomad Zen vs. Apple iPod vs. Toshiba Mobilphile

[The Evil Twin]

Seems no one has noticed that the Toshiba Mobilphile (what used to be known as the gigabeat in Japan) is now available.

http://www.toshiba.com/tacp/portable/current/MEG 50 AS.html

It's SMALLER than the Zen but bigger than the iPod.
Has an ejectable card instead of haveing to HACK your unit when you want to upgrade.
Though in only comes with a 5gb drive as standard so after selling it on ebay and buying the 20GB drive would run you more.

RUNS LINUX!!! :)

Suposedly lasts 18 hours!

Does not have as good of a S/N ratio as the Zen.

Does not have Firewire (USB 2.0).

Cheaper than either of them (but only 5gb).

This is the player I'll probably get. Longer battery life and the chance to try to hack the Linux OS on the thing! :)

Re:You're obviously an uninformed zealot QWZX

[pbrammer]

• Winamp (Nullsoft)
• Sonique (Lycos)
• iRiver America

They've picked up support for it, or they are going to (documented). But maybe those don't fit your definition of companies.

-Phil

Battery life..

[z_gringo]

It says:

Bring over 8,000 songs (WMA/80kbps) or 5,000 songs (MP3/128kbps) everywhere you go with this cutting-edge compact 20GB player. ,

But then it also says:
"The Zen offers up to 12 hours of continuous playback using the quick-charge battery, and the sleek aluminum body makes carrying your music even more fun."

Forget about how a "sleek aluminum body makes carrying your music even more fun", but 20 GB would offer around 400 hours or so of music. Obviously the batteries cant keep up with that, but enough battery life to listen to more than a tiny fraction of your music would be nice.. I guess this goes back to the whole batteries arent progressing fast enough argument....

Isn't anyone going to point out...

[Baguerra]

... that one of the most appealing aspects of the iPod is the hardware design? Looking at the Zen reminds me a lot of the Nomad MG [nomadworld.com] (which I own). A great player, but the fact that there are buttons on BOTH sides of the unit makes it a huge hassle to hold onto (always pushing buttons by accident). At least the MG has different button layouts on each side -- the Zen has identical button layouts on each side, making the situation even worse. The iPod's wheel and push button method of interacting with the UI is much more intuitive than having to remember two sets of buttons located on the side of the unit, which you can not see while looking at the screen.

I don't own a Macintosh, or any Apple product for that matter, but THIS is the reason why Apple is still around. You can talk about things like Ogg support and the ability to hack a device with custom apps until you are blue in the face. At the end of the day, those things don't sell product, but making thoughtfully and intelligently designed products will.

That said, I do think the Nomad MuVo [nomadworld.com] looks interesting for active MP3 listening (running, snowboarding, etc).