Creative unveils its iPod alternative - better screen & battery

December 11, 2005

Creative
Technology, a well known and respected company for high end
consumer sound cards has unveiled their latest addition to the Zen Vision
series, the Zen Vision: M. This one is designed to compete against the
Apple iPod with some features not available on the video compatible
iPod.

The player claims to have a colour display with 4 times the colour capability and about twice the battery runtime for video of the 30GB iPod. It features a 320 x 240, 252,144 colour 2.5" display, 30GB HD, support for MP3, WAV and WMA (PlaysForSure) audio and MPEG 2 & 4, MJPEG, WMV9, XviD and DivX 4 & 5 video playback. It has a battery runtime of 4 hours for video and 14 hours for audio. It has the same length & width of the iPod, but 0.2" thicker.

For those on the move, it features an FM radio with recording capability, Microsoft Outlook synchronisation for contacts, calendars and to-do lists and a built-in Microphone for dictation. The player is expected to begin shipping later this month with a retail price of $329.99.

The 30GB Zen Vision: M, which the company said it designed to give Apple's iPod some creative competition, offers a number of features including MP3 and video player, photo viewer and FM tuner.

"We designed the Zen Vision: M to display four times the color of the 30GB iPod that plays video, and to provide twice the battery life for video playback," said Sim Wong Hoo, Creative's CEO, in a statement.

The Vision: M, which includes a vertical touch pad, boasts a 2.5-inch high-res 262,144 color LCD display. The device weighs about five ounces and measures in at 4.1" x 2.4" x 0.7".

In terms of multimedia, the Vision: M PMP offers video, MP3 and photo capabilities. It also has plenty of memory for storing thousands of photos, up to 15,000 songs or 120 hours of video.

While the Zen Vision: M may have more features than the
iPod video, unfortunately it lacks iTunes support due to Apple's refusal to license
out its DRM. Despite Napster, Yahoo and several other services
offering unlimited download subscription services, so far these had very little
success in competing against iTunes. Then again, as Apple has most of the
market covered when it comes to its iPod players and music download service, it is very difficult for a competitor to compete unless they can offer a successful combination of both.

Source: PC Magazine