TheBadger
01-03-2009, 16:07
For those that haven't seen one..
The Cowon Q5W is a Personal Media Player – That’s like an mp3 player but for Video, Audio, Radio, Web, Flash and Morris Dancing.
It’s a state-of-the-art piece of kit, with an excellent high resolution 5” touch screen display. It’s chock full of codecs and connectivity and features you wouldn’t even dream of…
However…
Don’t buy one! Don’t even think of buying one! Don’t be seduced by the glossy pictures and blootooth interweb browsing USB connecto-matic wireless remote technology….
Because it’s a useless pile of bile.
Here’s ten reasons why:
1) It has a touch screen. Touch screens are great, but what do you touch them with? Your finger would be your first choice surely. But the buttons are so small and fiddly that this is not really an option. Besides, the writing is so small that you have to hold the screen inches from your face to read it. The only thing I can think of is that it's designed to be operated by your nose. A nasally operated touch screen... That's not cool.
2) There are some gadgets with really slick interfaces. The iPhone springs to mind. If you hold it sideways, it switches into landscape mode, for example. The team behind the Q5W interface has put just as much effort into making its interface unwieldy, ugly and ultimately unusable as others do on making their stuff work well.
3) It’s a glorified mp3 player. With 60 gigs of storage. That’s a lot of songs. How would you like them to be organized? By tags? In folders? By genre? Or dumped in a big disorganized heap by default? Guess which option Cowon went for?
4)It doesn’t work properly. The blootooth feature doesn’t recognize other blootooth gadgets. The wifi won’t stay connected. The web browser doesn’t browse very well. It can play flash files only if they are really, really simple, and only in a tiny window, surrounded by reassuringly large buttons that don’t do anything. The radio only works if you plug earphones in, and the aerial… Who knows what that’s for.
5)It gets hot. Properly hot. I think it may be some sort of glove warming feature.
6)It crashes regularly and quite thoroughly. It’s based on Win CE, so you get occasional CE error messages to cheer you up… But on top of this not-so-sound basis is a special application layer that’s as flakey as a teenager’s scalp. Imagine my joy trying to use this to play backing music at a live concert. Good job I had a backup mp3 player already wired in!
7)There’s no manual. It has the quirkiest and most un-user friendly interface and no manual. I’ve had hours of fun trying to figure out how it works – only to discover that it doesn’t.
8)It’s expensive. Actually, as glorified mp3 players go, it’s very expensive.
9)It’s new. So there’s no user base to find out the answers to important questions like; “How can I make it work properly?”
10) It has no conceivable use. I got this one because I wanted an mp3 player with a remote control – not easy to find. What I got is a very expensive glove warmer that may or may not explode next time I plug it in.
Just don’t buy one. It’s that simple.
The Cowon Q5W is a Personal Media Player – That’s like an mp3 player but for Video, Audio, Radio, Web, Flash and Morris Dancing.
It’s a state-of-the-art piece of kit, with an excellent high resolution 5” touch screen display. It’s chock full of codecs and connectivity and features you wouldn’t even dream of…
However…
Don’t buy one! Don’t even think of buying one! Don’t be seduced by the glossy pictures and blootooth interweb browsing USB connecto-matic wireless remote technology….
Because it’s a useless pile of bile.
Here’s ten reasons why:
1) It has a touch screen. Touch screens are great, but what do you touch them with? Your finger would be your first choice surely. But the buttons are so small and fiddly that this is not really an option. Besides, the writing is so small that you have to hold the screen inches from your face to read it. The only thing I can think of is that it's designed to be operated by your nose. A nasally operated touch screen... That's not cool.
2) There are some gadgets with really slick interfaces. The iPhone springs to mind. If you hold it sideways, it switches into landscape mode, for example. The team behind the Q5W interface has put just as much effort into making its interface unwieldy, ugly and ultimately unusable as others do on making their stuff work well.
3) It’s a glorified mp3 player. With 60 gigs of storage. That’s a lot of songs. How would you like them to be organized? By tags? In folders? By genre? Or dumped in a big disorganized heap by default? Guess which option Cowon went for?
4)It doesn’t work properly. The blootooth feature doesn’t recognize other blootooth gadgets. The wifi won’t stay connected. The web browser doesn’t browse very well. It can play flash files only if they are really, really simple, and only in a tiny window, surrounded by reassuringly large buttons that don’t do anything. The radio only works if you plug earphones in, and the aerial… Who knows what that’s for.
5)It gets hot. Properly hot. I think it may be some sort of glove warming feature.
6)It crashes regularly and quite thoroughly. It’s based on Win CE, so you get occasional CE error messages to cheer you up… But on top of this not-so-sound basis is a special application layer that’s as flakey as a teenager’s scalp. Imagine my joy trying to use this to play backing music at a live concert. Good job I had a backup mp3 player already wired in!
7)There’s no manual. It has the quirkiest and most un-user friendly interface and no manual. I’ve had hours of fun trying to figure out how it works – only to discover that it doesn’t.
8)It’s expensive. Actually, as glorified mp3 players go, it’s very expensive.
9)It’s new. So there’s no user base to find out the answers to important questions like; “How can I make it work properly?”
10) It has no conceivable use. I got this one because I wanted an mp3 player with a remote control – not easy to find. What I got is a very expensive glove warmer that may or may not explode next time I plug it in.
Just don’t buy one. It’s that simple.