Apple Lose To Meizu

[Admiral Valdemar]

Impatient Japanese make own video iPod

This iPod wannabe looks like a fan-inspired mock-up – but it’s real, and on sale in Japan this month

Looks like all those mock-ups of a ‘true’ video iPod had the boffins at Japanese firm Meizu so worked up they just couldn’t wait – they created their own!

The Meizu miniPlayer looks like something straight from Apple’s labs, but is, in fact, on sale this month in the Far East, packing all the features we’ve wanted, but Apple has yet to deliver.

Sizing up at a nano-challenging 10mm thin, the pint-sized player packs impressively broad video support, as well as a built in microphone and FM radio.

Most surprisingly, Meizu claims the tiny tunebox keeps going for 20 hours in music mode, and a staggering six while playing video on its 2.4-inch screen.

This is exactly the device we’ve been crying out for from Apple, but it’s a surprise to see the iPod giant beaten at its own game. Can’t wait to see what they come back with in return!

Suck it, Apple fanboys. Although I just invested in a tiny Samsung 2 gig flash player (half the price of the Nano and better battery life + smaller), I will one day get a full media player when they're decent. This is definitely going the right way, at least, until the full touchscreen iPod is released (when they get those flaws ironed out).

[Durandal]

What the hell is the big deal about FM tuners? The whole reason anyone buys a portable music player is to play his own music, not the garbage floating around on FM radio. The fraction of the market that's interested in this feature doesn't justify the expense in adding it.

[Bounty]

What the hell is the big deal about FM tuners? The whole reason anyone buys a portable music player is to play his own music, not the garbage floating around on FM radio. The fraction of the market that's interested in this feature doesn't justify the expense in adding it.

News. That's the only thing I used the tuner on my old player for.

[Admiral Valdemar]

What the hell is the big deal about FM tuners? The whole reason anyone buys a portable music player is to play his own music, not the garbage floating around on FM radio. The fraction of the market that's interested in this feature doesn't justify the expense in adding it.

Fuckin' A! The Samsung model I have has no FM tuner, just a nice little mic for recording. For a little more, I could get a colour screen, image and video player that looked like an iPod (only some unknown brand). I then asked myself why I'd want a smaller capacity, shorter lived battery operated device with a radio, when I wanted a tiny, flash based music player. Besides, commercial radio sucks balls, and the whole point in parting with my cash was, shock horror, so I could listen to my music away from the PC.

I'm amazed some critics rate players without FM tuners lower (or ones without colour screens, because, y'know, the Nano is just so great for looking at picture albums).

[Mr Bean]

What the hell is the big deal about FM tuners? The whole reason anyone buys a portable music player is to play his own music, not the garbage floating around on FM radio. The fraction of the market that's interested in this feature doesn't justify the expense in adding it.

Three,
1. Traffic reports, if you used your mp3 player constantly in some places it's useful to be able to tune into the local stations and find out how things are going.
2. Acutal good FM stations(IE NPR) to listen too between audiobooks and music.
3. The feature acutaly costs less than a dime to inculd and gives you a marketing bullet above the competition.

[Archaic`]

As far as Japan is concerned, you've also got a fairly significant number of radio shows and radio drama's that would be targeted directly towards the same kinds of people who'd be likely to buy this kind of product.

[Faram]

My Ipod Nano has radio, but I had to buy a remote to activate it, and it works just fine.