[MadDog]

What is your preference? As for me I would choose the Creative Zen as the most underrated one. Based on the blind testings with few of my friends and my wife who's a pianist, in some instance Zen was preferred even over Kenwood MediaKeg for being more natural and clear. Admittedly Kenwood was rated as being more colorful/elegant/musical but on a negative side may exhibit a tiny bit of artificial amplication (?).

So many people are choosing the Ipod for what reason? I believe it has a lot to do with the cost-capacity factor. Whopping 80GB/160GB could be a major deciding factor. I for one would defnitely prefer the bigger size players to carry all my music collection on the go. If the SQ remains simliar among all these players, the looks and bigger capacity could be a major vantage point.

If I am a product marketing manager for these MP3 player corporations, I would drop the promotion of these tiny flash players and concentrate in making bigger capacity players which would defintely sell. Just imagine, your favorite Sony and Cowon players come in 60GB or bigger size. Wouldn't you go crazy over it? Feelig sense of incompleteness holding all these small size players (2GB, 4GB, 8GB...)?

 

[ceres]

Lot of people, especially those buying retail offline pos, don´t want to spend more than 99 USD, EUR. Hence there will always be a market for such players. Also, the way music is "consumed" these days makes 2-8GB players absolutely sufficient for the majority.
I don´t think there is a major brand dap that is getting undue attention or heat around here. Whenever a new iPod is released there is lots of talk bc it´s so popular. Part of that popularity is certainly deserved but imo Apple has grown complacent over the yrs. which should allow certain competing manufacturers to make small inroads here and their and yes looks are important when making the buying decision

 

[Aevum]

overrated : Kenwood media keg, Stand alone ipods, anything by archos,

under rated : Sony NW-HD6,

 

[DominicKarma]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aevum /img/forum/go_quote.gif under rated : Sony NW-HD6,

It must be really very underrated.... I've never ever ever heard of the NW-HD6 Aevum, what is it? (link request)

 

[Exapno]

Perhaps you mean the HD5? I have the HD5H and it's a great player.

 

[abitdeef]

Ipod touch SQ is underated, sounds as good as 5g- 5.5g ipod which are pretty well reguarded. I have to agree kenwood media keg is overrated because the sound is matched or overtaken (imho) by cheaper alternatives. I am talking about unprocessed sound here - no EQ. We all pretty much know apple's software eq algorithms suck.

Maybe cowon is just a teeny bit overated, but they are kind of niche stuff. I do feel theat sony is doing a good job lately and if they keep releasing new and bigger capacity units, they have a chance to steal some of apples thunder. Samsung and iriver are missing the boat (imho) with their daps low capacity. If a units going to support video I would like to see a minimum of 16 gigs. I also agree the zen is underated, you have a decent unit with a lot of memory for a low price, I'm not a fan, but hey

I also think the classic is a little underated, I think it sounds good and you can get one on amazon for 237.99. Not bad for an 80 gig unit, that has decent looks and pretty good build quality and LO. If only rockbox was possible.