iAudio X5

Akula

Hi guys,

just curious, hearing a lot about iAudio X5 from Cowon. Whats so special about it? Versus say an Iriver h320, which seems to have almost everything it has.

pauln

Well I'm going to be slightly biased having just pre-ordered the 30Gb X5L, its features are great, FLAC support, line in & FM tuner recording, USB OTG etc. One possible downside is no Id3 tag database searching, but i can live without it.

I can't say I know alot about the Iriver, but I looked at all and decided on the X5 in the end.
The best info i can give is go to iaudiophile.net and read the X5 forum, everything you could want to know is there.

There is a review there that will give you a good overview.

I cant wait for it to arrive, 2 weeks more I hope. If you have some specific questions after going through that lot post them up and i'll try to help as best I can.

cormie

I'm pretty sure the X5 is the best. The only concerns I have will be the price and the "additional" accessories available for it, I just hope they don't charge ridiculous amounts and leave the player package bare.

As far as I know, the H3XX series from iRiver has a better screen, but that's about it, I think it's the resolution that's better, I'm not too sure.

iRiver should put more effort into their firmware and implement the basics like otf playlists. Hopefully this will give them a kick up the arse in the right direction and we will see the perfect MP3 player in a year or so. With perpendicular hard drives coming soon (10x more storage on the same sized HD) we will see great boundaries being pushed.

Compare the 2 devices anyway. The iRiver is definitely not one to be frowned upon, it's just the Cowan has more features etc, not that much more but enough to make it better. Wheter the extra features are worth the extra money is entirely up to you.

There is a massive thread here comparing the two. I advise you read it fully as it's an expensive purchase.

Edit: The one major flaw I see is the way the earphone socket is at the side and not on top. Maybe this wont be a problem and I'm just used to having it on top. Maybe it would be a problem though.

pauln

Ya the placement of the headphone socket on the top left side is strange alright, i think it's because the remote control/displaly has a 90 degree connector. Once your headphones have the same it should be ok and if that's all I find to complain about (with the ID3 thing) I'll be very happy considering the Iriver users are still trying the get firmware realeased to fix bugs long after release.
Iaudio are on their 4th firmware release (2.04) already and it's not even out here. I don't see that as a bad thing either, those guys are just constantly tweaking/improving/fixing things to make the player better.

That's one thing that's annoying, the lack of addons in the package. You get the bare minimum needed. The remote dispay/control and a cradle will available but at extra cost.

The Irivers screen is bigger alright but the X5 has a higher frame rate, so video appears smoother.

pauln

For those interested the first extensive English X5 review has been completed and can be read here.

Summary: It kicks ass :cool:

comet

pauln wrote:

That's one thing that's annoying, the lack of addons in the package. You get the bare minimum needed. The remote dispay/control and a cradle will available but at extra cost.

Well thats no different from the iRiver, they originally were selling it with the option of cradle, remote etc. but they have now discontinued that now. Plus it seems impossible to get the colour LCD H300 remote for the iRiver, it seems to be only available in Korea.

cormie

if your willing to pay about €60 for the lcd remote you can get it off Jeff at misticriver.net. He gets a few every now and then.

Let us know how you get on with your iAudio anyway:)

Scubadevils

Amazon.de have all the iAudio listed.

http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/ref=sr_sp_go_qs/028-6083551-1904526

pauln

Nice prices but I don't think they'll ship to Ireland.

Scubadevils

Yeah, probably not. Although, would they care where its going if the shipping etc is being paid?

pauln

I tried ordering from them already and I did a rough translation, basically they wouldn't even give the option to ship to Ireland.

Scubadevils

suppose given we have the .co.uk one to buy from.

comet

The iAudio x5 manual, handy to check up what features it has etc.

http://rapidshare.de/files/1908250/iAUDIOX5_English.pdf.html

click "Free" and then wait 60 seconds

pauln

Thanks Comet, great find.

comet

The more I read about the x5 the better it sounds, i'd love to get my hands on the 60Gig one, if only it was cheaper...

cormie

60GB! YUM!! I'd love it too, I'm holding out for rockbox on my H140 though, should kick ass. I just can't wait till we see portable mp3 players with about 300GB storage!

comet

cormie wrote:

60GB! YUM!! I'd love it too, I'm holding out for rockbox on my H140 though, should kick ass. I just can't wait till we see portable mp3 players with about 300GB storage!

300GB player! I'd have to approach the bank manager about an mp3 player mortgage to afford that!!
Maybe they could give a few of these mp3 players to us on boards to road test them and write reviews on them

cormie

Damn straight, I'd say I've made iRiver a good few sales by recommending them here.. Cowan is catching up too!

klingklang

About to get a mate in NYC to order a x5 as it looks like COWON America won't accept international credit cards.

One question re. its AC adaptor - can I use that here with a travel plug adaptor or do I need a different transformer?

Thanks in advance.

Kingp35

One question to you guys? What actually makes the iausio better than the iriver?

Nobody has said why yet just opinionated things. what features does it have that the iriver doesnt etc.?

Thanks

comet

cormie wrote:

Damn straight, I'd say I've made iRiver a good few sales by recommending them here.. Cowan is catching up too!

A lot of people think you work for iRiver!! they'll probably think you've moved to Cowon now if you start recommending that

klingklang wrote:

One question re. its AC adaptor - can I use that here with a travel plug adaptor or do I need a different transformer?

I'm not certain but usually thats all you'll need for a product like this all you'll need is the travel plug

Kingp35 wrote:

One question to you guys? What actually makes the iausio better than the iriver?

Nobody has said why yet just opinionated things. what features does it have that the iriver doesnt etc.?

Thanks

I don't think its out and out better than the iRiver. Some people think iRiver is better. The x5 is smaller and looks a bit cooler. Its got a tougher case than the iRiver apparently. Its file scrolling seems better, speeds up the longer you have the button pressed. That little joystick thing seems to be really easy to use and better than the buttons on the H3xx. The screen is smaller and lower resolution though than the iriver but has a higher video frame rate. You can schedule radio recordings, something you can't do right now on iRiver. They say Cowon provide better support in terms of firmware upgrades. Apparently the H320 US version has been discontinued, replaced by the H10. Neither of them will allow you look at photos and play music at the same time, something which you can do on a photo ipod. The x5 supports FLAC playback, iriver doesn't. Theres probably more important things i've missed.

As far as I can see there isn't a whole lot in it really but the x5 does seem a bit cooler and just slightly more rounded feature wise.

cormie

A lot of people think you work for iRiver!! they'll probably think you've moved to Cowon now if you start recommending that

Tell me about it :rolleyes: I was simply trying to point people in the direction of a better/cheaper player. A simple good deed


iAudio also has on the fly playlists, true shuffle and fixes some other things that bug iRiver users.

I must say, my bud has a Karma and the gapless is really nice, if you change a song instead of it stopping and starting it just fades in. Really nice.

comet

Well some people just want to hear "Yes the ipod is the best player, you should buy it" say anything else and they'll suspect you're up to something :rolleyes:

Kingp35

comet wrote:

Well some people just want to hear "Yes the ipod is the best player, you should buy it" say anything else and they'll suspect you're up to something :rolleyes:

i think we all agree there is no way in hell the ipod is the best!!

Damn I just bought my iriver player yesterday I didnt know about the iaudio. Seems like its slightly better than the iriver but the iriver still is a top player.
Prob would have gone for iaudio if I had known about. ah well nothing I can do now

Kevin_rc_ie

from my understandings you'll only need a plug adaptor. and in theory, could swap the american plug for a irish plug if your handy like that.

cormie

You could also buy a new adaptor with the correct polarities and amp and all that jazz.

comet

Something else i thought of
iRivers USB-OTG is USB 1.1, the x5's is USB 2.0 which is a hell of a lot faster than 1.1

cormie

Didn't know that. That's very nice. So if you want to take "photo albums" off your friends iRiver or anything it would be a hell of a lot faster. Do you know how compatible it is with other devices such as iPods etc?

Creamy Goodness

cormie wrote:

Didn't know that. That's very nice. So if you want to take "photo albums" off your friends iRiver or anything it would be a hell of a lot faster. Do you know how compatible it is with other devices such as iPods etc?

if you're taking photos off an iriver wouldn't it still only work as 1.1 as the iriver is a usb1.1 device when it comes to OTG (i'm assuming OTG means on the go)?

cormie

hmmm...

No, I don't think so.. if you were taking photos from the iRiver, well wouldn't you then use the iRiver usb2.0 port that you would usually connect up to the PC... I'm certain you would, even if you were taking files off a H140, it would be usb2.0 to the cowan 2.0 host device. OTG is on the go yep!! If someone could confirm this please. Be verryyyy interesting.

comet

Yeah well if you were taking photos/music off the iriver you wouldn't be using the irivers usb otg you would be using the x5s USB OTG port so you could connect it to the iRivers USB 2.0 and transfer at that speed, yeah it makes sense. USB OTG works with any USB mass storage device, unfortunately Canon cameras tend to need drivers so they won't connect straight to your player, a lot of other cameras do, you can always just use a card reader. In terms of connecting up to an iPod, I'm not sure but I would guess no as that has to have drivers to work with a PC doesn't it? so if thats the case then you can't use it with a USB OTG player.

cormie

Hmmm... well what would be a selling point for me is being able to connect an external hard drive (which don't need drivers) say a 300GB hard drive and be able to play the files using the X5 and not have to copy the files to play. That would just kick ass.

Scubadevils

One of these is waiting in my office for me, arrived today. Will play with it tomorrow and give some feedback

cormie

Lucky you!! Let me know how Suzanne sounds on it:D

Creamy Goodness

Felixdhc wrote:

One of these is waiting in my office for me, arrived today. Will play with it tomorrow and give some feedback

sweet can't wait to see what you think of it, any chance of some pictures too?

Scubadevils

Sure will, will be one of the first transfers
Along with some techno, trance, house, rock, metal....need to get a feel for its all round abilities!

Scubadevils

Yeah, no probs, will take some pics of it.

Its typical, was out of the office this afternoon and got a call to say it had arrived. Was tempted to drive back out but would have taken an hour in heavy traffic so somehow had to contain myself till the morning!

Creamy Goodness

one thing with the pictures could you place another everyday object in the picture so we can get an idea of size, that would be brilliant.

i'm seriously thinking of purchasing one of these betsy's.

Scubadevils

I'll picture it with a pack of smokes and a lighter, that should give an idea of size.

Scubadevils

Until I add my own pics, found this site this evening with some good shots.

http://www.dapreview.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=138&page=1

Attached one shot comparing size against iPod & Rio Karma.

Feels like Christmas Eve as a child tonight, don't know if I will be able to sleep tonight

cormie

It's a nice one alright! Tell me if it says Color Sound on the one you get though! The Karma is a nice lil thing, I had a go of my friends and it's got some nice features, like gapless. Very nice when changing songs.

Creamy Goodness

yeh i saw that color sound writing on it, me don't like one bit.

comet

nice pictures here too

http://www.akihabaranews.com/en/revue_48.html

I'd be interested to know how good the connection between the player and the subpack is. Apparently theres no kind of locking mechanism, it's just a friction hold so it could easily fall out, which would be bad if you wanted to record a gig or something.

Scubadevils

Too tired to say much now but here are my first thoughts :rolleyes:

Its a great player, sound is amazing, actually beats my Rio Karma in that dept. Build quality is great, really sturdy and well built.

Although, as it does not support ID3 tags I have spent the night sorting my music into files for easy management on the player (a horrible task).

To answer your questions, yes, it says "Color Sound" on it - believe me, it will not bother you if you get your hands on one.

The subpack is losely connected and I guess could be an issue if out somewhere recording. Although there is a built in mic too.

All in all so far I LOVE this player. I think I can safely say its the best toy I have ever got my paws on (then again its only been a day!)

Feck, pics I took are too big file size. Will take more tomorrow lo res and post.

JetAudio Screenshot.JPG:
File Too Large. Limit for this filetype is 490.6 KB. Your file is 1.74 MB. :mad:

cormie

cool, get tagscanner, it can sort mp3s into folders by the tags:)

Scubadevils

cormie wrote:

cool, get tagscanner, it can sort mp3s into folders by the tags:)

Must get that, serious pain trying to rename all my music!

Some pics.

cormie

Cool, now have you got an external hard drive with mp3s that you could test out hooking up to the USB OTG and seeing if you can play MP3s from it without copying them please:)

Scubadevils

no, no external drive with mp3s! Do have one but in work. On hols now for two weeks so wont be able to answer that for a while!
Don't know if it will work though because I hooked up a digital camera and to view the pics I had to copy and paste, although I might have been doing something wrong

That tagscanner is great, thanks for the tip!

The X5 really is the dogs. The more I use it the more I really cant believe how good it is. The sound is just amazing and it is so easy to navigate. I thought that the file storing would annoy me after the Karma system but I actually prefer it now. Its handy being able to file different genres or by artist etc. I have a folder for DJ mixes and then sub folders for the genres. Then all artists arranged in different alphabetical folders.

Creamy Goodness

they are great pictures.

i'm seriously thinking of selling my h140 now.

Scubadevils

Just resized some more pics.

Creamy Goodness

what version of the x5 is this is it the L version with the long battery life or just normal?