The perils of being an early adopter

• Ok, so waaay back in time (imagine Robert Bradley's Blackwater Surprise singing that), I bought an Archos Jukebox 6000. I said to myself, its the early 2000's (I think it was 2001 already), I have a new job, and some disposable income. I also have a computer filled with music in this odd little file format called ".mp3." I want to listen to it everywhere, CDs are the past man! I went to Best Buy (now universally panned as Worst Buy), and spent probably 200 dollars. At the time, it was yes a lot of money, but there were basically no other comparable models out that could match the behemoth that was 6GB of music. Well....it was a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad heavy brick. It worked fine for 6 months or so, and then it had trouble booting. I suspected the HD died, I tried changing the batteries (a cumbersome process) and to no avail, it just wouldn't wake up. By "worked fine," I mean it had a horrible interface, and sickly green backlight (only when you pushed a button), an a analog volume control! My biggest gripe was the lack of a shuffle amongst folders...they essentially could never write software that could do such magic.
  

• Fast forward a few years, and after perusing lots and lots of reviews, I have embraced a South Korean firm (after my bad lot with the French). I bought a 1GB I5 (see image at right). I loved it! The sound was amazing, the interface easy, it had a great radio, much better battery life (replaceable AAAs). Heaven! But.......I should have learned. Once again, I hit the wall of death. This time it was a dead circuitboard, lasted me a full year+! Out of warranty now, I was forced to think again.

• Its now Fall 2007. I'm thinking again (dangerous, yes!). I still want to avoid the HD based players (based on the 6k's faults), and I love the flash memory, but its pretty small in capacity terms. Should I abandon the brand loyalty? Well, I'm a sucker for smooth looking devices. So I bought another Cowon product. The I7 and wow is it attractive. Comes in a 6GB red flavor, with again wonderful sound, great radio, 60h life on a lithium battery, and a "innovative interface." Blah, blah, the verdict is again, that I love it. Drawbacks off the top of my head are these:
1. The "swing touch" is great when its in your hand, but is waaaay too sensitive in your pocket. Thus you must rely on the hold button, which also turns the device on. It gets too much work, and I've had one break on me already (fixed under warranty, w00t!)
2. I don't really need to watch videos on a screen the size of a postage stamp, so i don't. I like being able to change the screen background though
3. As its flash memory, you're really paying through the nose for the capacity you get. HD-based players are far cheaper in that arena. But I can shake it all I want, drop it on the ground, it still plays. Suck it Apple.
   
4. The radio reception was actually better in my building with the old I5, except in the strange nexus of good cell phone coverage that is Kulpa lab though. Too bad I don't work there.

• Ultimately, its hard to pick a winner these days, when consumer electronics are made to not last long. I could probably resurrect the Jukebox 6k, but I don't need to carry around that much weight, I've already got a baby on my back! Besides, its not like I bought an iPhone. *smirk*
  

• /end