This week, Donald will just not_shut_up already, so Jasmine tries to impose a word cap on his ramblings (it fails). Items that are babbled upon include the overly bass-heavy Dr. Dre Beats Solo headphones, a potential Zii war between Nintendo and Creative, an itty-bitty $9 MP3 player, and a potential HD video player from Cowon. Also, Donald shoots Jasmine with lasers, and we drool over an ultraquiet vacuum with a built in iPod speaker.
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The Creative Zii Egg is officially announced, and Jasmine is very confused about the whole thing. Donald's muted attempts to offer clarity are unsuccessful. Also, the MP3 Insiders have caught wind of the potential new S-Series Walkman and are none-too-taken with the Disney design leanings. Plus, a dead-simple (and ugly) new MP3 player from Archos draws scorn, and Donald and Jasmine respond to criticism about talking about Apple too much...and then proceed to dedicate the last third of the show to iPhone apps and the potential for cameras on the iPod.
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The Creative Zii EGG in all its Android-loving glory.
(Credit: Zii.com)We knew Creative was up to something when that Zii Egg FCC application flew past us earlier this month, but we had no idea it would be this awesome, or this confusing. Turns out the Zii Egg (what an unfortunate name) is a multitouch-wielding, HD video-playing, dual-camera-having (front and back) rival to the iPhone and iPod Touch, running on Google's Android OS (see all the official specs over at Zii.net).
You can grab a 32GB model now for $400, but don't expect it to be fully baked. Creative is announcing this as a "developer edition" in the hopes that the Android community will pick up the platform and run with it. I guess it takes a village to beat an iPhone.
Adding to the confusion is the fact that we may never actually see the Zii Egg released to consumers as an official Creative product. The company is looking to sell rebranded Zii Eggs directly to other manufacturers as an OEM product.
For a company that's been trickling out half-hearted products all year, it seems odd that Creative would make something with such unprecedented appeal, only to lob it to open-source developers and slap someone else's name on it. Then again, maybe it's smart enough to know it has made a product that's potential is beyond Creative's capabilities to execute. If this thing ultimately becomes a phone (all the ingredients are there) Creative is likely just being cautious about entering the mobile phone market as a newcomer.
(Via DAP Review)
Jasmine and Donald bring the Sony X-Series Walkman into the studio for some hands-on analysis. Creative shows signs of life with an FCC filing for a new touch screen portable media player. Apple laughs all the way to the bank.
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Meet the backs of the Creative Zii and the developer-edition Zii Egg.
(Credit: FCC)A filing with the FCC offers some evidence that Creative has a new touch-screen portable media player in the works. Named after the system-on-a-chip processor Creative showed off during CES 2009, the Zii (and the developer-only Zii EGG) include music and video playback capabilities, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, and an HD camera on the back.
Little else about the player is revealed in the FCC filing, but it's pretty easy to connect the dots and see that Creative is playing catchup with Apple's iPod Touch. Creative is no stranger to playing second fiddle to Apple, but the company has no precedent when it comes to working with developers to create mobile applications (as the developer-edition Zii EGG model suggests).
Some speculate that the Zii will run on Google's Android OS, taking advantage of an established developer community. If so, Android seems to be iPod-killer OS of choice these days, as Sony has also announced plans to use Android in future versions of their Walkman line.
(Via EpiZENter)
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Donald Bell is an electronic musician, a veteran record store employee, and a fearless hardware hacker. He's also CNET's Senior Editor for MP3 and digital audio.
Jasmine France is CNET's resident digital audio doyenne, writing and editing product reviews, crave blogs, and feature stories on all things MP3. And if you need advice on headphones, she's your girl.
