It's high time companies shed their largely egotistic attitude, in the name of competition, which I feel has ceased to make any sense at all. What’s all this proprietary bull about? How about getting together and deciding what’s good and what’s not, arriving at a consensus for a standard, and sticking to it? What’s happening instead is that everyone wants to be exclusive.
There are very few PMPs in the market that allow drag-and-drop for videos. In all probability you will end up hating the conversion software bundled with the player. Apple’s iTunes is a classic example. But all’s not lost yet... let's look at some players that still believe in the good old drag-and-drop feature.
Cowon
Cowon has perhaps been a victim of its own wait-and-watch policy. Elsewhere it may have made a mark, but in India the company is still testing the waters. No matter what the company spokespersons say to try and convince us, we know Cowon has a lot of ground to cover.
All video players from Cowon support drag-and-drop for all content types, so you can pretty much pick whatever you like from the assembly line. That leaves you with the leisure to make some important choices... such as screen size, playback features etc.
There’s the flash-based D2, and the big-screen A2 that obviously has more up its sleeve. While the D2 comes with a 2.5 inch, 24-bit QVGA (320x240) TFT LCD touchscreen, the A2 is equipped with a 4-inch screen (480x272 pixels) that's a 16:9 wide TFT LCD.
Both the players could play anything we threw at them, so apart from watching the movies; you can also get rid of conversion issues and suchlike. You can watch movies, listen to music and FM radio, and browse photos with ease. TV options are available in both, while the A2 also allows you to capture from the TV. The D2 costs Rs 10,000 (4GB) and Rs 13,000 (8GB), while the A2 (30GB) costs Rs 20,000.
aigo E868 PMP
This is another lesser-known name, but as is the way with things it’s these anonymous brands that offer what you really need. Don't tell us you're still swearing by the big names? Tsk tsk.
aigo is a big name outside India, however, and very soon may become a force to reckon with here as well. The E868 comes with a 2.5 inch 16 million color LTPS display, and supports AVI (DivX), VOB, DAT, MPG, MPEG, MP4, MP3, WMA, and OGG (phew!) What more could you possibly want?
This player also offers an AV-out option (RCA AV cables provided), and you can change the TV standard from PAL60 to PAL or NTSC. Like the D2, this is also flash-based, comes with a good music player, and reads TXT files too. With 2GB of internal memory, and an option to extend memory further, and with a price of Rs 9,000, it’s a steal.
Archos 605 Wi-Fi
Researching for this article would be enough to piss anyone off, simply because there aren’t enough options for us Indians. As it turned out, there were only two players worth talking about in this section. This one comes in through the backdoor.
Drag-and-drop isn't supported, BUT an optional software plugin (paid of course) does the needful. The cinema plugin can be bought from the official Archos website for an additional 2K or so. The player supports MPEG-4(4) (ASP@L5 AVI, up to DVD resolution), WMV (MP@ML, up to DVD resolution); with the plugin you also get MPEG-2 MP@ML up to 10 Mbps (up to DVD resolution) and AC3 stereo sound.
The storage capacity is 30GB and the screen size is 4.3 inches (800x480 pixels). Apart from the capability to watch movies and listen to music, the player also comes with a PDF viewer and Wi-Fi. It's available only in the gray market as of now, and costs Rs 14,500 for the 30GB version.
If you can think of any devices that you feel deserve a mention here, please leave a comment.
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