Three Rivals to iPod Nano Strut Their Features

By RACHEL METZ

NEW YORK — It’s easy to understand the appeal of Apple Inc.’s iPod Nano music and video player: It’s slim and simple to use, and it has a crisp 2-inch LCD screen. Its brand name is considered synonymous with hip tech gear.

But what if you want a player that looks di0erent from those wielded by the Nano army, costs less, includes features like an FM radio or voice recorder, and lets you drag and drop songs from your computer desktop instead of going through Apple’s iTunes software? I tried out a handful of options and found three to highlight. All include a bevy of features and support multiple file types including MP3 and Windows Media (WMA) tunes, MPEG4 videos and JPEG photos. These players are not perfect, but it is comforting to know there is multimedia life o0 Apple’s planet.

Iriver Lplayer: Owing to its diminutive hotness and fairly strong performance across the board, iriver’s Lplayer ($100-$130) was my favorite of the bunch.

The sleek device comes with 4 or 8 gigabytes of flash memory storage. Its face consists solely of a 2-inch screen whose sides can be pressed to control the device. The only buttons — for power and volume — are tiny and located discreetly on one side.

The Lplayer’s screen is bright, and photos and videos looked fairly crisp.

My music sounded pretty good on the Lplayer, and while I wouldn’t want to read a novel on the tiny screen, its support for files in the “TXT” text format make it a good place to keep simple notes.

And I liked the clean, uncluttered look of the iriver software and found it fairly easy to use.

Though this device was the fattest of the bunch, being a bit larger than a Zippo lighter meant it was also the easiest to hold in my palm. Its battery can handle 12 hours of music playback and 3 1/2 hours of video playback.

Sansa Fuze: Of the mini-multimedia players I tested, the Sansa Fuze ($80-$130) looks most like the current-generation Nano. But where the Apple device draws you in with a crystal-clear LCD, the Fuze o0ers a subpar, 1.9-inch display.

The Fuze’s screen was plenty bright, but images did not look crisp and were plagued by what looked like slim vertical lines across the face. This made it annoying to view photos and videos.

The Fuze got points for its more traditional set of controls and rubbery-feeling clickwheel, which made it easier to operate than the others. I had no problem scrolling through tunes or the device’s main menu, and could navigate faster than on the other players I tested.

The Fuze also scores with its microSD slot that lets users expand the player’s flash memory capacity. This is important to me, as I tend to swap microSD cards between my cell phone and digital camera and like being able to move photos and MP3s with ease.

Those looking for capacity at a low price will note that the 8- gigabyte Fuze costs less than the 4-gigabyte Nano, which costs $149. Also, the player is rated for up to 24 hours of music playback, and five hours of video playback.

Samsung YP-S3: With its long, slender body and glowing, touch- sensitive LED controls, Samsung’s S3 ($100, due out by early fall) looks oddly like the top half of a flip phone.

Despite that and some other annoyances, the S3 — available with 4 gigabytes in the U.S., though I tested a 2-gigabyte version — proved to be pretty solid.

Most notable is the S3′s crisp, 1.8-inch LCD that is surprisingly good for watching videos or viewing photos.

Listening to music on the device was simple, with lots of equalization options that were easy to manipulate. And when using the player’s digital radio, I enjoyed seeing information like artist names, song titles and the names of stations where I tuned.

Another feature unique to the S3 was the inclusion of several games.

The device’s playback time is rated as essentially comparable to the Nano, with 25 hours of audio and four hours of video.

IPod Nano alternatives

What they are: Samsung’s YP-S3, Sansa’s Fuze and iriver’s Lplayer–small multimedia players for those who want a full- featured option that is cheaper than Apple Inc.’s popular iPod Nano.

What they do: All three devices support file types including MP3 and Windows Media (WMA) tunes, MPEG4 videos and JPEG photos. They also include features like an FM radio and voice recording capabilities.

The bottom line: These players aren’t perfect but at least provide a good starting point in the quest for a less-expensive iPod alternative.

Originally published by RACHEL METZ Associated Press.

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