More Details on the Cowon S9
Not all details were known about the S9 when it was first discovered on Cowon's site, but the full specs are now out on what seems to be one of the new big things this year.
We already knew the player has a 3.3" AMOLED screen with a resolution of 272x480. AMOLED screens are capable of lighting themselves and does not require backlighting like LCD screens. The Bluetooth support is listed as A2DP and AVRCP compatible which means audio streaming and remote controlling, and no support for headset mode or file transfer is listed. The interface will auto rotate as you turn the player and be flash, so hopefully that means it's skinable right out of the box. With a 500 MHz dual core CPU it should hopefully be rather quick. It comes with 9 EQ presets and like other Cowon players it does both Ogg Vorbis and FLAC. Size wise it will be 57.08 x 105.75 x 12.7 mm
It's the video aspect of the S9 that will disappoint many people. It only plays at the screens native resolution, which is rubbish in my opinion. This is most likely to make sure such players as the O2 have a market as well, but in doing so they limited a player which could be the new big hit and native Xvid support without resolution limits would definitely help towards that. It does do WMV and AVI (prob Xvid) like the D2 and h.264 has been added as a third supported video format. This means better quality per megabyte of data, and it might mean it will play back PSP formatted video. Don't get your hopes up however as h.264 compatible portable players tend to be extremely picky on what they will play back. The video support will do the job, but it could have been soooo much better - especially since the player has TV out, a feature that was barely a novelty on the D2.
Lastly, the capacity. A lot of people have been pointing out that this thing doesn't have memory expansion, something that's become a must have after the reign of the D2. With capacities up to 16GB at release and 32GB later, it isn't ever capable of reaching the D2's 48GB combined storage space. Not to mention the 32GB version will most likely be rather expensive, maybe more than people are willing to pay. So the question that remains is this, will you still want one after seeing the limitations?If so, it will be out in October.
Comments
None on August 31, 2008 11:36 AM
Why would you need a headset? "audio streaming" is enough for headphones.
Greetings!
Tirim4 on August 31, 2008 11:43 AM
But for all of us that doesnt have 100 gb of lossles audio and don't use our players as portable harddrives for watching films on TV this player looks great!
Devon on August 31, 2008 11:54 AM
If it has a 32GB version I will be buying this, otherwise I will not. You can get 32GB thumbdrives for around ~$100 (about $50 more than 16GB) so I think they could include it and it not costing too much more.
Xenodius on August 31, 2008 11:59 AM
Sounds like the d2 still is the king, at least for me...
nywytboy68 on August 31, 2008 1:56 PM
Quote: "So the question that remains is this, will you still want one after seeing the limitations?" the answer is no seeing how Cowon has crippled the device and I'm not going to settle for a watered down media player. It has some nice features and the specs aren't bad but the player isn't worth it. Thanks for the follow up CptnO!!!
ian on August 31, 2008 2:05 PM
Is October the Korean release date or US/Europe date?
ian miller on August 31, 2008 2:09 PM
will it be out in Europe/US in October or Korea
JC on August 31, 2008 3:06 PM
Its resemblance to the iPhone 3G is too embarrassing. I'd get tired of telling people, "No, it's not an iPhone. No, it's not a phone at all. No, it doesn't have any applications. No, you can't surf the internet. No, you can't..."
Anonymous on August 31, 2008 4:59 PM
The iPhone is a black rectangle, this is a black rectangle.
Does Apple have a patent on black rectangles?
I think the outside of the S9 looks better than the iPhone/ iTouch.
Anonymous on August 31, 2008 5:02 PM
The iPhone is a black rectangle, this is a black rectangle. That's where it stops. Comparing this to the iPhone is a insult to Cowon.
Does Apple have a patent on black rectangles?
I think the outside of the S9 looks better than the iPhone or iTouch.
Anonymous on August 31, 2008 5:02 PM
Comparing this to the iPhone is a insult to Cowon.
Andreas Ødegård on August 31, 2008 5:19 PM
@None: A2DP is fully capable of workign as a ehadset, thats not what I meant. "headset mode" refers to the Samsung players which let you take and make calls with your player, connecting it up to the phone in such a way that it pauses the music for incoming calls and let you use the headphones to talk to people.
@Anonymous: We're having trouble with the system that delivers articles and takes care of commenting, hopefully this will be fixed before too long but until then any double post will be taken care of by us. If you get error messages posting, dont post again - refresh and the comment will be there
joe on August 31, 2008 7:50 PM
The cowonglobal version of the page is up, but only the S9 and O2. The German page though gives the O2 details. Here is the most important part: It can handle quarter pel, GMC and b frames now in Xvid, aka MPEG4 ASP something that even the awesome TCPMP could not do (could only handle b frames).
Still, it is a bit of a deal breaker, unless you enjoy re-encoding. At the very least it should take 480x320.
Besides, if you can only support the BP of h264, why bother? It is not worth it to me to encode a BP h264, a ASP Xvid and a SP Xvid encode, with different resolutions.
I just like the fact it has Bluetooth for wireless headphones. But, for now, I got a D2.
The O2 will handle mkv and ogm containers, with vorbis audio, so now my encodes will be source resolution with all of Xvid's features and vorbis audio.
joe on August 31, 2008 8:25 PM
I might also add, to clarify, that h264 BP cannot use b frames, SI and SP frames, and cannot use a CABCAC encode. It can though benefit from the deblocking filter. That latter point is most important.
See http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=658090
Whether or not the CABCAC had a big hand in getting rid of the blocks along with the deblocking filter, I have to check for myself. Sometimes though, it is a moot point for me since at high bit rates Xvid looks fine and has no blocks Limits for bitrate: unknown for the O2, but the S9 has 800kbps for h264, 1.5mbps.
sprockkets on August 31, 2008 10:48 PM
Might also add that via firmware updates and via the techs at Cowon say that the A3 can play h264 with CABCAC and the HP now, but oddly enough still cannot play B frames (!). I think that is a limitation of the TI chip used.
Oh and when I said it should take 480x320 material on the S9, I should have added the word "wish", as in wish it could.
Perhaps like the A3 firmware updates will add later h264 functionality. Cowon is infamous for this. That's why I got the mature D2 :)
N00d13s on September 1, 2008 4:10 AM
i still wish there were more players with wifi, but right now i am probably gonna get this or the iriver spinn.
None on September 1, 2008 6:26 AM
Ahhh....thanks Andreas. Didn't know that...
James Forelo on September 2, 2008 12:55 AM
I'm kind of on the fence for this, because of bluetooth, flash, and h264.
If its price is comparable to the D2, with a superior battery life, I'll pick it up. Otherwise, it wouldn't seem worth it.
Jonathan on September 2, 2008 9:42 PM
Is it just me, but this player looks very similar to the Samsung P2.
dfkt on September 3, 2008 1:02 PM
Is it just me, but the P2 looks very similar to the iPhone. ;)
MFG on September 3, 2008 1:58 PM
Most specs are more than great for me. Nice size, screen, codecs support. I don't even care too much about h264.
It may be awkward having to rip your movies or series to the player's screen size. Even TCPMP in my Palm TX can resize video. Why wouldn't this thing?
But... No Expansion Slot....... That sucks man!
My friend has a D2. He carries his full 16GB always full, and another 3 extra 16GB SD Cards full of music and TV series.
I have always loved the expandability of his player and I consider it very practical.
I guess I've been waiting in vain for a D3, and I'll buy a D2 before they take it out of the market.
lulu on September 3, 2008 11:48 PM
Does anyone have any information on O2's screen resolution and color depth? I tried to find it on the website, but I don't think it's there...
Since it is supposedly an upgrade to the A3, would it be safe to assume that the screen res and color depth have not been downgraded? Hopefully the h.264 playback issues from the A3 have been resolved too.
joe on September 8, 2008 12:28 AM
I agree. TCPMP on my Palm LD or even on WM stuff is awesome. It cannot do qpel or gmc encoded stuff but could handle b frames, ogm content and stuff recorded direct to xvid via my Leadtek winfast xpert tuner card.
Of course, the video quality pales in comparison to the D2 color wise, or my LD is simple biting the dust now, even though the LD has a 480x320 screen.
The O2 is an A2 upgrade. It has a 480x272 LCD screen with 16.7 million colors, but can play every format up to 1280x720 (no mention of h264 profile level though)
Btw, I notice that the D2 can play aac files, even m4a and m4b files I have if you change the extension to aac. Firmware used is 2.57
sprockkets on September 8, 2008 4:46 AM
Wait the last version of TCPMP released could do qpel and gmc.
If Cowon worked with Rockbox or had a community assisted firmware, it would be just like having the gpl TCPMP. That I believe is what made it awesome.
Of course, having a 400mhz and higher ARM processor vs a specialized 200mhz ARM processor in a Telechips package makes a difference, and also who makes the OS.
I still think that the D2 can resize, but it either doesn't work well so they flat out disabled it.
dirtyrotten on September 13, 2008 8:48 AM
Loving this. I don't really care about the video, so playback at native resolution doesnt bother me. The only con I have in looking at the features is the lack of an expansion slot. 32GBs is just not enough. I'm almost at 60GB in my current player and constantly adding stuff. Not videos, all music. I do not want to keep replacing music everytime i need to add more. This is still a beast though.
jess on October 2, 2008 12:24 PM
so does it mean h264 is supported by hardware (some kind of chip) like psp does?
btw, h264 is NOT video format but codec. i wonder which container they will use mp4? or maybe mkv (i highly doubt it)?
aki on October 14, 2008 12:20 PM
anyone knows about the price for a 16 gb version?
and how is the soundquality compared to a D2?
Hanface on December 2, 2008 2:06 AM
Has there been anymore word on the release dates? They're currently saying mid december but they've postponed twice before.
xoxo
Edds on December 2, 2008 6:32 AM
As pretty as it is, I think I'll stick with my D2.
If it had an SDHC slot then I'd buy it just for the looks - if it had a serious improvement on the D2 other than just aesthetics I'd buy it.
But as it is the D2 remains the superior (if a little ugly) option.