In my post on MP3 players a few weeks ago, I noted that I'm leaning toward the new Creative Zen instead of the new iPod Nano or Touch models. The good news is that Creative has started shipping the 8GB model that I was strongly considering, but they've lowered the pre-release price of the 16GB model to $249. This is highly intriguing - and if it were shipping, I would already own one.
My employer has provided a Blackberry 8703 for me to use for some time now. While the Blacberry serves as stellar and indispensible email device, it offers no multimedia features (no MP3 or video capabilities) to speak of. (and thus my desire to get the Creative Zen player) But there's a new wrinkle of reports from
But this week, the Blackberry got a VERY positive boost. Sling Media is developing their mobile player to run on the Blackberry OS. Those that aren't familiar with Sling Media or their Sling Box, here's the quick rundown: Sling Box is a small server that connects to your home network. This box is set up next to your TV, and accepts the output from your cable TV, satellite, or Tivo-type devices. The Sling Box is connected to the internet via your home network, so you can access your own TV content anywhere you have an internet connection. That means I can access any of the previously recorded content already on my Tivo, or even change the channel and watch live TV at my leisure whenever I please. The great thing about Sling Box is that there are no service fees to use the device, other than the $100-150 for most of their Boxes. As I see it, the only real issue is that the service wouldn't work well on an airplane since there's no signal up there...
I'll still probably get the Creative Zen player, but I'll definitely watch for the Sling Box once they release the Blackberry compatible version.
2 comments:
I have about 2200 songs in my iTunes collection. I have heard that it is hard to find music for non-iTunes devices. Is that true?
Apple uses the AAC compression format, and the Creative player will play AAC unprotected files. This means that my iPod connection that I ripped to iTunes will work on the Creative player.
Apple is now selling some "unprotected" files from iTunes that could be purchased and work on other players as well. The key is that only certain files from EMI (music label) currently have this ability.
There are other music stores available as well. Rhapsody, Napster, and Yahoo all have offerings as well.
So it's not that difficult if you know where to look.
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