The iPhone has effectively ushered in the age of the touch screen. Ever since Apple’s class-defining phone pushed buttons out of style, every new crop of digital media players, phones, and PDAs includes a fresh batch of touch-enabled models that are marketed as the slickest, most intuitive and capable of the bunch. Hard controls are out, soft controls are in.
But as you might expect, marketing and trends probably don’t tell the whole story. After all, do we really like to paw at unresponsive plastic screens to control our music, dial up friends and schedule our appointments? Judging on sales, plenty do. But not everyone feels quite the same about this new wave in user interfaces, and some would prefer to savor those click-clacking hard controls of yesteryear than move on to the sterile touch-screen. Korean manufacturer iRiver has attempted to tap into that active resistance of tactile-feedback aficionados with one of its latest digital media players, the iRiver Spinn MP4 Player.
Rather than jump to the default touch-screen setup, iRiver engineers spiced up an old standby, the analog control wheel, which they now call Spinn System Technology. (We’ll call it a control wheel, thank you.) Perched in a corner position where it can be flicked around by the thumb, the control wheel includes your basic right and left scrolling, and also has a button on top for making selections on soft menus.
Groundbreaking, it may not be, but combined with the rest of the player’s Spartan exterior, it certainly makes a statement. The company seems to have omitted almost all other exterior controls on the Spinn, putting faith in a menu system that should be navigable with the basic functions provided by the wheel. As a reward for this omission, the Spinn gets a generous 3.2-inch LCD screen with 480×272 pixel resolution that dominates the rest of the player.
Fortunately, a clever user-interface and big screen aren’t all the Spinn has going for it. iRiver has a reputation for outfitting its players with plenty of bells and whistles, and the Spinn is no exception. Besides video (which should be very watchable given the size of its screen), it can handle audio, photos, and text. There’s also an e-dictionary, FM tuner, built-in microphone for recording, and it’s Bluetooth 2.0 compatible for use with wireless headphones.
When the Spinn makes its Korean launch in May, it will come in 4GB, 8GB and 16GB capacities, as well as color choices of either white or silver. According to online sources, silver will likely remain a premium color reserved for the 16GB model, while both lower models will end up in white. However, we don’t yet know whether this player will make it out of Asian markets, or what it will cost. So for those of you who chafe at the suggestion of pushing animated buttons on a hard, flat screen, keep your eyes peeled and your fingers crossed for something a little more satisfying to touch coming from iRiver.
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