Reviewing iRiver's New Player

It's not often that a new MP3 player makes an impression on me. Most companies seem to be playing catch-up to the iPod rather than finding ways to innovate on design. However, when I saw iRiver's U10 at CES, I was pretty impressed.

The $250 1GB U10 is a multimedia device that plays music and also displays photos and MPEG-4 video (there's also a 512MB version for $200, but that's almost useless for video). It features a decent-sized 2.2-inch screen that covers just about the entire 2.7-by-1.8-inch face. But what's really cool is the tilt-sensor control system: You navigate the device by pressing the edges of the screen. It's really quite intuitive.

Our sister site PCWorld.com now has a review of the U10. According to the reviewer, the display is bright, audio quality is good, and the unit is supersmall and light. However, he also criticizes the price, the lack of bundled software, and the 15fps video frame rate (although he does say video is fairly watchable considering). So if you're thinking about breaking out of Apple's grip, check out the piece here.

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