This player definitely isn’t for the movie buff regardless of what Philips says – the Cowon S9, iPod Touch, iPod Classic, Samsung P3 and D2 all have much better screens. With music, the player needs more juice and this was the only player where the amp volume was nearly 12 o’clock before we got the same volume level out of the Grados. The slight background hiss audible in ~Trampled Rose~ was less prominent – this is something I didn’t notice with the Apple players – kudos to Philips here; though to be honest some are of the opinion that the album recording has a barely noticeable (but audible with high-end equipment) hiss. Rock music sounds decent but with blues and such it isn’t as emotive, perhaps this could be perceived as being more neutral but we found a couple of instances where some of the finer details during vocal pieces were missing so we as disinclined to say this. Treble is pretty detailed with good nuances as well as good extension, sans sibilance. The price would be the decider and at Rs. 7,999 the GoGear Opus is a little pricey for the features and performance. Moreover, it’s not exactly compact.
Pros:
Cons:
Apacer AU824 | |
| Compact and affordable | |
Apple iPod Classic | |
| Size matters | |
Apple iPod Nano | |
| Diminutive powerhouse | |
Cowon D2 Plus | |
| The chunky wonder | |
Cowon iAudio 7 | |
| Pocketful of sound | |
Cowon S9 | |
| Jack of all trades | |
iPod Touch | |
| The apple of our eye | |
Philips GoGear Aria | |
| No use hanging around this aria | |
Philips GoGear Opus | |
| Not major league material | |
Samsung YP-P3 | |
| Oh boy! Was our reaction | |
Samsung YP-Q2 | |
| Affordable for sure, but we expected more |