Customer Reviews

Cowon iAUDIO 7 Portable 8 GB MP3 Player (Red)

5 star:		(46)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

First of all I want to state I am no Ipod/Apple fan boy or hater, I am just an engineer that is quite fond of music and tries to get the most out of his hard earned money.

What can I say about the iAudio 7, hmmm
First of all for context, I've had (or someone in my family) an iPod Shuffle, and iPod Video 80Gb, a creative zen video 30Gb, a Sansa 8Gb,a sony Ericsson w800i (it's basically a mp3 player we all know that) and now a Cowon iAudio 7 so I can say I have been around always keeping an open mind, just looking for the best purchase money/features.

The iAudio 7 is a very small flash based device, albeit thick like a sony ericsson phone (believe me it is not bad at all, don't listen to nano owners, thin is not everything) it has quite a fast boot speed and as most flash based players (8gb) it has fast access between songs.
I have been looking thoroughly for my next mp3 player since my iPod video died I took a while and went over most of the mp3 players on the market trying to outsmart the consumer advertising hype and looking for real facts.

I decided to give cowon a chance and after a few solid days this is my opinion
Pros:
Multiple format support, ogg, FLAC (I'm an open source guy this is a must for me) plus all the standard ones
Supports podcasts, DRM music (Haven't actually tried this one out as I don't believe in DRMs I buy the music CD I want and rip the whole thing)
Lite, compact and small yet fells sturdy (as sturdy as a small precision electronic device can be)
Connectivity through mini USB
Radio, customizable radio recording, voice customizable voice recording
Video and photo support (Though it needs conversion for videos, that is a minor thing for me, videos looks great, and let's face it an mp3 player with a screen an inch or so shouldn't be bought to watch videos, you can though and they look great)
Music playback supports lyrics
Text reader
User programmable buttons
Awesome sound quality (Best amongst all PMP I've had)
Decent, above average earphones provided
Interface, needs time to master but is quite accurate and natural (This could go as a Negative feature, depending on the owner, controls are great IMO)
Outstanding battery life (Might be wrong but I feel it outlasts iPod and creative 3-1 in battery life 2-1 at least)
Great and extensive equalizer settings.

Cons:
Device is a fingerprint magnet
Few peripherals and add-ons available (iPod fans)
Thick (Some might say this is a Con, if feel it has adequate dimensions, still depends on the owner, might go either way)
Graphics, it reminds me of the 90's computer games or SNES games, other mp3/video devices have much nicer and impressive graphical interfaces)
Jet Audio is it's "itunes" to put it in a certain way, as much as I like it and it gets the job done great, it is not as flashy as Itunes, just as solid IMO
Videos are a bit uncomfortable to watch in such a screen.

As usual it depends on what you mainly intend to use the device for.
For me it is mainly a flash based, multi-open-format support with good sound and battery life, because this little device handled my needs so well I can't think of any more flaws.

I just tried to be as straight forward with the facts as I could.
If you look for a video player, look elsewhere, hope this review helps
Cheers

Update: Under heat it just goes berserk, the heat kinda activates or messes up the controls and it needs time to cool down. Not good for a tropical country.

Since the early days of 256MB flash mp3 players, I've owned and used plenty of different types of mp3 players before (>20 different types) and I have to say that iAudio mp3 players have, by far, impressed me the most. I was looking for a small, versatile, flash-based mp3 player with superb audio quality and features such as FM radio, voice recording, and line-in recording. Though I don't use the latter two functions often, it is nice to know that the option is there if needed. I was deciding between getting an Apple iPod nano (the 2nd generation: short, stocky, and unbelievably thin with a large screen) or the Cowon iAudio 7. My co-worker has the iPod nano and let me check it out for a day. I flipped through songs, tested the features, and watched videos. It is an impressive unit. However, I had used two different iAudio mp3 players in the past (the iAudio U2 and the iAudio U3) and felt nothing but sheer satisfaction with them. I had found out that Cowon/iAudio had released a new 8GB flash-based mp3 player (a direct competitor with the 8GB flash-based 2nd generation iPod nano) and was automatically drawn to it as the company has released great products in the past.

I took a chance and purchased the iAudio 7. It arrived in the mail a few days later and I tested it out. First, I plugged it in using the included USB cable, and proceeded to fill up all 8GB of capacity with around 1,200 songs (256kbps). I started listening to a few tracks. Then I got disappointed. It took an agonizingly long time to load up, and then each time I switched to a new song, there was a 4 second delay pause. This started to get irritating, and I started to feel remorse towards my purchase. The next day, I looked online for any firmware updates. My firmware version at the time was 1.13, and I had found that a new firmware version 1.15 was available. I downloaded and updated the firmware to my iAudio 7. After it completed the update, I loaded all my songs again (a word of caution, all files will be erased from the iAudio 7 when you update the firmware) and checked it out again. WOW. It was much much MUCH faster. The response time to switch songs, even at random, was instantaneous. Load time to power up the little player was about 2 seconds. The firmware did it! Cowon has made me a true believer. I will never doubt this company's products again. The iAudio 7 is UNTOUCHABLE (no pun intended). Excellent audio quality (the signal-noise ratio is even better than the U3 (far surpassing the iPod), the battery life is amazing (it can last me a week without a recharge), it is loaded with useful features (FM radio, voice recording, line-in recording, FM radio recording, video, etc), and I really like the fact that you don't need proprietary software to upload files to it (whether it be music, video, or whatever). Want to know something else that's cool about this? You can change tempo. Yes, you can increase the speed at which an audio file plays, or slow it down. If you have it, try it. It's a very cool feature (though you probably wouldn't use it much, unless you're trying to analyze the audio).

So overall, my grade for the iAudio 7 is an A. A superb little player. The only shortcoming I see with this player is the touch-sensitive controls. I prefer tactile buttons/controls, and if you slip your fingers or fiddle around with it, you may accidentally go to another track or fast forward or start recording. I'm aware other users have voiced how this is a drawback for getting this player, but everything else more than makes up for it in my opinion.

first, this will run forever it seems. i usually listen to it all day at work, commuting, and at the gym. it only needs to be charged every week or so... pretty impressive.

i'm not an audiophile but sound quality was the most important requirement. i listen to a lot of technical death metal, and i don't want any slop getting in the way when i try to follow a particular instrument. experience with their A2 media player convinced me that cowon might live up to expectations. the iAudio 7 definitely sounds amazing when paired with some bose headphones. still playing around with it, but i really like the 5 band eq with adjustable band frequency and band width.

i do hate drm with a burning passion, so any media player i buy won't saddle me with ANY proprietary encoding or protections. the iAudio acts just like any usb key. wonderful! i only use the software to re-encode movies as all my music resides in a meticulously organized directory structure.

it has plenty of power to give a good signal when plugged into the car stereo, receiver at home, or some quiet comfort 2 headphones.

the swing touch takes a little getting used to. i found it to be over-sensitive out of the box but the sensitivity can be turned down. now i'm used to it and i have no complaints.

i did have it lock up on me once. i think it had to do with a combination of inputs being activated simultaneously. luckily there is a reset button which took care of the problem. no settings were changed after a hard reset, which is good.

the whole device is very configurable... from the music effects and eq, to timers (alarm and sleep), to display, play list behavior, 2 programmable "buttons" (a longer press activates the programmed function)... the list goes on.

it has a small screen, so pictures and movies are not it's strong suit. the screen is beautiful though, i was impressed.

8gb is plenty of space for me, especially because the musical phases i go through never involve that much music at once. if i were going on a long road trip, i'd bring the A2 along. it holds everything and i could transfer music from the A2 to the I7 if that 8gb was getting boring.

everything i needed was included in the box, which is very nice. the I7 charges off a usb connection (pretty quickly it seems). i didn't even bother plugging the included headphones in, so no comment their quality.

overall, very satisfied. in any specific area, also satisfied. this is a great product and i highly recommend it.

The iAudio 7 is what hours of research boiled down to, but in the end, I am finicky when it comes to electronics. This player passes the test. First off, upgrade the firmware and then complain about the sensitivity. Default on the player when I got it was So sensitive that I literally did not touch the buttons and they would trigger. But firmware (1.17 currently) has fixed that. Normal sensitivity setting is perfect now.

This player is Audio Booking made easy. I had an iRiver H10 which was horrible for audio books. It didn't have bookmarking, so if pause/resume failed, I had to search through the hour long music file at a few seconds per tic of fast fwd. However, what my research did not uncover was, you can set the fast forward rate up to 30s per tick. I have it at 5s for now and it blazes. That means at a rate of 30s per tick of ffwd, you can reach 30min into a chapter in just a few seconds. That's handy. And of course you can save 20 bookmarks.

The sound is as good as everyone boasts. I like the look and am not worried about it cracking as i would a wimpy ipod.

There is a lot to program in the settings, like secondary functions of buttons - hold the Menu button down to Record Radio, Bookmark, Voice Record, etc. whatever you want to set it at. 2 programmable function buttons like that.

Pros: bookmarking, fast fast forwarding, programability, great sound, sturdy, mega battery, sharp looking.

Cons: small viewing screen for movies, must convert movies from avi/mpeg into the jetaudio format, which takes about 30 minutes for 700mb.

This mp3 player (if that is what it can be called) rocks. The variety of codecs, esp. OGG, with tag support is great and the sound quality over other players through earphones that come with the player is even better.

I have looked at other mp3 players, flash memory, battery life and codec support were my selling points of the iAUDIO 7. Most mp3 players that contain flash memory also have an expanded battery life, but very few have the codec support.

My only problem with Cowon, not the iAudio, is the lack of firmware support. This is easily overcome by searching the internet for "iAUDIO 7 firmware". Many people have asked that question already and you are bound to stubble across someone nice enough to give a link and instructions on the firmware.

I will not be covering what others have already written. Rather, I will give my perspective from a guy who owns a few brands of players (Creative Vision W, Creative Zen, Ipod Classic, ipod nano) and has a week of use with this player.

The good:
i) The best sounding player I ever had. The EQ is very good but even with a flat EQ, they trump both the Ipods and Creatives.
ii) Amazing battery life
iii) Powerful amp - It drives my Sennheiser HD555 superbly.
iv) Just-right form factor. I like this size. I find the ipod nano way too small to be comfortable.

The bad:
i) User interface is iffy at best. It is almost impossible to use the player on the run without the hold button on because the touch interface is super sensitive, even at the low setting. That said, if you customize the hold setting to enable you to use the volume buttons as forward and back buttons when hold is set to on, the player works well (but you can't change volume on the run then...).

Conclusion:
If you care about sound like I do, get this player. If you care more about user interface, get a creative. I can't recommend ipods for anymore as I find them too expensive, I hate itunes, and I hate DRM music.

pros
- awesome sound quality (blows ipods away)
- enough power to drive good headphones
- crazy long battery life
- record FM radio (you can also use the timer to auto-record a show)
- FLAC and Ogg Vorbis support
- connects like any other extermal storage device so you can just drag and drop music, files, whatever. This lets it work with podcastready too which is a small program you keep on the player and then you can update podcasts from any computer (you manage the podcasts from their site, it's really slick).
- Also due to the above it is Linux and Mac compatible. I believe the software for converting videos is windows only (maybe Mac too?) though, but I haven't tried running it under wine in Linux (don't care at all about playing videos personally).
- text file viewer (handy I suppose if you want to throw a shopping list or directions or whatever on there)

cons
- FM tuner reception is a bit weak
- voice recorder is less than spectacular
- fingerprint magnet
- conrols are touchy and take a bit of getting used to. It's easy to accidentally start the voice or FM recorder. The hold switch is essential if you are carrying it around (disables all controls). I have it set so I can still pause and change the volume. Aside from some minor gripes the UI is very easy to use once you get the hang of it though and hopefully will continue to get better with firmware upgrades.
- the stock headphones actually sound pretty good, but were uncomfortable and constantly falling out. My ears are small though. I'm using some $20 JVC air cushon in-ear phones for now that I really like, but will probably invest in some high end in-ear phones at some point as I use it almost 8 hours a day 5 days a week.
- thick (I don't care, it's still tiny, but yeah it doesn't look as slick as an ipod).

Overall, highly recommended.

I just bought the Iaudio 7 8BG since I had experienced an Iaudio U2 1GB which was tiny with great sound quality. Overall the Iaudio 7 has most of the important features I need - great capacity; great sound quality with MP enhance, equalizers, bass enhance etc; fm tuner; video capability; and of course - NOT AN IPOD, so no need for annoying proprietary software.

The only bad is that the Iaudio7 has gone for cool with the touch keys and they are way too sensitive to use while in your pocket. I find the songs frequently skipping and having trouble going to the next songs without looking at it and having it in my hands. The Iaudio U2 didn't have that problem.

I currently own a Sandisk e280 and this Iaudio 7 mp3 player. Sound quality
on the I7 is by far much much better than the e280. The equalizer on the I7 is far superior also. Not only do you have presets but you can also create your own. It also has an advanced EQ settings where you can set the frenquencey of each band. Wide,normal and narrow waves are available for the EQ as well.

You can delete a song as it is playing which is a great idea. The touch pads are not as sensitive after updateing the firmware. That by the way is really easy to do. Did an experiment on the battery life and got 36 hours out of it. Keep in mind though I kept the display on and had a set of speakers hooked up to it at the time. With normal use will get 50+ hours easy.

The headphones used for sound quality testing were Sennheiser PX100,Grado SR 60, and AKG K 26 P. This little player was able to have punch on all three even the Grados. That is amazing from such a small unit. Only thing is I wish I had gotten the 16GB model.

Update: 02/13/08. After normal use the battery life lasted 54 hours before it flashed red. This thing still gets a top vote to me.

Pros
1. Phenomenal sound
2. No proprietary software
3. Excellent battery life

Cons
1. Small screen
2. Thick

First off, a little bit about myself and my mp3 player purchasing so you can properly evaluate whether this review will suffice your needs. I am a self-described audiophile who likes to listen to things with the best possible sound. I originally started out in the mp3 player market with a Creative Nomad Jukebox (had a 2.5" 6gb hard drive and ran on 4AA batteries for about 4 hours). I later upgraded to a Cowon iAudio G3 in 2004 or 2005. The play button no longer registers on the G3, so I started searching for a replacement.

Design
The device is similar in dimensions to a bic lighter, just a little wider and a little thicker (about as thick as a AA battery). I like the fact that the device has some dimension but weighs very little. The controls on the front of the device are touch sensitive. People have complained that it's too sensitive. I so far have not found this true, however when I keep it in my pocket, I use the hold button, which prevents accidentally skipping tracks. The cover over the USB port feels solid. As for the screen, it is small. Probably about the size of a postage stamp. I would not this device for video purposes. Also, the device is very glossy, which is very fingerprint prone. I have no case for the device, and I still have no scratches (although realize I have only been using for about 2-3 weeks at this point).

User Interface
This is the area where there are lots of differences between users. As mentioned above, the touch controls are sometimes rated to be too sensitive. However, one nice feature is that the user can adjust the hold button to permit the buttons on top of the player to continue to adjust volume as well as play/pause.

As for file searching, I tend to use the folder mode, for two reasons: (1) I previously had the iAudio G3, and that device was only folder mode, so my music is organized in folders in a very easy to search way and (2) for whatever reason, Cowon does not have a way to use DPL (Dynamic Playlist - the ability to create a playlist on the fly) when using ID3 searching.

Features

This device has many features beyond just audio playback, but even with audio playback, it can playback more than just mp3 and wma. It also can playback ogg and flac. It can play video files (I hear that a conversion is required to put it on the device, but I have yet to use this for video). In addition, it can record both voice and line-in. I hear that the line-in recording (wire not included) will automatically start new tracks when there is a gap in the music. There is also a radio with decent reception and, if you are listening and hear a song you like, you can record.
Performance
Music Transfer is purely drag and drop. No need for any proprietary software. And all very good is that the device uses standard mini USB, not a proprietary software.

First off, let's get this out right here - I have NEVER opened the earbuds that came with the device. I am listening to is using my Sennheiser PX100 (entry level portable headphones). One of the main reasons I purchased this device was my level of satisfaction with the G3. It sounds absolutely phenomenal. It's almost like having a portable stereo system. Between BBE, Mach3Bass, and customizable EQ, this device sounds amazing.

As for other playback features this device has (video, pictures, text, etc.), I have not used tested this device. As mentioned earlier, the screen is very small, so it probably is not the greatest device for these other options.

Summary
If you are looking for a device for quality audio playback, look no further. This device sounds phenomenal, especially when paired with a good set of headphones.