You probably don't want to be seen at the beach with most solar-powered PMPs, but Shiro's SQ-S is superior in functionality if not in appearance. It can store 16GB of APE, FLAC, MP3, OGG, WAV, or WMA files, receive and record FM radio broadcasts and play video on its itty-bitty screen. Unfortunately only its backside is adorned with solar panels -- four hours of tanning on a beach towel will get you up to 35 hours of music and 7 hours of video, but you won't be operating it while it's lying on its face. No word yet about price, availability, or a flesh-and-blood photo, but let's hope it looks as good in real life as it does in this render.

[Via PMP Today]

Goodie! The long, excruciating wait for more information on Cowon's exceptionally sleek O2 PMP is finally over, and two of the more important tidbits you could ever want to know have been revealed. The PMP, which supports a gaggle of file types including MP3, OGG FLAC, AAC, WMA, DivX, MPEG4 and WMV (just to fire off a few), will arrive with a 4.3-inch touchscreen, SDHC card slot, 8GB / 16GB / 32GB of internal capacity, an internal speaker, TV output (up to 720p), 10-band custom equalizer, 18-hours of battery life for audio playback (8-hours for video), optional T-DMB TV tuner / e-dictionary functionality and your choice of pink, black or white motifs. The real news? An October 13th ship date in South Korea along with prices ranging from ₩294,000 ($224) for the stripped-down 8GB edition to ₩399,000 ($305) for the 32GB edition with a DMB tuner. Yanks, sadly, will have to wait.

[Via iAudiophile, thanks Ang]

It's been a long wait since we first saw iriver hint at the SPINN way back at CES in January, but the flash player is finally shipping -- just a few days late. Our full hands-on impressions are on the way, but there's no denying that iriver has caught our eye with this distinctive player. 3.3-inch OLED touchscreen, unique spin controls and that traditional iriver eye for design make this thing potentially worth the hefty $250 (4GB) and $290 (8GB) asking prices -- though we have a few issues with long-term usability we'll need to hash out. It'll be available at iriverinc.com, Amazon.com, J&R and B&H online stores, though iriver's seems to be the only one with it live just yet.

Uncle Woz is stirring things up today in an interview with The Telegraph, saying that he thinks "the iPod has sort of lived a long life at number one, things like, if you look back to transistor radios and Walkmans, they kind of die out after a while... they get real cheap and then they are not selling as much." That's certainly an interesting parallel to draw, since the iPod is unquestionably the market leader and the recent updates to the nano and classic weren't particularly overwhelming -- but we've got to disagree here and say that the metaphor doesn't quite work.

Walkmans and radios were standalone products that didn't really change over time, while the iPod is clearly evolving into a compelling standalone computing platform -- and it's tied to iTunes, which, hate it or love it, is the most popular content store out there. Sure, things could change dramatically -- competitors like the Zune are getting way better, subscription music could finally take off, and DRM is slowly going away (at least for music) -- but it's hard to see Apple getting baited into a brand-tarnishing price war or simply letting the iPod fade away without putting up a fight. We'll see, we suppose -- any of you willing to throw down some bold predictions?

[Via Wired]

Just when we were getting used to having most Nikon announcements thoroughly preceded by a flood of leaks, the company's managed to totally surprise us by introducing a new head-mounted display with PMP features -- and it actually looks pretty sweet. The WiFi-enabled 8GB Media Port UP UP300x has a .44-inch 640 x 480 screen that appears to be the equivalent of a 50-inch image viewed from about 10 feet away, and includes a motion sensor that allows media functions to be controlled through head movements. (There's also a "basic" 4GB UP300 that omits the motion control features.) Codec support is pretty slim, but there's a browser app and a new UP media store that allows for direct downloads. Two AA batteries will last for two hours of video or 270 minutes of audio, which should be enough time for you to look thoroughly like a dork, but we won't lie -- we'd buy one of these in a heartbeat if they ever make it out of Japan.

[Via Akihabara News]

Have you always dreamed of a giant, wall-hanging iPod seemingly warped and twisted like a big, crappy, old television? Well, Russian artists Aristarkh Chernyshev and Alexei Shulgin have, and now they're subjecting the world to it. Yes, say hello to the wowPOD, a fully functional iPod mutation which is absolutely worth whatever our business manager has been authorized to pay for it.

[Via TUAW]

For obvious reasons, we don't get too excited about PMPs developed and produced entirely in China, but similar to Gemei's lot, Ainol looks to have a winner on its hands with the V3000. We've seen this display-dominated unit prancing around for awhile now, but we've just now learned how much the company plans on charging for it: 699 Chinese yuan, or around $102 before haggling. For that, you'll get 4GB of internal space, a 4.3-inch 800 x 480 resolution display, FM tuner, TV output and a rechargeable battery. Now, where to find one is the real challenge.

[Via PMPToday]

Look, we'll be honest -- Gemei's PMPs are among the few developed entirely in China that are actually worth a glance, and yes, we're digging the overall sleekness of the A320. But seriously, could we decide on something other than Sony's iconic button logos and a very blatant OS X-sourced wallpaper? Petty gripes aside, the handheld should handle a plethora of audio / video formats along with GBA games via an integrated emulator. No telling how much this thing will sell for, but if we had to guess, we'd put it somewhere between "dirt cheap" and "cheap enough."

[Via TheGadgetSite]

Hope you don't mind two similar worlds running together, because today we're asking about not one, but two of Cupertino's latest. The iPod touch 2G and iPod nano 4G were both simultaneously (give or take a few minutes) announced back in early September, and after getting a chance to handle both, we felt that Apple did a stand-up job with the each of 'em. That being said, there's always a thing or two that could use tweaked, added or removed completely, but we'll spare you any additional opinions from us on that. Instead, we want to know how you, dear reader, would change either of Apple's freshest PMPs. What are you digging? What's still not good enough? The floor is yours.

We sure hope you're an iPod owner if you're looking seriously at any one of Yamaha's latest mini audio systems, 'cause every last one of them packs an inbuilt dock front and center. Kicking things off is the MCS-1330, which features 60-watts of amplification, an integrated CD player, two speakers and a few other inputs for non-Appleites. The MCR-330 and MCR-230 only seem to differ in connection type, with both units packing 40 total watts of power and a USB socket. The CRX-430 finishes things off with 50-watts of RMS juice and a built-in CD player. The whole lot should ship by early December and will range in price from around $300 (CRX-430) to $1,233 (MCS-1330).

[Via TechDigest]

Sling Media has a history of not disappointing, and while we were admittedly bummed to see Clip+Sling omitted from SlingPlayer 2.0, it looks like that one gripe is about to be remedied. If you'll recall, said feature was originally announced way back at the front end of 2007, and now select users are receiving e-mails announcing the launch of a private beta program. The Sling.com portal promises to "give users access to a premier library of content from top TV networks, movie studios, sports leagues and websites," and reportedly, it'll let folks "grab snippets of television content, upload them to the Sling site and create playlists and feeds that can be viewed and subscribed to by others." Is that YouTube / Hulu / Joost / et al. quaking in their boots, or are we just happy it's Friday?

Update: Sling pinged us to say that the actual Clip+Sling functionality was still in progress and wouldn't be a part of the initial Sling.com portal. It's still in the works, though -- shame it won't happen sooner, though.

Rumors of a Zune phone have floated around forever, but we've always thought it would make more sense for Microsoft to start by simply making a Zune player for Windows Mobile -- a plan Steve Ballmer casually confirmed today in an interview with CIO Magazine. Sure, Ballmer's hinted at Zune on WinMo in the past, but those were just hints -- not like today's pronouncement that "the Zune software will also be ported to and be more important not just with the hardware but on the PC, on Windows Mobile devices, etc." That's a pretty solid declaration of things to come, if you ask us -- too bad he didn't give a time frame. Now, about that 360 integration.

[Via WM Power User]

We got all down and dirty with DoCoMo and Fujitsu's prototype "Separated phone" today at CEATEC, and we can confirm that the device does, in fact do what they say it does. As reported earlier, the device uses Bluetooth to communicate between the phone's two magnetized halves, enabling configurations in everything from standard clamshell to gaming landscape formats. Perhaps the most compelling configuration is one that allows the phone to be held to the ear while one accesses data on the another half, complete with neck cramps. The touchscreen, Symbian S60-based UI was easy enough to use (albeit in Japanese) and features a hearty media playback element, but we were unable to squeeze any commitment to a launch date, price, or probability of seeing the unit on the market. That all said, the demo units were very much operational as you can see for yourself in the video after the break.