A few weeks ago, I concluded my six-month Listen To This series, which compared six of the leading portable media players, and ultimately chose the one (or more) which I felt really excelled in each of several areas.  No sooner had I posted it (can you still say the ink was still wet?) than I received an email from one of our readers, darkcorner, asking why I had not included the Cowon S9 which, in his opinion was the best sounding media player available.  Well, that is pretty high praise, and once a few other folks confirmed that opinion, I knew I was going to have to review this one.  So, I headed over to Newegg, and dropped a couple of hundred dollars to find out what was the big deal with this media player.

What’s In The Box: Cowon really did not go out of their way to include any extras in the box here.  In addition to the media player itself, you are going to get a USB sync/charge cable, and a pair of standard headphones.  I have said this before, but I am continually disappointed by the lack of attention so many mp3 makers give to headphones.  If you are going to spend the time and money to make a top notch player, why create a weak link out of the box.  Needless to say, these hit the trash fairly quickly. 

In addition, Cowon also offers an AC adaptor, TV-out cable, and a line-in cable.  All of these are sold separately.  I understand the two cables, because most people will not need them.  But it would have been nice to find that AC adapter in the box.  I am not always near a computer when I need to charge my media player.

Hardware: Before we go any further, let’s take the traditional JAMM quick walk around the media player.  Starting with the face of the device, you can see the glorious AMOLED screen (remember, we learned all about AMOLED the other day).  This is a fantastic and vibrant touch screen.  At least until you touch it.  as soon as I took it out of the box, the screen was smudged.  It is a fingerprint magnet, which is really unfortunate.  I would have had a significantly better experience with this player had the screen not been marred by fingerprints.  There is nothing else on the screen except that extra-large bezel on the bottom…kind of a waste of space if you ask me (JAMM logo not included).

There is nothing to see on the sides and back (well, in fairness, there is a microphone and reset button on the back, but they are really not much to see).  But while we are looking around, check out the unique shape and sleek design of this player. 

That curved shape fits perfectly into your hand.  Then again, once it was in my hand, I found that the body of the player had kind of a cheap, plasticy feel to it.  It is a bit disconcerting because the case looks like it has a solid metal construction, but feels like cheaper plastic.  I was disappointed by this.

The bottom of the player has a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack, flanked by the power switch on one side and power jack on the other.  The power switch is pretty much what you would expect.  Slide it to the left to power on; slide it to the right to lock the buttons.  I highly recommend locking the buttons because, as we will see, that touch screen can be very touchy,  One thing I did notice, however, is that sliding it to the left during playback does not necessarily power off the unit,  but only kills the screen.  This is fantastic, because it allows you to preserve your valuable battery while listening.  Slide to the left and hold to power off the device.   

On the left is the power connector.   As I have lamented in the past, this one is covered by a rubber door.  Other than making a slightly sleeker line, these doors really serve little purpose. I found the one on the Cowon was also particularly difficult to open.  Once opened, a thin plastic strip is all that holds the cover to the body.  This just looks like an accident in waiting.   Next time, device manufacturers, just skip the tiny rubber door.

The top of the device has a few hardware controls.  in the middle is a play/pause button, which fits into the design of the player so well, I did not even notice it for a couple of days.  That is flanked by a volume button, and a FF/Rewind button.  At first, I thought it was a little silly to have these hardware buttons which were completely redundant of the touch screen controls.  As we will see later, however, this is actually a little bit of genius in this design.  I love having the option of using these buttons instead of the touch screen controls.

Controls: We have already talked about the controls a little, but let’s take a look in more detail.  The Cowon really hits you with a well designed trifecta of controls: touch screen, accelerometer, and hardware buttons. 

The main interface on the Cowon comes from the glorious touch screen, which really worked great.  The icons on the screen are large and finger friendly, and the screen is extremely responsive.  One thing I really liked was the bullseye which appears when you touch the screen, giving you instant feedback so you can see exactly where your finger met the interface.

In addition to the touch screen, you can also use the motions sensing accelerometer.  This is fantastic.  It gives you both shake to advance, and tilt to see a tiled view of your album covers.

Finally, as we discussed earlier, you have the hardware controls on top of the media player.  At first, this felt redundant to me.  I mean, all of the controls you need are built into the touch screen.  So, why do I need duplicate hardware controls.  Once I started using the player, however, I found myself relying on these buttons more and more.  The truth is, you can listen to music while shuffling off to other parts of the player, or even with the screen off.  That makes it awfully difficult access the volume or advance to teh next track via the touch screen.  Thank goodness for redundant hardware controls.

In the end, I found that the controls on this device were perfect.  The trifecta of touch screen, motion sensors, and hardware buttons could have been a confused jumble of overkill, but not here.  Cowon did a great job of isolating the functions which required each different control type, and avoiding overlap unless it was absolutely necessary.  The result was an effective and intuitive control scheme.

Interface and Menus: I had high hopes for the menus on the Cowon S9.  The main interface screen is fantastic, with small icons leading to each of the 10 main functions.  You can even choose one of two different skins for this screen.  Tap any of the icons to enter the menus for that particular function.  You can also switch from the main home screen into the custom home screen (below), where you can design your own three screen personalized interface.  Now that is pretty cool for a media player. 

Unfortunately, once you get passed the main interface, things start to fall apart.  These menus were just a mess, with long lists of options,which must be scrolled, no way to jump to a later part of a list, no way to search the items in the menus, and seemingly little rhyme or reason to any of the various options.  We’ll look at the specific menus and options as we discuss each specific area, but the truth is that the further you get into the menus of the Cowon, the less intuitive and more confusing it becomes.

Loading content and desktop software: The big question I always find with media players is how do I get content onto the player?  Like many media players, this one comes with its own software.  It is a combination media player and content loader.  To be honest, I pretty much ignored it.  Well, in fairness, I gave it a try and found it to be completely unusable.  Then I ignored it. 

The good news is that this is what I call a universal media player, meaning that you can load content from anywhere, or just drag and drop your content using the file explorer.  On the other hand, I recommend the fantastic Media Monkey, which I have used with many media players with a great deal of success.

Music and Audio: OK, let’s go ahead and talk about the main attraction.  If this review were a short story, this would be the denouement.   So, let’s savor it for a moment.

When you select the music icon from the main menu, you will be taken to the media library.  What is really strange here is that this is not the music library, it is a full media library, including photos, videos, and other stored items.  The odd thing here is that you will reach the same media library from any mode in the player.  It would have been nice organizationally, if these different libraries had been separated so that when I selected music from the main menu, only my music would be displayed. 

That being said, you have quite a few options for sorting music.  You can choose to scroll through music by:

• artists
• albums
• songs
• genres
• years
• new music
• playlists

In other words, pretty you will find pretty much any manner of sorting music in there.

Select any of these options and you will receive an alphabetical list of the entries within the category (aside from year, which is obviously arranged chronologically.  And now get ready for the scrolling.  If you have a lot of music loaded like I do, there are no shortcuts here.  So, to get from Abba to ZZ Top, you have no choice but to scroll through the whole list (there is a handy slider on the side which moves this job a bit quicker).  I really would have preferred some kind of search by first letter, or other mechanism to skip through the list to a specific letter.  I also found that these one line entries in the menus were a bit less finger friendly than the rest of the interface.  Fortunately, you can fix this.  Just use the zoom control to adjust the font as large or as small as you would like.

OK, so now you have selected the song you wish to hear, let’s take a look at what will be displayed on the screen.  One thing Cowon did well was cramming a lot of information into a relatively small space.  In the middle of the screen, there, is a large image of the album art.  Now, I have to admit that I had some problems with album art not loading properly, though I have a suspicion that this was related to my computer, not the Cowon S9.

Beneath that is the song info (artist, album, and song title).  Now, watch what happens when we tap the album art.  Now that is pretty unique.  A little more metadata information than I am used to seeing.  This advanced information might not be useful to everyone, but for those are interested, I think you will like how accessible this information is on this player.

On the left of the screen is another really cool feature, the Quick List pop-out.  Just tap this to extend the Quick List, which will show the previous song, current song, and next song.  That is really a fairly unique feature, and I really liked the implementation here.  Especially the fact that you could tuck it back away when not in use.

On the bottom of the screen are your controls.  Pretty much what you would expect here: play/pause, forward, and reverse.  As I mention, though, you can choose whether to use these on-screen controls, or the hardware buttons on top of the player.  Hit flip to reveal a few additional, slightly more advanced controls.  Here, you will find the bookmarks and favorites settings, the shuffle settings.  Each will appear in its own popup window.  I liked this to a degree, but I found these controls could be a little hard to locate at times.  The location and functionality is not terribly intuitive.  But the way the controls appear in an on-screen popup is really pretty cool.

Oh and did I mention the motion sensor controls earlier?  Here comes the really cool part.  You can set the motion controls to tilt, shake or lock.  In tilt mode, just turn the player on its side to scroll by album art.  Not too shabby.  Switch to shake mode, and a quick shake of the player will advance you to the next song.

OK, well, this brings us to the part you have all been waiting for…sound quality.  How does this player sound?  And along with that, I also have not mentioned the equalizer yet.  But first, the sound quality. I tested this media player alongside the Zune 16, which has become my gold standard for sound quality.  I tested it by listening to Chickenfoot on both players, swapping my Ultimate Ears super.fi  5 pro between the two players.   And boy was I impressed.  After listening to Chickenfoot, I tested it out with a number of other songs, in a variety of genres. 

The Cowon really held pace with my Zune 16 almost step for step.  I will say that the Zune seems to have a more powerful amplifier in there, but otherwise, the sound quality was fantastic.  I thoroughly enjoyed listening to music on the Cowon S9. 

Even more important than that, in my opinion, was the incredible equalizer, which allows you to customize your listening experience to meet your personalized listening needs.  Now, I have to say, I have used and reviewed quite a few media players, and I have never seen an equalizer like this.  Just head over the JetEffect (it is under the settings menu).  You can choose from several dozen preset selections, including a variety of bass focused options.  Or, if you prefer, you can create up to four different custom user profiles.  This is really pretty cool, especially if you are a fan of bass, at which the Cowon S9 appears to particularly excel.

Video: I am sure I have said this before, but video is pretty much the bane of my portable media player existence.  I use Aimersoft to rip DVDs, and there are well over a dozen codecs, some of which have several different formats or sub-codecs.  What this means is that you could end up spending a lot of time with trial and error before you figure out the correct settings.  The Cowon recognizes two common formats: WMV and XVID (which is related to AVI).  This was great, but it would have been nice if the extremely common MP4 format had been supported, as well as iPod formatted videos. 

Additionally, unless you buy digital videos online, it is far more complicated to rip a DVD than a CD.  Trust me, this is not for the faint of heart.  Third, even if you know all of the correct settings, this is a long process.  It takes the full run time of the DVD to rip it onto your computer (generally 90-120 minutes) and then another 10 minutes to copy it to your portable device.  This all seems like an awful lot of work to watch a video on a tiny (in this case, 3.3 inches) screen.  Especially when I could just pop the DVD into my DVD player and watch it in 56-inches within seconds.

OK, so, let’s say you do figure out the correct codecs, formatting, and other settings, and finally get the videos loaded onto your Cowon S9, what happens next?   One nice thing is that, unlike music, you do not go to the universal library screen.  Instead, you jump straight into the video portion of the library, where each of your videos will be listed.  Just tap the video you wish to watch and you are ready to go.

We’ll start with a video in portrait mode, though I am really not sure why you would want to watch like this.  The top half of the screen is your vide.  Beneath it is some additional technical information about the recording.  Like I said, while I think it is nice to have this information available, I have no idea why you would want it in your face for the duration of the video. 

Before we get to the landscape view, I do want to take a quick look at the control panel beneath the screen.  For the most part, there is nothing special here.  Play/pause, forward, reverse, and equalizer profile.  Essentially, the same thing we saw with music.  The last button is kind of cool, though.  It is the scene selector, and will layout a thumbnail view of each scene in your vide, so you can just jump straight to the scene you wish to watch.

Here is your video in landscape mode.  Much better.  And you can even decide whether to watch with the original size of the video intact, or expand it to fill the full screen.   I have to say I was extremely impressed with the screen on this one.  It is AMOLED, which is about as good as a portable video screen can get. 

I sat it next to the ipod Touch, and I must say I was impressed.  The iPod Touch is a little larger and a little bit crisper, but the Cowon S9 is the first media player to offer a screen that even comes close to competing with the iPod Touch screen.  I have to say, I usually end this section by saying if you want to watch videos, then buy an iPod Touch.  But now, I think it is more than reasonable to offer up the Cowon as an alternative.

Photos: What can I say here.  The Cowon displays your photos.  There is really not much to see here, and it really does not stand out at all from any other photo viewing device.  Two quick things I did want to mention.  First, since you can exit from your music to the main menu without shitting off the music, you can play a slideshow with any music you like playing in the background.  Additionally, I really liked the zoon feature, which allowed you to really get up close and personal with your photos, without compromising quality.

Other content: There are a few other things going on in this one, and I just wanted to mention them quickly for you.  First is the Flash video player.  At first I was not sure about this one, but really, when you start looking around at the amount of Internet content that is based on flash video these days, this can be an extremely helpful addition.   And it does not stop at videos, either.  You can download any flash content (games, apps, utilities) and load them onto the Cowon as well, once again closing the gap between portable media player and portable computer (don’t get me wrong, it is not the iPhone, or even a Windows Mobile device, but it is nice to see this option in a media player).

Next is the document viewer.  Now, I am really not planning to read any documents on this one.  But, again, it is kind of cool to see this feature included.  unfortunately, although it can handle various TrueType fonts, it does not format the text.  This mean it will not be able to display Word or Wordperfect documents.  So, you need to convert them into txt files before they can be viewed here.  From that respect, I think Cowon would be wise to put some more time into the document viewer.  I might consider taking a second look at it if I could load my documents without reformatting them.  But the extra couple of steps it takes to reformat are just not going to be worth the effort.

An audio recorder has become almost a standard on these media players (though how cool would it be to find a video recorder here as well).  And I thought the implementation from Cowon worked fairly well.  There are no advanced settings to fumble with here (although you can modify the bits per second.   What I really liked about it, though, was the interface.  When you use a voice recorder like this, you are not looking for anything fancy.  It is more along the lines of “I just had a great idea and need to jot it down while driving before I forget…”  So, the simple interface with nothing except a record button and playback button worked great.

Another feature which has grown to be expected in a media player is the FM radio (why is AM never included).  Again, Cowon did a great job with the interface on this one, recreating an old fashioned radio dial, which you can use via the touch screen to scroll through the available radio stations (or use one of the 24 programmable preset stations).  More importantly, however, was the quality of the radio.  I have used a number of media players which offer FM radio in name only, leaving you scanning the dial for a station which will never exist.  Not so on this one.  Every station I tested came in loud and clear.  And if you hear a song you like, just hit the record button to make it yours forever.

Battery: All I can say is Wow!  Those of you who read my Listen To This series probably remember the battery tests I conducted.  The top tier of those tests ended up with something like 10-12 hours of continuous playback.  So, you can imagine my surprise when, after a nearly 12 hour day, the battery was barely half drained.  In fact, I got two solid days of listening…almost 20 hours, before I had to reach for the charging cable.  I was a little annoyed by the non-standard proprietary cable, but what the heck, with a battery like this, I’ll suffer through.

Memory: The Cowon S9 comes in three versions: 8 GB, 16 GB, and 32 GB.  Now, this is the part in the review where I would normally lament the fact that the was not an expansion card slot.  But, to be honest, 32 GB is a lot of memory.  I loaded all of my music onto it, every CD I own (close to 200 discs) and used a mere 10 GB.  That left well over half the space for videos and photos.  Not unlimited, but close enough.

Bluetooth: The Cowon also sports a Bluetooth connection, which is starting to become a little more prevalent in portable media players.  That being said, stereo Bluetooth is not nearly as universal or refined as it should be by now.  I tested the Bluetooth on this with the Etymotic ETY 8, which I still believe is the best stereo Bluetooth headphone I have used (sadly, there were no Bluetooth headphones included in the box, which would have been nice.

I thought the Bluetooth connection was fantastic.  It paired and connected easily, and was crystal clear…well, maybe I should clarify that.  It was crystal clear as long as I had the player sitting still on my desk, and I was not moving around.  This illusion of clarity, however, was shattered once I tried to walk around, groove to the music, or even so much as pick up the player.  Then the skipping began.  And this was not a minor skip here or there.  this was constant skipping, worsening depending upon how I held the player and how much I was moving.  What a disappointment.

Conclusion: I was anxious to give the Cowon S9 a try.  After I completed the Listen To This series, several people wrote to ask why I did not include the S9 in my series (it was released too late) and indicated that it was better than any of the players I had included.  And after giving it a thorough workout, I am finding it quite difficult to argue with this sentiment.  The sound quality was exquisite, the video was crisp and clear…second only to the iPod Touch.  In fact, pretty much the only bad thing I can say about this one is the the menus are a mess.  The Cowon S9 is the first of what I call the next generation of media players, sporting powerful touch screens, large OLED or AMOLED screens, and giant banks of memory, all in a small compact space; and it has left an awfully high bar in its wake.

What I Liked:

• Sleek design
• Finger friendly home screen
• Customizable home screen
• AMOLED touch screen
• Great sound quality
• Great video quality
• Easy to use audio recorder
• Flash video and apps
• FM Radio
• Amazing battery life
• Great memory (up to 32 GB))
• Bluetooth connectivity

What Needs Improvement:

• Screen is a fingerprint magnet
• body felt flimsy, like cheap plastic
• Menus are a mess and extremely unintuitive
• Desktop app is terrible
• No search option
• Limited video codecs
• Bluetooth skipped way too much

Where to Buy: Cowon’s web site

Price: $289.99

Related posts:

1. The iPod Touch Review. Part 2: The Touch is a Portable Media Player
2. Review: Pocket Player 3 — Raising the Bar to a Better Media Player
3. Review: Archos 605 Wifi Portable Media Player.
4. Listen To This! The Great JAMM Portable Media Player Showdown. Part 1: Introduction
5. Review: MyVu Crystal – Bringing Crystal Clear Persuasion To A Portable Media Player Near You