It's high time companies shed their largely egotistic attitude, in the name of competition, which I feel has ceased to make any sense at all. What’s all this proprietary bull about? How about getting together and deciding what’s good and what’s not, arriving at a consensus for a standard, and sticking to it? What’s happening instead is that everyone wants to be exclusive.
There are very few PMPs in the market that allow drag-and-drop for videos. In all probability you will end up hating the conversion software bundled with the player. Apple’s iTunes is a classic example. But all’s not lost yet... let's look at some players that still believe in the good old drag-and-drop feature.
Cowon
Cowon has perhaps been a victim of its own wait-and-watch policy. Elsewhere it may have made a mark, but in India the company is still testing the waters. No matter what the company spokespersons say to try and convince us, we know Cowon has a lot of ground to cover.
All video players from Cowon support drag-and-drop for all content types, so you can pretty much pick whatever you like from the assembly line. That leaves you with the leisure to make some important choices... such as screen size, playback features etc.
There’s the flash-based D2, and the big-screen A2 that obviously has more up its sleeve. While the D2 comes with a 2.5 inch, 24-bit QVGA (320x240) TFT LCD touchscreen, the A2 is equipped with a 4-inch screen (480x272 pixels) that's a 16:9 wide TFT LCD.
Both the players could play anything we threw at them, so apart from watching the movies; you can also get rid of conversion issues and suchlike. You can watch movies, listen to music and FM radio, and browse photos with ease. TV options are available in both, while the A2 also allows you to capture from the TV. The D2 costs Rs 10,000 (4GB) and Rs 13,000 (8GB), while the A2 (30GB) costs Rs 20,000.




