In other words, it’s a DVD player, digitial photo frame, home cinema, radio and an MP3 player! Not like Samsung to be so modest with one of their new products!

None of this is what makes the IceTouch stand out, though. As you can see from the pics, the IceTouch’s screen is its unique feature – it’s transparent!

The reason for this is that it’s an AMOLED screen, which makes it super-sharp, crystal clear – and viewable from the front and the back, as you can see form the video below.

It’s also the world’s first touchscreen based on AMOLED technology (that’s more like it – this is Samsung, there had to be a “world’s first” there somewhere!). This makes accessing all your content extremely easy, particularly when the user interface is a variant of the same Touchwiz interface that Samsung uses in its mobile phones.

The IceTouch MP3 player supports tonnes of content formats, so you should be able to watch and listen to whatever yuo want. In particular, it supports the following formats:

Audio

• MP3
• WMA
• OGG
• FLAC
• AAC
• M4A
• WAV
• MP3 HD

Video

• MPEG4
• WMV
• H.264
• Xvid
• Divx

With 8GB and 16GB variants, the glorious looking Samsung IceTouch MP3 player will be out sometime in the first half of 2010.

[Source: Engadget]

This weekend I had the unhappy misfortune of using Samsung’s YP-U4 mp3 player; code named Litmus due to its colour graduation. First looks were good: it

More details after the jump.

Two new Philips Streamiums

First up is the announcement of two new Philips Streamium wireless Hi-Fis, the Philips Streamium MP2500 and the more capable (and louder!) NP2900 (top).

As you can see from the pics, they’re both rather good looking. They’re at the cheaper end of the Streamium spectrum, and so don’t offer all the bells and whistles you get from the more high-end sets. What you get instead is a 32W amp and four speakers (in the case of the NP2900), a large screen, and the ability to wirelessly connect to your PC, from which it’ll stream Internet Radio channels, MP3 tunes stored on your hard drive, or music from RealNetworks’ Rhapsody service.

The NP2900, then, is basically a music streamer without any means of playing tunes itself, and so competes directly with the Logitech Squeezebox and other such gadgets. This is becoming an increasingly crowded market as the idea of streaming your digital music from where it’s stored (your PC) to where it sounds best (your Hi-Fi) finally catches on. We’ll producing a report of the best music streamers in the new year, so stay peeled!

Philips iPod Docks

As well as new Streamiums, Philips will also be showing off new iPod docks at CES 2009. The first, the Philips Docking Entertainment System DC350 (left), is a rather grand looking unit that envelopes your iPod Touch or iPhone, and comes with a remote control from which you can control the tunes you want to play.

It’s also a clock radio, and comes with Bluetooth, so you can make and take calls via your iPhone with it.

Only 6W of power output, though, which is a bit weedy, but at $150, it should be a nice addition to your bedroom if you’re the type who cant get out of bed until you hear the right tune in the morning!

In addition to the DC350, there’s also the Philips DLO iBoom (left), which features a remote control that in many respects is as big as the iPod it’s used to control!

Makes you wonder why the iBoom comes with an iPod dock at all – why don’t Philips simply provide it as a speaker, an amp, and a big cable into which you plug your iPod?!

Anyway, the iBoom will set you back $200 if you’re interested.

Philips SPA5300 PC speakers

Finally, Philips will also be showing off the SPA5300, a set of flash-looking 2.1 multimedia speakers for your PC, complete with remote control.

Summary

This is an odd time of year for gadget makers, with Christmas just around corner, followed directly after by the biggest gadget trade show of the year in the form of CES 2009. As such, the manufacturers are usually focused on selling their current wears as hard as they can, and don’t worry about hyping their future products until the new year.

The fact that Philips and others are starting the hype now, reflect perhaps the challenging retail climate we’re currently in, and how everyone has written off this Christmas, and will be focusing instead on drumming up trade for next year. CES is certainly going to have a different feel about it next month, that’s for sure!

[Source: iPodNN]

Now, all this is fine, but I can’t ehlp but feel that such a device is playing catch-up, and not just with the iPod Touch, either. The new Walkman sports many of the features that the latest mobile phones have had for months (incuding, ironically, Sony Ericsson Walkman phones!)

As such, Sony isn’t just competing with the iPod Touch, it’s competing with the entire mobile phone industry, including its own Sony Ericsson division. I’m not sure what the Sony Touchscreen Walkman offers that the other devices don’t already offer, and given that you can get the phones for free, whereas the new Walkman won’t exactly be cheap, Sony’s gong to have a tough time on its hands getting it shifted.

Still, that said, I’m looking forward to seeing exactly what Sony have in store for us at CES next year, and it certainly makes January much more exciting than it would ordinarily be!

[Source: Electronista]

Instead, you play a flat rate subscription that gives you unlimited downloads for a year, after which you get to keep the tracks you’ve downloaded, but not download any new tracks unless you take out another subscription.

Seems like a reasonably deal. Unfortunately, as with all things digital music, there’s catch – the tunes you download contain DRM that locks them into the mobile phone or PC you register with the service. In other words, you can keep your tunes for as long as you like, but you can’t transfer them to other devices.

Until now…!

Yes, after just a few months of the service going live, a new application has emerged called TuneBite that extracts all of the DRM from any tunes you’ve downloaded from Nokia’s stores. It works in a similar way to ye olde tape recording of the last century, in which you used something called cassette tapes to record the tunes you or your friends had on vinyl.

TuneBite plays the tune silently in the background (at speeds up to 54x the original) on your PC and re-records the resultant signal to any format you need – without DRM.

So, combining TuneBite with Nokia’s Comes With Music lets you download any tune you want – legally – for a year, and the you can use TuneBite to strip it of its DRM – legally! You’re then free to keep the resultant track forever, and transfer it to any other device you want to listen to it on – legally!

Very nice. The only thing you can’t do, of course, is upload it to a file sharing app, but that goes without saying.

The sooner DRM dies the better, and TuneBite is just one more nail in its coffin!

[Source: TechDigest]

What is it?

Regular iPhone speakers are for wimps! What you need is the Alesis Transactive Mobile (although calling it “mobile” is a bit of a stretch!), a huge industrial strength amp and speaker designed for outdoor events that belts out tunes to over 150 feet.

Obviously not your average iPod speaker, it’ll make your mates’ jaws drop, both from the sound, and the slightly weird sight of seeing an iPod on top of this beast of an amp.

Why is it mental?

Just look at the thing!

And no, it doesn’t go all the way up to 11 (tried really hard to resist saying that, but just couldn’t stop myself!)

4). Numark iDJ iPod DJ system

What is it?

Heard about vinyl and how it’s used by superstar DJs but not entirely sure what vinyl actually is?! Then you need the Numark iDJ iPod DJ system, which lets you plug in an iPod and play two songs from it at once.

Of course, you don’t want the tunes blaring out over each other – you want them to mix seamlessly, blending from one to the other, even scratching if the mood takes you.

Not for nothing is the Numark called the iDJ, because that’s exactly what it lets you do – become a complete turntablist, just with an iPod rather than a record deck. You can also plug in other inputs from CD players or record decks, and even record your tunes via USB to any USB-equipped external source.

Is there no end to the iPod’s flexibility?!

Why is it mental?

Geeky and cool in one button-strewn box – perfect for the techno DJ.

3). Tonium Pacemaker HandHeld DJ system

What is it?

Like the idea of the Numark iDJ, but don’t have an iPod? Get the Tonium Pacemaker, then, which features its own 120GB hard drive, and which lets you seamlessly DJ in the palm of your hand.

Designed for professional DJs, the Packemaker will let you do everything you can do on turntables and other professional mixing gear, but comes with a unique hand-held user interface. You can select tracks, mix, pitch-bend, crossfade, apply effects, loop, and loads more – all in the palm of your hand.

It’ll detect beats for you, let you change the pitch of a tune, and offers full cueing and cue search. It’s fully capable of delivering a perfectly mixed DJ set from the palm of your hand.

It’ll even save all the mixes you make onto its own hard disk, or let you transfer them to your PC via its USB 2.0 port.

If you’re into DJing, or just want to see what else you can do with your huge library of tunes, give the Tonium Pacemaker a go. Your tunes will never seem the same again.

Why is it mental?

It’s a complete set of decks, a 120GB MP3 player, effects unit and professional DJ device that fits in the palm of your hand. ‘Nuff said!

2). iBlaze iPod Bag, for putting an iPod in a bag

What is it?

What list of audio gadgets would be complete without an iPod, er, bag?! The iBlaze iPod bag doesn’t just let you carry your iPod around, though; no, that would be far too straightforward! The iBlaze goes one better and actually integrates itself into your iPod, letting you control your trusty little MP3 player with the bag’s external controls.

Why is it mental?

Used by geek posers, who’d like to think that pushing buttons on a bag to control their tunes makes them alpha-geek. The only problem, of course, is that no-one else knows what they’re doing, as they’re the only one who can hear what’s going on!

There must be some way of integrating the iBlaze bag with the Alesis Transactive Mobile, surely?!

1). Radio Shark 2

What is it?

Finally, the Radio Shark 2 is billed as being like Sky+ for radio. You plug it into your PC via USB, and it’ll scan the airwaves for AM/FM radio stations as well as the Internet for Internet radio stations. As well as being able to search for different radio stations from either the airwaves or the Internet, you can also record programs, including entire series, just like you can with a Sky+ box. You can pause and rewind live radio, and automatically store any recordings you want directly to iTunes.

Why is it mental?

Rumour has it this started life as a product for Radio Shack, but something got lost in translation, and so ended up as a Radio Shark instead.

The End

Here ends the first of a regular series of weird and wonderful Mental Media gadgets. Video’s next, so stay tuned for that, or better still, subscribe to our feed for instant updates.

And if you know of any audio gadgets we’ve missed, feel free to add them in the comments.

<< Back to part 1

You can see the complete top ten after the jump.

To be fair, this list comes from AdvancedMP3Players, a somewhat niche UK-based online store, and so shouldn’t be seen as representative of the MP3 player market as a whole. However, the store caters to people who want their MP3 players to be more than just clones; players that really stand out and add something a little bit extra. In other words, the type of people you’d expect to buy an iPod Touch, but who clearly aren’t.

Maybe the iPod has lost its touch, at least with the early adopters?

The complete top ten follows below:

Top 10 MP3 Players

1. iRiver Clix 2 8GB MP3 Player
2. Cowon iAudio 7 16GB MP3 Player
3. Cowon iAudio D2 4GB MP3 Player with DAB Digital Radio
4. Cowon iAudio D2 4GB MP3 Player
5. Cowon iAudio D2 16GB MP3 Player
6. NU Dolphin Waterproof 1GB MP3 Player
7. SumVision M18 4GB FM MP3 Player
8. Samsung YP-K3 1GB MP3 Player (Samsung Reconditioned)
9. Cowon iAudio D2 8GB MP3 Player with DAB Digital Radio
10. Apple iPod Nano 8GB MP3 Player (New)

[Source: Advanced MP3 Players]

TuneWiki MP3 Player software

If it’s MP3 playing, karaoke singing, wireless syncing, location-based music mashup software you’re after, then just look what what Andoid users can look forward to when TuneWiki launches on the platform later this year.

TuneWiki is software developed by an Israeli company that was originally designed for use on the Apple iPhone. Since Google’s Android is an entirely open mobile phone platform that gives programmatic access to the entire device, they decided to port TuneWiki onto it. After looking at the specs of Android, they then realized that they could do something special with Android that they couldn’t do on any other phone – something very special indeed.

TuneWiki overview

TuneWiki, at its heart, is an MP3 player, so it can playback MP3 tunes and also provides playlists and the usual control options you’d expect from an MP3 player. It’s also a karaoke machine, as it’ll automatically sync any song with lyrics stored in its huge database. This is where the term TuneWiki comes from, as the database of lyrics is supplied by users, meaning there’s a huge inventory of lyrics for it to draw upon.

Better still, we’re not just talking about lyrics in English – we’re talking lyrics in virtually any language, as TuneWiki users come from all over the world and have happily supplied translations to the tunes of their favourite artists. The lyrics are perfectly synced with the song using some kind of algorithmic magic.

TuneWiki on the iPhone would let you search for songs on the iPhone itself or on iTunes. With new TuneWiki for Android, though, you can do all of this, plus search for songs on Windows Media Player on your PC, or on Songbird, synchronizing the tunes via Bluetooth or WiFi. If the tune you wasn’t isn’t available on either of those services, it’ll direct you to YouTube and play the video directly, complete with the lyrics from its own lyrics database overlaid on top of the YouTube video. Fantastic!

TuneWiki wizardry – mashing up GPS and music

And now for the special sauce in the TuneWiki magic. The software mashes up music and location providing a visual map of the music people are listening to all across the world.

If you’re wondering what’s so special about this, just check out the video above. Suppose you’re playing “Never Gonna Give You Up” by Rick-rolling uber-celeb Rick Astley. TuneWiki will be able to show you all the other people that are listening to the tune at that exact moment, overlaid on a Google map. If there’s one thing that’s guaranteed to provide a sense of community, it’s music, and being able to see the location of other people listening to the same tune as you while you listen to it really does make the world seem very small indeed.

Just imagine listening to your favourite break-up tune seeing on a map where everyone else is listening to it. Suddenly, you don’t feel so lonely any more as you can see at a glance just how many other people are feeling similar emotions to you. You’re not alone, after all..unless “Never Gonna Give You Up” is your break-up tune, in which case you probably are!

In addition, TuneWiki collates the music that people are playing and provides a list of the top tunes by geographical area. So now you can see what the top tunes are in the UK, or Dubai or China or anywhere in the world, for each day. Not just by country, either – TuneWiki breaks it down by area as well, so you can see the top tunes that are being played in a radius around you (Android phoens all have GPS in them, which is where this bit of magic comes from). If you’re a student, you can therefore see the top tunes that your campus likes, and compare it with other campuses across – well, the world!

TuneWiki has to be one of the most impressive pieces of software I’ve ever seen. It’s a truly innovative use of the Android platform, making full use of its GPS abilities and the openness of the platform, together with the Web 2.0 concept of the Wiki. MP3 players have become pretty same-old same-old of late, with each new variant simply adding new skins to the same functionality as any other MP3 player; TuneWiki has shown that it doesn’t have to be like that. They might just have created the world’s best MP3 player!

[Source: TechCrunch]

I can’t wait to try out the Creative ZEN X-Fi, a series of portable media players with all the usual features but it is the built in Wi-Fi and sound manipulation features which have sparked the biggest interest. The Wi-fi in particular will open up the way into the future of potable media player. Read on to find out more.

X-Fi settings

OK, so I am slightly geeky, but I like the idea of being able to change sound in such a way that it appears to be coming from different locations, that’s why the X-Fi Expand particularly appeals to me. But I am not completely ignoring the other X-Fi setting, the X-Fi Crystalizer.

Starting with X-Fi Expand, this makes the sound seem to move away from your ears so it is no longer coming from the headphones but is in fact coming from in front of you. The official line is “X-Fi Expand gives audio a realistic and natural feel”, but it just sounds like a gimmick to me, a very neat gimmick that I like, but not sure how much it will be used after the novelty dies away. X-Fi Crystalizer on the other hand appears to be slightly more useful. Depending on the compression methods used details in the audio files can be lost, X-Fi Crystalizer tries to combat this by “intelligently” restoring those details, it claims to deliver sound closer to the original quality.

Creative Centrale

Now this is a nice piece of software and is tied in with an online application called Public Home Server. Creative Central will enable you to handle all your multi media, so your music, movies and photos, then you can publish them to Public Home Server that will give you remote access to your media files from any where you can get a connection! This is definitly the trend at the moment, access your media where ever and when ever you like, if you get the right software it won’t even limit you on what device you use to access that media. It is becoming less and less a matter of how big is your hard drive in your device but how fast is your contection to your home PC.

No release date or price or anything particularly useful right now. That would be expecting far too much.

[Source: episenter]

You may remember our article on Sanyo’s new waterproof HD TV which enabled you to watch TV in a down poor if you so wished. Well now you can also listen to music while singing in the rain.

This Sentry speaker system can accommodate up to 6 wireless receivers that can be speakers or headphones, the Sentry system is not fussy. You can plug any audio device that has a 3.5 mm headset port directly into the unit for easy plug and play. The transmitter also has built-in USB support which enables you to charge your iPod or MP3 player. What more can I say… it is a joy to behold even when wet.

Available at Amazon for $99.99

The official specifications from Sentry Industries are: