Cowon a3 games

Cowon accommodated shutterbugs by including faster USB Host connectivity for transferring files directly from cameras or many other gadgets to the A3. Of course, that would have been another reason to include a larger hard drive.

Image Courtesy of Cowon. Half the times we tried to push the stick straight in to make a selection or pause a movie, we wound up moving it to one side, selecting the wrong item or jumping ahead in the movie.

We were hoping Cowon had addressed this design flaw from the A2, but maybe next time. The three contextual buttons marked A, B, and C change behaviors depending on what mode the player is in; we found these helpful for jumping directly to settings without having to dive back in via the main menu. The icon-driven main screens are easy enough for any user to figure out, but the dual-paned file browsing, which relies on file and folder names instead of metatags, could use an update.

The Cowon A3's battery life is rated at 10 hours for audio, and 7 hours for video, which is admirable for a PVP but not awe-inspiring. The Cowon A3's total charge time is estimated at 5. We'll update our review soon with the battery results from our CNET labs. Final thoughts In light of gadgets such as the iPod Touch that offer very limited format support, or a high-capacity PVP like the Archos WiFi that offer only video recording and extended file support as expensive upgrades, it's refreshing to see a portable video player such as the Cowon A3 that simply tries to offer its customers the most features with the best quality at a good price.

You can almost feel Cowon tripping over themselves to try and give you everything you could want in a PVP, which is why it stings to think that something so seemingly insignificant as clumsy joystick control or ID3 tag sorting could make us look elsewhere. When it comes to using a product every day, however, you might not notice the A3's unique support for WavPack audio or OGM video files, but you'll certainly notice that the joystick occasionally misfires, and that the only way to unearth your favorite song is to dig through countless folders.

Despite its drawbacks, the Cowon A3's prowess as a portable video player is not to be understated. If you're looking for a PVP that can handle a wide array of formats with impressive audio and video quality, the Cowon A3 is a solid choice. Donald Bell. The Good The Cowon A3 portable video player PVP offers outstanding audio and video format support; a sharp, colorful screen; the most attractive Cowon user interface we've seen; built-in video output; video and audio recording capabilities; and superb audio quality.

The Cowon A3 is cursed with a clumsy joystick interface; a highly reflective screen; no support for DRM-protected media; and archaic music sorting. It's also a little on the chubby side. The Cowon A3 portable video player is a fantastic value when judged on the merits of its file support and integrated video-recording capabilities.

If you've got nimble fingers and an eclectic assortment of audio and video formats, the Cowon A3 should be at the top of your list. The A3 supports about as many file types as we've seen for a portable device. You may not want to put a lot of music files on the A3, anyway, because it doesn't support ID3 tag sorting.

Instead, the A3 uses a file-tree system that you must manually organize on your PC through Windows Explorer or a similar file management program before syncing to the device. The A3's audio quality improved significantly over that of the A2. The signal-to-noise ratio the higher the number, the cleaner the sound of the A2 was a lower-than-average 71dB; for the A3, it's 85dB, which is higher than that of some of our top-ranked players.

During my hands-on tests, the rich audio quality was ideal for watching movies on the A3's top-notch screen. Audio sounded fine through the included earbuds, but if you really want to enjoy the A3's rich sound, swap them out for higher-quality headphones.

The ten-band equalizer allows you to control the frequencies and bandwidths of each band, making the A3's sound adaptable for the many file types it supports. Our Verdict. Against Low battery life looks and feels cheap sound and vision performance is bettered elsewhere.

Cons - Low battery life - looks and feels cheap - sound and vision performance is bettered elsewhere. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands. Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors. Thank you for signing up to What Hi-Fi?. You will receive a verification email shortly.