Cowon D2+ 16 GB MP3 Player

5 comments

1. 

   Lance Vambridge on January 27, 2010 at 2:35 am

   The Cowon D2+ has a few shining strengths which are dwarfed by a large number of crippling weaknesses. As someone with technical know-how concerning audio/video codecs, I didn’t think I would have many problems getting this device to work. However, I’ve spent too much time grappling with it, crawling forums for workarounds to its problems, and generally just trying to get it to work. Overall, it is a poorly made device and I must say, “caveat emptor.”

   Pros:
   
   + Lots of sound tweaking options.

   + Battery life is quite good on average.

   + The notepad application let’s you scribble notes on the touchscreen.

   + It keeps track of the current date/time.

   + Nice alarm clock feature (although you have to sleep with earphones in to use it).

   Cons:
   
   - It had problems handling my MP3s with comment or lyric tags (including my Amazon MP3s). This is fixable by using a re-tagging program.

   - Ugly artifacts occur when watching some of my videos. These errors do not occur when watching the same videos on my computer, leading me to believe they have a buggy implementation of the XviD decoder (note: these videos were converted with the official Cowon converter, so I doubt it’s due to advanced XviD options like QPEL).

   - The included video converter that comes on the CD incorrectly converted several of my videos. Moreover, it inserts the “COWON” logo at the beginning of every converted video, which is annoying and unnecessary.

   - My device could not handle all AVI container formats properly. From what I’ve read, there are two ways to synchronize audio/video in an AVI: either using frame counts (the most popular mechanism) or by using timestamps. According to what I read on a forum, the device supports timestamp synchronization but not frame counts.

   - The built-in flash player is slow and buggy, to the point where I consider it unusable. This is a real shame, it could have been a killer feature.

   - No gapless playback. This ruins the listening experience for some of my music, where a single song is stretched out over multiple tracks.

   - Interface is a bit clunky.

   - It has a very devoted fanbase, which cuts both ways. The associated forums have some genuinely friendly people, but a fair share of people that are somewhat fanatical about the device. Be wary of the fanboys.

   - It’s “dynamic playlist” (which lets you create a playlist on-the-fly) has an upper limit of 256 songs, which is too limited for my use.

   In sum, this device does let you tweak the sound moreso than any other device I’ve ever run across, but it has so many other broken features I cannot recommend it (unless the *only* thing you care about is sound tweaking).

2. 

   Harry S. Gerla on January 27, 2010 at 5:08 am

   The player has great sound, and if you’re an audiophile, its expandability via SDHC card and its ability to play FLAC and OGG formatted files is great. So why the poor review? It’s got a flaw that really takes away one of its key features. That feature is the ability to be used in MSC mode rather than in MTP mode. For those not fluent in technospeak, that means that in a Windows based computer, the device will be treated as just another drive by the computer rather than as media transfer point. What that means is you can load your media on to the D2+ or take it off the D2+ via Windows Explorer (or some substitute for it) rather than via Windows Media Player or some similar software. The ability to use Explorer makes the process much faster and simpler. Unfortunately, when used in the MSC mode, the D2+ messes up its internal file system rendering the loaded media inaccessible. I know because I’ve tried two of these. Both had the same problem. Moreover, it’s been reported by other users at forums dedicated to the D2+ (see the anythingbutipod forum). BTW those forums are also filled with complaints about Cowon’s unhelpful customer service. For me, the ability to use MSC was an important selling point and when it turned out to be illusory, I was not happy. If I was going to be stuck with an MTP player the Cowon would not be my first choice. I got a Sony NWZ-639F which is smaller, had a more user friendly interface, was slightly cheaper, and actually sounded better than the D2+ (no expandability via SDHC card, no FLAC or OGG support–oh, well can’t have everything). I guess to sum up, I was deeply disappointed by the unit.

3. 

   Stan Walker on January 27, 2010 at 7:36 am

   I’ve have my 8 GB D2 for quite a few months now. Its mostly been an enjoyable
   
   experience, easily the best flash-based DAP I’ve owned. The touchscreen interface and menus probably aren’t as intuitive and easy to use as they could be, but its nothing horrible IMO. The sound quality goes a long long way to make up for it.

   What comes brings a possibly stellar DAP down to mediocre levels for me is the obvious and stupendous lack of playlist support. I mean, how could you go to the lengths to create what really isn’t a DAP, but a ultra-compact PMP and not include this basic feature?? I don’t understand it.

   Another thing which completely crushes this little gem is the horrible, and I mean truly truly horrible database support. Not often, but every so often that it annoys you to high hell because you won’t expect it, the database will corrupt or refuse to recognize all files on the player when it does one of its numerous rebuilds (Every time you add or delete a file, even a measely text file, the database will rebuild which takes anywhere from 1 to 2 mins). This automatic rebuild is incredibly annoying. I’m not sure if its rebuilding the id3 tag database or whether this is more related to the master file table on the flash card (If it is, its the slowest MFT updater in history. I’ve been told that the internal NAND used to store the firmware and files is of a very poor quality & slow speed and prone to writing errors (which leads to the database corruptions)). If it is for the id3 database there should be an option to turn it off for Folder browsing, but there isn’t, which leads to the corruptions and the headaches.

   The battery life is nowhere near 52 hours. You will be amazed that the bars don’t drop after your first day of listening, but most people report only around 25-30 hours of use with realistic settings and medium-quality audio files. Video is another matter of course.

   Even despite these problems as I said, the sound quality and the compactness of the unit and its PMP-like features can make up for its severe shortcomings for the more technically inclined. I’m not going to say its for everyone however. Cowon really needed to put more work into it and use better quality materials to make it a truly stellar DAP/PMP.

   If sound quality is your main concern then there’s very little to find at fault with the D2. If ease of use and the interface are prime for you then you’d probably best search elsewhere. If you want the most features and bang for the buck and are willing to forego a bit of ease of use then this is probably what you’re looking for. If you want something that makes you look cool or ‘current’ then go with anything Apple puts out, your priorites with regards to ‘music’ are obviously suspect.

4. 

   M. Lehr on January 27, 2010 at 9:29 am

   I bought the D2+ strictly for audio use and from this perspective the D2+ succeeded superbly at some things and failed miserably in others. With top-quality cans, the sound is “to-die-for”, and the player is conveniently compact and light. The user interface is so-so – a bit annoying in some respects, not nearly at iPod convenience levels, but definitely manageable. But on the deep, deep downside: The D2+ doesn’t support playlists; it frequently doesn’t play album cuts in the proper order; and it doesn’t seamlessly integrate expansion cards. Plus, the support from Cowon is pitiful, including the support for Cowon’s related JetAudio media software.

   Finally, I read the previous reviews with interest, so let me say that I spent considerable time trying to make this puppy work, and while many are more accomplished digital music experts than me, I am also somewhat familiar with digital audio and computers. My experience is that you can work around some of the problems above with enough time and effort, but you can’t work around all of them. Your mileage may vary. Anyway, if you want a light, compact player that delivers beautiful sound, the D2+ may be right for you, but be prepared for a high-maintenance audio experience. Now, the fine print . . .

   THE GOOD STUFF
   
   With top notch headphones, the audio is close to breathtaking, and I was shocked. While it’s hard to describe great sound in words, two things that especially stand out for me are the crystal clear bass and detailed resolution of anything percussive, even down to details of guitar picking: It’s like being there! My reference is a current iPod classic combined with either Etymotic ER-4P, Bose QC2, or Denon AH-D5000 headphones. I’ve even auditioned the iPod with two different headphone amps and had modest results at best. But plug a first rate pair of cans into the D2+ and it absolutely shines, even with lossy mp3s at sufficiently high bit rates (192 or 256 VBR). On the other hand, the D2+ is not much better than the iPod with even good quality ear-buds like the Etys.

   Other good things about the D2+ are the portability and – at least in theory – the expandability. The D2+ is notably smaller and lighter than the iPod classic and even more “pocket friendly”. It has a generous capacity for a flash player (16 Gb) and it’s expandable (although not without some hassles – see below).

   THE BAD STUFF
   
   As stated above, there are four things that combined to turn me off to this compact, lightweight, audiophile quality player:

   1. It doesn’t accept playlists. You can copy an .m3u playlist file to the player, but you can not get the player to play the songs listed in the playlists. There is a complicated, manual way to get playlists onto the D2+ by copying duplicates of your files, but this eats up flash space quickly. And in any case, this is not what most of us are used to, where you can automatically sync playlists, and have the player actually play the songs on the playlists (and without having to copy duplicate music files either).

   2. It doesn’t play albums in the proper order. There is a way to overcome this by renaming all of your music files so that they conform to a standard naming convention. Aside from the inconvenience of having to do this on a large, pre-existing library, there is the issue of how to find the right format. (see #4 below).

   3. It doesn’t integrate expansion cards in a convenient way. Windows sees the SDHC card as a separate drive. MediaMonkey does not see the card. (As for JetAudio, I find that program unusable, but that’s a different review. I even bought the pro version and was very disappointed in its refusal to cut a high bit-rate mp3. But try this test for yourself: go to [...], download the JetAudio free version, and check out the JetAudio manual and support. Make up your own mind.)

   4. Extremely poor support from COWON. Most of the help I found was on the iAudiophile forums, “a fan site for Cowon . . . players”. There are definitely some very knowledgeable and dedicated folks on iAudiophile. But while this support was invaluable to me and much appreciated, it took some time to sort out the wheat from the chaff. Cowon itself is amazingly insensitive to support needs. As of this writing (April 2009) there is no online D2+ manual and the latest English JetAudio manual is a 2003 beta version.

   After investing over 30 hours, I regrettably returned the D2+ to Amazon. (Another good reason to shop here!) But I will be keeping an eye on Cowon periodically – as well as their competition – to see who first markets a reasonably user-friendly and portable audiophile quality player. Two out of three just doesn’t do it for me.

5. 

   Keith R. Paul on January 27, 2010 at 9:43 am

   I like this mp3 player because of its small size and great sound. I also like the audio codec choices and the easy to use windows file hierarchy. Great unit, I would definitely recommend this mp3 player.