iriver W10 (8GB)

By Edvarcl Heng, CNET Asia
Jan 17, 2007

For now, the W10 is the Korean firm's most anticipated PVP for 2007. Prior to CES 2007, pundits had been guessing that it would feature a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver, though as it turned out, it uses Wi-Fi to determine its location instead.

Memory capacity maxes out at what is now the standard for flash-based players (8GB), but the W10 will also have a miniSD card slot to expand itself. The touchscreen interface remind us of the Cowon D2 and, if the W10's 3-inch WQVGA screen is anything like the D2 in terms of crispness, we will be mighty impressed when it lands in our hands.

There's plenty of content format support onboard: MPEG-4, WMV for video and MP3, WMA and AAC for audio. Usual standards from iriver like FM radio and voice recording are also included, but what's a real nifty possibility is that the W10 may support VoIP though its Wi-Fi connection.

While iriver would not reveal the final technical specifications, the Wi-Fi locater will probably work on the premise of triangulation. Software within the W10 will have an updatable map of the Wi-Fi hotspots, and by identifying the SSIDs of the nearest hotspots, it will approximate your location. We trust it will work best in cities that enjoy blanket Wi-Fi coverage, but unlike GPS the coverage will not be as vast. However, the virtue of Wi-Fi is that locating oneself while indoors is possible, while with GPS it's not.

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