Review The portable media player market ranges from the cheapest, smallest screen players, aimed primarily for playing music, to palm-sized, PDA-style pads, more than suitable for watching films and time-shifted TV. The Cowon D2+ DAB is definitely at the smaller end of the scale, but still offers a good range of programme sources including, as you’ll have guessed from the name, DAB radio.

Cowon's D2+ DAB

The D2+ DAB is intended as a pocketable player, which can provide audio and video output, although its relatively small, 320 x 240 pixel screen biases it towards audio. It’s flash based and comes in capacities of 4GB, 8GB and 16GB. Very similar in size and function to the D2+, which was itself a firmware revamp of the D2, the D2+ DAB is available in black or silver and is about the size of a compact GPS. The chamfered surround to the 63mm TFT display makes the screen look a little smaller than it is and the player’s 16mm thickness means it’s a chunky device.

A bar down the right-hand side of the case is there entirely for the slot in one end, to which you can tie the strange triangular stylus. Actually, the stylus isn’t that strange, when you realise it can be fitted into the same slot to act as a stand for viewing the D2+ DAB on a table or desk. When you then realise it can be slotted in two ways up, giving different viewing angles, it’s actually quite clever.

Controls are minimal, with a power/hold slider and buttons for menu and volume up and down on top. There’s a card slot in the bottom, which can take SD and SDHC cards up to 32GB and set into the left-hand side are USB and EXT connections (for external power supply, not included) – under a tethered, pull-away cover – as well as a stereo headphone jack.

The reason for the sparse set of buttons is, of course, that the LCD is a touch screen. You can use a finger to operate the virtual buttons and make menu selections, but it’s a lot easier with the stylus and almost mandatory for controls such as audio equaliser sliders.

The bright TFT display is best used with the supplied stylus

The user interface is functional, but not remarkably slick. There are a few too many buttons with legends that aren’t immediately obvious and we’ve never been a big fan of translucent overlays for transport controls. Still, it’s not too difficult to work your way around, and there are certainly a lot of functions to explore.

The player is primarily a music player, with video as a bit of an afterthought – and a slight strain for prolonged viewing on this size of screen. Yet, for audio, it has a tremendous amount to offer. As well as stereo playback, there’s a sound recorder, which can record at up to 256kbps using the player’s internal mic, or be connected using an optional AV cable to an external mic.

It even doubles as a notepad

There’s still an FM radio in there, which gives reasonable reception, but the big news is the DAB receiver. Although we’re still unconvinced by DAB, as ‘more channels you don’t want to listen to’ seem a poor exchange for the wider dynamic range of FM. However, there’s little doubt that Cowon has got it pretty much spot on for a DAB receiver this size. The exact set of channels available depends on your location, but we received a full set of BBC transmissions, from Radios 1 – 7 and including the World Service, plus eight commercial stations, such as Planet Rock and Classic FM.

The original D2 included DAB radio reception, but it was flaky and difficult to get a solid signal. Things are much better now, even though it may not all be down to improvements in the player, as DAB transmission has been evolving, too. Whatever the reason, reception is now pretty consistent and sound quality is certainly at the MP3 level, though still lacking the dynamic range of a strong FM station.

Playing back recorded music, which is what the D2+ DAB will be doing most of the time, is made easier by support of typical lossy compression formats such as MP3, WMA and OGG, and more lossless offerings of FLAC, WAV and APE for the audiophile. The significant omission from the set is AAC, so if you’re an iTunes fan, you’re going to have to do some conversion before loading tracks onto the D2+ DAB.

Cowon’s JetAudio PC software won’t help, either. Although it converts between all the audio formats the D2+ DAB can play and others like IMS, Musepack and Speex, it doesn’t handle AAC. You could, of course, say that if you want to play iTunes formats you buy an iPod, but it’s a shame you can’t at least convert them with the software supplied for this player. For Mac and Linux machines, you use the player as an external drive and drag files to the appropriate folders.

Easy to use but, bizarrely, the jetAudio software offers no AAC conversion
Click for a full-sized image

The key advantage of the D2+ DAB over its main rivals is the sound quality. Using the supplied iAudio earbuds the clarity of the treble and mid-range is good on a variety of material. Use better headphones and you can hear the quality of the sound across the full frequency range. The ability to play lossless files means you can get cleaner sound at the expense of larger file size, if you prefer.

The ‘+’ in D2+ is Cowon’s proprietary BBE+ technology, a suite of sound enhancement algorithms that can sonically sweeten most kinds of music. OK, so you can spend long hours tweaking equalisers and effects and still end up switching back to flat output, but the facilities in BBE+, if used sparingly, can improve the stereo soundstage and bring the sound forward, improving its presence.

Easy memory expansion offers a way to cut the purchase price

The presets for pop, rock, vocal and jazz are a good point to start, although some did appear to put the lead vocals too far back in the mix. This was particular true in heavy rock tracks and in some experimental music, too. You can save your own settings as user presets.

Cowon claims the D2+ DAB can deliver up to 10 hours continuous video playback and 52 hours of audio. It also claims 5.5 hours to fully charge the D2+ DAB via USB and 3 hours using its optional charger. There are three different, internal memory capacities in the range, but because you can slot in an SDHC card, you can undercut the price differences. For example, an 8GB card will cost you under £15, which is a £25 saving on going from the 8 GB to 16GB player.

Verdict

The touchscreen works well, especially if you don't mind using the stylus, and the video playback is a useful bonus, but not really a prime function. However, if you're after a pocket player, which excels at sound reproduction, includes a DAB radio and support for lossless sound files, then the D2+ DAB is a good choice. ®

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