Updated 23 May, 2012, 6:39 pm IST

The Cowon A2 Vs Creative Zen Vision:W

29 Jul, 2007, 11:00 am IST | by Shayne Rana

We've pitted The Cowon A2 against the Creative Vision:W and these are our findings.

PMPs are getting increasingly popular in this day and age as they presume to be great ways of travel entertainment. With a large screen for video playback, who wouldn’t want to spend their time traveling and watching a movie as compared to just listening to music? Of course you will have to worry about the rest of the world peering over your shoulder. So daily commuting with a PMP for company in our fair city is definitely out. But what about longer trips? On outstation journeys either by train, plane or automobile, the PMP would be ideal. So what we decided to do, is pit two of the big name manufacturers of PMPs against each other and see who comes out on top. In one corner we have the Cowon A2 and in the other we have the Creative Zen Vision:W. We’ll have a fair fight with no below the belt shots so let's get ready to rumble!

Design
Shayne on the CV:W – The Vision:W was a bit on the heavy side at 276g, so it did become a bit of a problem to carry around too easily. Although in paradox its dimensions are just 134 x 75 x 22 mm. The simplicity of the controls with the 5 way nav pad and simple menus allow you to navigate the various options quite easily. What I also liked was the Compact Flash Card port on the side so it can be used by photographers as well. What’s most impressive is the large 4.2-inch TFT LCD screen that has a 16:9 aspect ratio. Its sub menu Button is also a boon to have and use.

Laiq on the A2 – As far as design is concerned, the A2 looks really elegant. It's a simple design, with no frills attached. It’s got the blend of white piano finish and brushed gray. Yet in all its elegance, the player does look rather vulnerable to scratches. To counter this, Cowon has bundled a leather carry case, which can be folded in place to prop the player up at a comfortable viewing angle. The A2 isn’t very different from the Vision:W with dimensions of 133 x 79 x 22mm but weighs slightly more at 298g. All this to accommodate a smaller screen size of just 4 inches!

AV Quality (Performance)
Shayne on the CV:W – It was breeze watching videos as it was hardly required that I convert any videos at all. The Vision:W can read AVI, DivX 4 & 5, XviD 4, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG4-SP, WMV9 and Motion-JPEG formats so there wasn’t any need to. The player also gives you an option of watching the movie in the normal 16:9 format or you can stretch it to the full screen size. Video quality was aces but the audio was not something I was too thrilled about.

Since the CV:W has a graphic EQ that can manually be customized, it does help enhance the audio experience. It also has a Bass Booster setting and more importantly it has a preset for Smart Volume. This actually keeps the volume output in check. The output was loud enough but the quality I’m afraid could have been better at peak volume.

Laiq on the A2–The A2 seems to have made up for its smaller screen size with its playback capabilities. As is the case with most PMPs this doesn’t require one to convert files before playback. In my case, I tested the machine with a lot of recently encoded videos and it managed to play them all. It plays all the files formats including AVI, DivX/XviD, WMV, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and ASF. The viewing quality is quite good as it is equipped with 0.183mm pixel pitches in the 4-inch screen (480x272 pixels) with the integrated high density and high definition technology.