Cowon A2

One thing I really love about his player is that you don’t have to convert any video files for viewing. It comes with an integrated DivX player with an official registration number. This pretty much covers all the formats you can think of, including AVI, DivX/XviD, WMV, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and ASF. It also supports the AC3 sound format, which almost all the new DivX movies come with. However, if you do have a problem with a variation of DivX files then you can make use of the bundles software and simply convert. Conversion takes as long as the duration of the movie/clip etc., but trust me I haven’t had the need to convert even once. Although, you will need conversion for Quicktime and Real Media files.

Viewing movies is a pleasure on the A2, although we noticed some mosaic compression on the screen. This was prevalent in almost all the movies, but that’s something you can easily ignore if entertainment is what you seek.

One of the downsides of not equipping the player with touch-screen is that reaching a particular place in the movie requires fast forwarding. Yet, this is aided by a feature where in you can simply hold the thumbstick in place toward the right and the rate at which the player fast forwards increases manifold.

You can change video settings while watching the movie itself, which is bliss. You can change the aspect ratio from either 16:9 or 4:3 to auto. There is a Pan & Scan feature, which lets you zoom into the movie up to 300 percent. This acts just like the digital zoom feature and distorts the frames at the highest pan level. I don't see any reason why you should be doing this.

Apart from this there is an option to control the playback speed, subtitle color, and an option to switch off subtitles and shuffle between movie audio tracks. One of the most useful features that the A2 offers is an option to take screenshots. You can use it for your blog or to use as wallpaper.