new Toshiba Gigabeat S Series of Multimedia Players
Toshiba informs us that the Gigabeat S series will be available in Japan starting April 28, 2006 and that the higher-end 60GB model S60V will sell for $399, with the lower-capacity S30 going for -100.
We’ve made note of these hdd-based iPod-esque music and video players from Toshiba before, continue to think well of them, but still feel that the iPod provides a cleaner, simpler look, as compared to this new Gigabeat offering.
The Apple iPod has all of it’s functionality clustered in the Click Wheel controller. By contrast, the Toshiba has the Plus Touch controller and 2 buttons on the front of the device, as well as 5 more buttons along the right-hand side, for a total of 8 different controls - seems a tad much.
The superficial amongst us might be tempted to conclude that Apple is run by architecturalists motivated by the saying form follows function, and Toshiba by engineers determined to deliver mostly function … not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Complete specs for the S series are available at this link … Kanji alert.
The gigabeat S series (4/28 sale schedules) it added - Toshiba press release, 2006.04.10 … as rendered by Babelfish
