images1.jpgThe iRiver Clix sounds fantastic. It’s far the best Mp3 in the world, superior than the iPods. As icing on the cake, the iRiver Clix supports MPEG-4 and WMV9 video. That is, you’ll have to convert your files before playing them on the device. While iRiver’s user guide clearly documents the parameters for compatible video and describes.The iriver clix is almost all screen, leaving literally no room on the face for controls. So how do you operate it? By clicking the face, of course, as the name would suggest.

While this may sound clumsy at first when compared to a dedicated set of navigation controls, it really isn’t. Moving through long lists is hardly a chore thanks to accelerated scrolling, and two handy shortcuts exist for quickly moving between the two most common screens. Hold left from any screen to access the main menu, and hold right to quickly move to the now playing screen from most places. Also, there’s a dedicated “smart button” on the side of the unit that can be set to the following options for even more efficiency: A-B repeat, home, play/pause, shuffle, display orientation, start/stop recording, and display on/off.

it’s a tad smaller than I imagined, about the same overall as the iPod Nano. The audio quality is as good or better than my iPods. One of the coolest things about it is it can connect as an MSC external storage device, allowing you to simply drag-and-drop your media files into it. In this mode it’s platform agnostic, meaning that it’ll work on either a PC, Mac or Linux computer. Drag-and-drop is nice because I can simply copy media files onto it from multiple computers, regardless of platform and not be restricted to syncing with one source, like the iPod. It’s perfect for a geek like me who has multiple computers running different OS’s.

In the PC World Test Center’s audio tests, the Clix fared poorly at handling harmonic distortion and cross-talk; our test of the latter measure assesses whether sound from one channel leaks into the other. In informal testing, I got reasonably clean sound through the accompanying earbuds.

iRiver Clix (8GB, second generation) reviews from cnet

The good: The next generation iRiver Clix is even sleeker and slimmer than its predecessor, but offers the same unique and intuitive interface and stellar audio quality. This player comes packed with extras such as an FM radio; a voice recorder; an alarm clock; support for subscription content as well as OGG and Audible files; and photo, video, and text viewing. The Clix includes SRS Wow sound effects, it has good battery life, and it’s priced competitively.

The bad: There’s no cradle or line-in recording options for the new Clix yet, and iRiver doesn’t offer an easy way to get video content for the device.

The bottom line: The iRiver Clix offers the perfect blend of hot design, desirable features, and stellar sound quality. If you’re looking for an alternative to the iPod Nano, this device should top the list.

iRiver Clix (8GB, second generation) reviews from alatest

Pros: The next generation iRiver Clix is even sleeker and slimmer than its predecessor, but offers the same unique and intuitive interface and stellar audio quality. This player comes packed with extras such as an FM radio; a voice recorder; an alarm clock; sup…

Cons: There’s no cradle or line-in recording options for the new Clix yet, and iRiver doesn’t offer an easy way to get video content for the device.

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