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July 30, 2008

iRiver Lplayer 8GB MP3 player

Our first reaction to this tiny Lplayer was, 'where the blazes are the controls?' The unit itself is only 60 x 43 x 13mm while the 2in, 320 x 240 screen is, well, small.

The clever thing with the Lplayer is that the entire screen and its bezel is mounted on a four-way pressure pad, so control of the usual iRiver D*Click user interface is accomplished by pushing down on one of the four edges of the screen. At 41g, the Lplayer is among the lighter players on the market.

The L-Player does have some conventional external controls. Tucked away on the bottom are the on/off switch and the volume control, while around the back is a key-lock slider.

In day-to-day use, the design stands up rather well. To activate the relevant command, a pretty deliberate push is needed to make an adjacent on-screen arrow flash to show the command has been accepted, but this is doubtless a necessary compromise to prevent inadvertent knocks and bumps activating the player.

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Posted by pajaro at July 30, 2008 6:01 PM