So, I set out to look for a new DAP. My list of criteria was rather simple, or so I thought:

• At least a 20GB hard drive
• Ogg Vorbis and MP3 support
• Small, portable design
• A good, usable, intuitive interface

Since it had been a while since the Neuros — the first DAP to support Ogg Vorbis — was released, I figured that by now the list of players fitting this bill would be quite extensive. I was wrong. Any time I found a player that fit the technical criteria, some more digging around always turned up a pile of reviews trashing its usability.

Just when I was about to give up, I found the iAudio M3. Read the rest of the article to find out why I chose it and why I recommend it to anyone looking for a digital audio player themselves.

The M3 is made by a company which apparently has had quite a bit of success in Asia but hasn’t penetrated the U.S. market as much. I guess it doesn’t help that it goes by at least three different names: iAudio, JetAudio, and Cowon America.

Not only did it fit the technical bill, but it looks sleek as hell, and all the reviews I read seemed to offer generally positive comments. It’s also apparently the only 20GB DAP in the world that’s smaller than a comparable iPod, but they achieve this by taking the unusual step of removing the display from the main unit entirely and placing it instead on a wired remote. The comments on this seemed to agree this is a feature people either love or hate.

I went ahead and ordered one, and although I was skeptical of the design at first, I can say I quickly joined the first camp and fell in love with it. I can set the main unit in my car’s console while driving and clip the tiny little remote to my shoulder belt, making it very easy to zip through albums and playlists without taking my eyes off the road. And they pack a ton of info onto that tiny little screen!

A quick note about Ogg Vorbis and why this format is important to me: whenever possible, I avoid supporting technology which takes away my rights. Apple does exactly that with their iPod and iTunes Music Store. Although the deal sounds great — 99 cents a song! — you aren’t actually buying music from Apple. That’s because Apple, not you, gets to decide what you do with this music after you buy it. It is distributed in a closed, proprietary format which guarantees you’ll only ever play it on Apple iPods, Apple iTunes, or any other means Apple says is OK (yes, you can burn it to CD then rip it to another format, but this will cause a noticeable loss of quality).

I’m sure the day is quickly approaching when such Digital Rights Management techniques are all that’s available, but until then, I’ll keep buying my music on CDs and ripping them myself. That’s why I support Ogg Vorbis. Even the wildly popular MP3 format is proprietary, and although the technology is over a decade old (and rather technically inferior to other formats such as Ogg), manufacturers must pay a royalty to the patent holder for every player they sell. And, of course, that royalty is passed right on to you. Ogg Vorbis, on the other hand, is open and free in every sense. No royalties, no format lock-in, no license agreements.

OK, back off my soapbox… in short, I love the M3. There are only a few small problems: first, in their desire to squeeze the main body into as tiny a form factor as possible, they removed the USB, power, and line in/out ports, moving these to either a micro-sized "port replicator" type device or a docking cradle (the headphone jack, of course, is still there — and if you’re using the remote, the headphones plug into it instead). Both these are included with the unit, but I’m sure I’ll either lose one of them or forget to bring it along on a future trip.

Also, it lacks the ability to search your music by metatags such as ID3, instead relying on file folders to organize your music. This means you can’t play by Artist or Album unless you lay out your files that way, and you need to preface your filenames with Track Number to get them to play in that order. It took a bit of time to reorganize my collection this way (with the help of the wonderful, open-source, yet unfortunately named MP3BookHelper), but afterwards it’s not much of an issue. You can also create as many playlists as you want (such as one per album or artist), but these are all stored in the same folder for some reason.

Aside from these minor flaws, I really dig this player. It seems they are being phased out in favor of the new X5, which adds a color screen, photo viewing ability, and moves the display back to the main unit. It’s also quite a bit more expensive. You can still find the M3 on eBay and some online stores, though.

I also have gotten my wife to start using Firefox as well, and she seems to rather like it, which is proof positive that it’s not just a program for computer geeks!

Whether or not the “browser wars” become reignited as some have speculated, it is becoming obvious that the Mozilla Foundation and their free Firefox browser have gotten Microsoft’s attention. Microsoft seems to be backing away from their earlier stance that a new version of Internet Explorer will not be released until the next version of Windows comes out sometime a few years from now. The development manager of IE has even started a blog where he serves up a bunch of lame excuses as to why IE is such a horrible product.

They very well should be taking notice, seeing as how Mozilla browsers now account for almost 15% of web traffic. This is up from around 5% a year ago, and almost all of that gain is at Microsoft’s expense. People are simply fed up with Internet Explorer and its outdated interface, unwanted popup ads (battling these pop-up ads is often compared to those “whack-a-mole” carnival games), and horrible security record.

As the well-respected Netcraft website puts it, “This is an extremely dangerous situation for Microsoft. The phishing threats and the growing professional chorus of disapproval for Internet Explorer provide Windows users with very good reasons to turn elsewhere, even if only temporarily. But Firefox is so good that many will want to stay with it. And once they have tasted the power and freedom of open source, maybe they will be tempted to try ‘just one more program’.”

Last year I wrote about Firefox (then called “Firebird”), Mozilla’s stand-alone web browser. Since then, Firefox has become even faster, more stable, and more feature-rich. They just released version 0.9, the last version before the 1.0 milestone. Even now, Firefox is so much better than Microsoft’s Internet Explorer in every regard that I cringe whenever I am forced to open IE, which I only do when some poorly-written web site doesn’t follow well-established internet standards and instead relies on Microsoft’s misguided “extensions”. If this happens when I’m at a commercial website, I simply take my business elsewhere.

Anyway, it’s nice to see some cash flowing Mozilla’s way. If it weren’t for them, web browsing would be a very bland and often-maddening experience. I eagerly look forward to the day when I can put away IE for good!

One of the included games was Voodoo Vince, which is the funniest video game I’ve ever played (although I hear a new Sam and Max is in the works, so that distinction might be short-lived). I won’t spoil anything for those who haven’t played it, but I was laughing out loud through most of its levels. The visual gags are just incredible.

Despite a few programming quirks, and the inability to download extra levels, this game is great. And don’t let the cartoony look fool you; it’s not for kids — some of the puzzles would be too hard for them, and some of the humor is slightly dark or off-color.

Okay, I lied earlier; heres a partial spoiler: in one level of the game, you are required to properly set up the various conveyer belts and machines in a meat factory to make sausage which you later use to persuade a Cajun cook to help you along. And as for the meat, there are a number of cute forest animals scurrying about on the floor, which you must guide onto the conveyors. They wave at you, giggle, and say things like “wee, this is fun!” and “you’re my best friend!” in a highly cutesy voice… until they reach the grinder. Definitely not PETA-approved!