Full Review

17 August 2007 - Samsung has embraced "touch" with the announcement of a new MP3 player that like iPhone has just one button, but is this the experience a pleasurable one? Pocket-lint was given the chance to have a brief play in London.

The Samsung P2 launches at the same time in the UK as new versions of the company's K5 and T9B models (the S5 and T10) and is a 3-inch touchscreen media player that has a 16:9 widescreen LCD.

That touch screen dominates the entire front of the display and the screen and touch area all moulds into one rather than having a distinct screen.

Bright and crisp the 3-inch screen is powered by an OLED blacklight and the results are very good indeed. Images and video were especially good.

The model, which will be available in 2GB, 4GB and 8GB versions will come in black, wine red or white meaning it will answer to all those looking for an Apple iPod alternative or Creative Zen offering.

The main focus as we've said, is the touchscreen interface which takes up the whole of the front of the display and apart from an on/off button and volume controls on the side is the only way of controlling the player.

Users will be able to "touch" their way through the controls and access video, music, pictures, and listen to radio via the unit's 480 x 272 WQVGA screen.

If that wasn't enough, the unit will also sport Bluetooth 2.0 meaning you can ditch the cables and get one of those wire free headphones instead. It also means that you can transfer files to and from it from other people's mobile phones easily.

In our brief use, we were pleasantly surprised at the touch performance. The screen was very responsive, similar to that of the company's mobile phone offering, and the simple to use interface was really easy to use and navigate around.

The only confusing element in fact was a light on the front of the display used to denote when the unit is charging - for the first couple of minutes we though it was a button that did something.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Samsung has produced a really good offering here that provides plenty of features like Bluetooth, a radio and a screen that is although small, still suitable for watching video on.

With no issues about software compatibility (it's drag and drop), this is going to be a great alternative to Apple's current iPod range.

How it will stand up to a touchscreen iPod is another matter, but for now, we like it.