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Like an increasing number of portable media players, Samsung’s P3 has a touchscreen. It doesn’t feel nearly as sensitive as Apple’s iPod Touch’s screen, though, and scrolling through long lists can be quite frustrating. It has haptic feedback, so it can be set to vibrate when touched, which compensates for its lack of sensitivity. It doesn’t recognise multitouch gestures, but it does support more basic gestures such as swiping your finger to skip tracks. A small gesture area beneath the screen allows you to quickly access commonly used buttons and menus, such as music playback controls. There are physical volume controls on the top of the P3, but they can’t be used to adjust the volume without you having to unlock the screen first. The earphones included with most MP3 players usually sound very poor, so we were pleasantly surprised by the set included with the P3. They sound clear and detailed, with a respectable amount of bass. You’ll still need a good third-party pair for the very best audio quality, especially if you like bass-heavy music. If earphone cords annoy you, Bluetooth is built in so you can use wireless headphones without an external adaptor, but this will reduce the P3’s long battery life of 29 hours and 19 minutes when playing music. The P3’s battery also did well when playing video, lasting eight hours and 14 minutes. We had no trouble playing H.264 and DivX videos, but the P3 refused to play XviD files. Brightness can be adjusted without stopping the video currently playing. However, it can resume playing from where you left off only as long as you don’t start playing another file. The screen is bright, but poor contrast makes it hard to see details in dimly lit movies and TV programmes.
We were a little disappointed by the quality of the P3’s screen, while its lack of wireless networking and third-party applications means it’s not as versatile as Apple’s iPod Touch. It has a long battery life and good audio quality, though, making it a good-value music player. If such long battery life isn’t an issue, iRiver’s E200 8GB is a better choice.
