The folks on Slashdot were impressed with the Neo 35 MP3 player, but the Neo 25 MP3 player from SSI seems to me a much better product.
The Neo 25 is a lot like the Creative Nomad Jukebox, only much better. Unlike the Nomad Jukebox, which is limited to a 6 gig hard drive, you can order the Neo 25 without a hard drive and install up to a 20 gig 2.5″ hard drive (and, of course, you can order the Neo 25 with a 6, 12 or 20 gig hard drive).
More importantly, though, the Neo 25 uses a USB interface which also allows users to store files other than MP3s on it. Now they’ve got my interest. I’ve seen small portable 6 gig hard drives that use USB interfaces, and I’ve seen MP3 players like the Nomad Jukebox, but this is the first unit I’ve seen that combined the two. And since it uses USB, it is completely compatible with both PCs and Macintosh (the promotional literature notes that users could “even use it in outerspace.” I wonder how well it would survive magnetic disruptions from solar storms. Somehow I think not very well.)
That would be great to be able to carry 8 or 9 gigabytes worth of MP3s as well as a mirror of my active datafiles from my home PC. The 20 gig version goes for $599 via mail order which is not bad when you consider the 6 gig Nomad Jukebox retails for about $400.