“Creative today unveiled the Zii Egg. The device is in its stock form a competitor to the iPod touch with a 3.5-inch 480×320 multi-touch display that supports music, photo and video playback as well as web browsing,” Electronista reports.
“Creative however sees the device as a development platform. The built-in Plaszma operating system is Linux-based and therefore open-source, letting companies or end users add software, change features or even replace the OS; the device is ready to use Google’s Android almost out of the box,” Electronista reports.
“It also promises certain technical edges over the iPod through a graphics processor that can not only render 42 million pixels per second but output video at 720p or 1080p through HDMI,” Electronista reports. “The general-purpose design gives it not only Bluetooth and Wi-Fi but both an HD-capable outward camera for taking photos and a front VGA camera for self-portraits or video conferencing. A GPS receiver is built-in for location-based apps even when the Zii Egg is beyond Wi-Fi, and Creative’s X-Fi audio processing is standard.”
“Creative hasn’t specified plans to ship the Zii Egg as its own, pre-packaged device. [Rather, they are] is inviting other firms to treat it as a blank slate,” Electronista reports.
Direct link via YouTube here.
Full article here.
View the press release here.
A 32GB Zii Eg along with the Zii Plaszma Starter Kit (SDK) can be had for US$399. More info here.
MacDailyNews Take: We don’t know — can’t quite place it — but, for some reason, that Zii EGG looks very familiar.
Zii, egg, Plaszma, stem cell – stupid names much? The use of the phrase ‘stem cell’ is not only idiotic, it has negative connotations. Lemme guess, no marketing team over there. I can see the reviews not: “The Zii has laid an egg.”
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But it’s competition for Apple. I like the features the iPod Touch doesn’t have. Its always nice to give Apple a kick once in a while.
However, the video has noticeable stuttering. It has version 1.0 syndrome of course, then add the fact that its beta. I know Android has some security problems. We’ll see how that goes. Certainly the roll out is nothing like Apple’s class act. But it’s still viable competition. Kewlness. Just dump the dumdum names please. We’ve had our fill of hardware failures starting with ‘Z’.
Wow, what a cool product from a Singaporean company.
I can’t wait to load all my App Store apps onto it.
Oh, wait, that won’t work right?
Well, at least it will sync with my iTunes library.
No?
Sheesh. Well, what about acting as a remote control for my Macintosh.
Not that either?!
Dang. Might as well get a Zune then!
“As well as this stylish and attractive form factor..”
Translates as – IPHONE COPY.
‘Creative’ by name – not creative by nature.
You just know that any company with the word ‘creative’ in it is infact the total opposite – NOT very ‘creative’.
(See video in article for proof)
If anyone saw the ‘Zii’ ina store the 1st thing they will say is that it “looks like an iphone copy”.
I am constantly amazed how little innovation is out there from companies that compete with Apple.
The product is called the Zii Egg, and yet they dont experiment with round type form factors they just blatantly copy an iphone.
Duh – Eggs are a roundish shape… where’s the relevance to black and square in the word ‘egg’?
If my company was to design a mobile device called the Zii Egg we would have exploited the round form factor to create something that looks totally different and new and not an iphone clone (version 100+).
Only when companies realise this will they ever be able to compete.
But you cant teach an old company how to suck eggs – XD
@sc
“hmmmm, hd camera + video conference cam, massive storage, open gl, 1080p output, wifi, gps, and runs android, which means I dont have to worry about craptunes or paying for media. And when consumer version comes out its $199. While you guys are stoked on taking crappy pictures on your crappytouch’s, Ill be on skype and taking and watching videos in hd.”
—-
Errr… yes…..
And how will you do all this when the device will have a battery life of 30 minutes because of the drain on the processor?…
I can see their strapline on their ads now…
‘The Zii Egg – not compatible with iTunes’.
ROFL
“Copying the iphone without having a definitive OS or Apps, puts developers back to square one. Why not develop for the iphone and make money? Do the added features seriously drain the battery? What if you spend your life developing, and it never takes off? “
Ummm…. you should follow some of gruber’s links the last few days at daringfireball.com.
Personally my issue is this: “What if you spend your life developing and Apple rejects you?” You are obviously not an iphone developer and have no idea what it is like to deal with Apple when you are one.
I looked at this obvious knockoff and I’m already in love. Why, because my beautiful labor of love (and sweat and cash) could get written for that and actually not get killed by Apple.
For consumers the issue has always been… you can’t just be as good as the ipod, you have to compellingly better. As a developer Apple has turned it upside down… you can be almost as good as an ipod touch and just not be developer hostile.
These things are platforms now… not ipods. They will live and die by the QUALITY of their apps. I think you’re going to be surprised by how much innovation happens outside of the hostile treatment of the apple app reviewer.
I haven’t given up on the iphone yet. But this was a ray of hope. Creative can manufacture things and sell them cheap and I just decided to learn a lot more about android.
You people who benefit from all those apps have no idea how poorly apple is treating its developers–and how impossible it is as a business. If Creative gets 10% of the market… 10% of a huge number is a lot more than the zero you get when Apple blocks you.
Oh, and how’s that Google Voice working out for you?
Go Creative.
And I’m an apple fanboy!!!