Cowon S9 | Beacuse you’re not completely stupid

Or rather, Cowon S9 | Claw Wallpaper UCI, though these days I refer to it as simply the Claw UCI.

This is all of the functionality I have wanted in an MP3 player since I first purchased one.

I’ve been running Claw’s UI since I purchased the S9 in August and have never looked back. Most people use the Wallpaper UI to add extraneous functions that bloat the resident shell, however I use it to make my player operate as lean as possible, instead utilising the advantages of text customisation for easy, practical distinction.

Claw’s dedication to constantly updating his Flash UI is astounding, with bugs now very particular and usually resolved within weeks of release of the initial build. There are some existing issues that have endured because of hardware and environment handling complications, however none of them break any of the crucial usability. I’ve not crashed the unit once running his UI, though I did jump in at version 3.30 or thereabouts.

This is real, serious tech.
The Cowon S9 running stock UI is already as far from an iPod one can get, including the ever important navigation by directory structure while still retaining support of navigation by metadata. However Claw’s UI is built to respect the intelligent. The level of customisability is jaw-dropping and while some features do come at a slight hit to processing, there are usually decent workarounds or the impact of the additional load is negligible at best.

I have always believed in discreet technology, and the S9 is a minimalist’s dream, further facilitated by the options Claw gives me. This thing looks like it lives and breathes me, and any of my friends and family who pick it up and use it know that it’s mine. It’s lean, without extraneous and often hideous backgrounds and animations, and the level of audio-engineering respect has been amped up by Cowon’s native five-band limited parametric EQ (centre frequency and Q have presets rather than being fully parametric).
Claw’s options allow you to hide the interface overlays on all the important screens at a tap of the screen, and fully customise functions on the shortcut bar in the music player.

I’m stunned.
I’ve been running Claw since August, but the latest update just made me appreciate the hard work he put in, and also the native architecture of the S9 hardware that allows it.
It felt almost exactly like watching Texhnolyze, Tokyo.Sora or Mulholland Dr. for the first time; I’m stunned that people make things that seem specifically tailored for me and the way I think.

When it comes to satisfaction with a product, I don’t think I’ve ever been as satisfied with anything I’ve ever owned as I am with the S9.