4. Creative Labs MuVo Slim

Creative Labs has gone the other way. The MuVo Slim is like a credit card, no thicker than 7.5mm. It is 985mm long and 55mm wide and comes elegantly in silver and black. Its anodized aluminum cover inspires confidence and the buttons and dial on the side keep up the impression of luxury. What's more, the Slim comes with a handy, good-looking artificial leather case. Though it doesn't beat the Yepp in weight, you still can't say that 50 grams is really heavy. And it has a removable lithium-ion battery built into it, so the player won't pack up when it does. The upside is that you don't need to change batteries and that it lasts 14 hours. The downside is that you need a computer to be able to recharge it on the USB port. Like the Yepp, the USB input is not built in.

Less Flashy?

The MuVo Slim has almost as many functions, lacking only analog recording and encoding. It has an FM tuner and the Dictaphone with a built-in microphone. It can play MP3 (320kbps) and WMA (192kbps). It is detected as a removable drive and can be used as a USB key. Creative ships it with Mediasource, an excellent music manager for PC. This Creative player sticks to an equalizer, which is a good idea, especially as it can be adjusted for every track.