You cannot beat the sound quality imo. The interface is a bit bizzare, but nothing you can't master in 5 to 10 minutes of focus. The sound quality is top notch. I bought the M2 to replace my dead C2. As far as I can tell, they are the same machine ap...Read moreart from some style issues and that the M2 has a few more presets than the C2. The touch screen is the same resistive type as the C2, and that is what failed on my C2 after 6 years. I hope some tlc and keeping it out of the warm sun will make this one last longer.

Spendid little player. The multiple codec support is a winner for me, giving fabulous reproduction of lossless formats.

Like others, I'm still getting to grips with the UI but, unlike others, I'm not that fussy and as long as it does the job of se...Read morelecting what I want to play in the manner that I want it played, then I am happy.

Excellent all round "MP3" Player... supports multiple formats and the expansion slot is a great bonus... my only criticism is with a particularly full SDCard it can take a fair time to load up. More than it should really. But thats nit pick...Read moreing. Simple interface, don't be put of by the touch screen... Cowons latest models with touch screens similar to your smart phone cost a bomb and drain the battery life.

If you want decent protection though you will have to fork out quite a bit, unless you like those jelly/rubbery cases, as Cowon isn't that widely recognised so after marker accessories are sparse.

Player has excellent sound quality but poor restrictive touch screen. But if you can live with this nuance it is worth it.

Firstly Id say i am a long time fan of COWON MP3 Players But Im not a tech head So My review is purely based on usability & sound quality So here we go
Build: 9/10 a small but very solid little player fits nicely in the pocket & in your han...Read mored not so light weight as to feel as if it would fall out of your pocket without you noticing Not so heavy as to feel cumbersome.
User-friendly: 8/10 Ill mark this a few points down only because for me there seem to be a few pointless extra functions on the player that just clog up the interfaces & make them slightly clunky to use at first, until you get used to the amount of pressure required to move between the function screens. Im not sure its possible to remove any of the (for want of a better word i'll say) apps, which would simplify the functionality of the player. But to be fair after a few days I managed to work out most of the key functions even with my fat fingers!
Sound Quality: 10/10 If you have ever heard a COWON player before you'll know their probably second to none when it comes to sound. Although there are a vast number of EQ settings on this player for the vast majority of time I leave it on the basic setting as I use BOSE on ear headphones with my player So I don't personally need to embellish the sound sat all I have to say that the player is all about the music and sound quality for me and it plays any kind of file I have been able to throw at it Cocteau Twins Heaven or Las Vegas never sounded so brilliant on an Mp3 player before So Im one happy Goth! (Ironic I know!)

The Battery power is ridiculous! I have had the player for nearly a month now I have charged it once! & I use the player every day!

So over all I'll give the player 8.5 / 10 with a few tiny tweaks it would be perfect

As Others have said ... Not the best Touch screen "cough" more like push finger Through the screen. Cowon PLEASE ask Apple??? Who Can get it right! However the SOUND Quality is SUPERB ... my cowon M2 is up for sale after Only One WEEK! But ...Read moreOnly because I bought a COWON PLENUE P1 & Thank God the touch screen WORKS! Excellent ... & music playback is AWEsome! But there is a little difference in the price ;-) I am now on my 3rd Model of Cowon players an S9 , M2 & now the Plenue P1. I am a gadget freak & would NOT keep buying the products if they weren't Considered the best ... Ok the touch screen on the M2 is Not their best But the music sounds excellent , the price is Cracking & THAT (up to) 90HR battery life! Superb!

The interface of this device is a disaster.

Yes it has hardware buttons but Cowon seem to have completely ignored them.
Let me say this again, the interface is a disaster, so I arranged a returns note.

But then found there were alternate UI...Read mores written by third parties in flash.

So I installed them and the player was transformed. The main thing is the alternate UIs actually USE the hardware buttons sensibly so you do not have to use on the screen or put up with the horrible twee messages on the built in user screens.

So in in short I am now really happy with the M2, the sound quality is good, its great but only if you add the (free) third party User interfaces to it.

Interface is a bit fiddly and touch screeb alignment is not perfect
Haven't yet worked out how to get it to play one album after another so currently playing one at a time.
That said, sound quality is awesome and screen display is excellent
thrill...Read moreed with battery life and it is an excellent value player

So far so good, I bought this as a portable music player and radio with a long battery life and I've just about got the hang of the UI. I'd say for me the touch screen is an unnecessary gimmick, and some of the bundled 'apps' are a joke. However, as ...Read morea music player it does what you need. It would be good to display more of the tags (than just track title and artist) - I have several versions of some tracks and it's good to be reminded which is which. Perhaps I simply haven't worked out how to do this, for example the shuffle function works well enough, but it isn't in the manual.

A good player but the customary inadequate manual from Cowon. The interface is a bit clunky but nowhere near as bad as the X9. Having owned three Cowons now I’ve come to see the need to work out how to use the player without an adequate manual as add...Read moreing to their charm. Ditto Cowon’s ability to create a completely new obstacle course of an interface with each new device. But the sound and battery life make up for negatives. Also good customer support from AMP3 with a small glitch regarding the expansion card.

I bought the Cowon M2 for the reputed sound quality, the provision of a microSD slot, and the extended battery life. The sound quality is excellent and, for me, far outweighs any of the shortcomings in the GUI and touchscreen. I have been unable to t...Read morehoroughly test the battery life, but using it for about 20 hours seems to have made no impact on the battery whatsoever, so it is already a huge improvement on any media player I've used before.

I have no reservations about the sonic performance. I have been listening with B&W C5s and Grado SR 60i and the results are a delight.

As others have said, the touchscreen is a bit fiddly and the GUI is not quite as intuitive as I would have liked. However, after a day or two of use, it now feels like I've got the hang of it.

In summary: if you're interested in listening to entire albums in high fidelity sound, then this is for you; if you're likely to be looking for and playing lots of different tracks, then you may find the interface a bit frustrating.

I got this for my wife who just wanted a good MP3 player for our holidays, that had a good battery life. She also wanted it to be compact so that she could strap it to her arm when exercising.

General: We are generally happy with the purchase. I t...Read morehink that the user interface is over complicated as it has two views you can use (why?). Maybe just using buttons would be better than a resistive touch screen to navigate around and we have found and decided that a touch pen is beneficial to operate the touch screen interface.
Good: The unit is small and compact and has great sound. With 32GB of storage it has plenty of room for your music and other media.
Bad: Resistive screens are not as good a capacitive and the user interface can be a bit tricky to use. We tend to fall back on to the folder view and make the music selection from there and we have got used to the way that works.