We’re withholding judgment on the Zii platform until somebody really gets a chance to use it in a final form (you can see video of it running Android here), but little did we know that Creative has more planned for the vaguely-defined media platform than PMPs. They’ve just announced that we can expect a sort of media player/e-book reader with the Zii branding sometime… sometime in the next couple years I’d say. They actually showed a unit, boasting about its color touchscreen, but apparently nobody thought to take pictures. So we’re all left wondering — but whatever you’re picturing in your head right now is probably about right.
Except you there, with the freckles. What you’re thinking is wrong. So, so wrong.
Creative’s uber-device, the Zii, is looking to be a firecracker. With dual cameras, lots of space inside, and Android compatibility as well as Creative’s Plaszma OS, it looks like it may out-Touch the Touch.
Not only this, but it’s been revealed that the Zii also will be the first to run a specialized version of Opera. I trust Opera to go all in with a mobile browser like this; I have fond memories of the Ocean’s Opera Mini browser, and this should be ten times better.
Creative made a small splash the other day when the Zii project broke cover. It very well could be the first, real iPod touch competitor thanks to Android and impressive hardware. Here’s two more videos showing off the Zii. The one above is an impressive game demo that demos the accelerometer and the one after the break gets into the nitty-gritty about the hardware. Read More
Creative makes MP3 players. They do a good job. I like Creative. Good people over there. A good company.
But I got this email today describing Creative’s plans with the new Zii handheld and I was immediately struck by a question: What the hell is this Plaszma Zii StemCell garbage?
Ah, there we go — a little more info about Creative’s mysterious “Zii” project. It now appears to be an iPod touch-like device, called the Zii EGG, running Android. Interesting… I’m listening.
Some FCC documents have been filed by Creative which clearly outline (so to speak) a media player with a nice, big touch screen and an “HD” camera, which bespeaks 720p or better. The “Egg” version apparently is for developers, although I’d like to have “developer edition on mine anyway.
Beyond that everything is pretty much speculation, so we’ll just let you look at the picture for a while.
“Fire the Zii device!”
“But my lord! We still have men on the ground!”
“Silence, fool! Move the X-Fi gunships out of the area and prepare the Audigy for a ground assault. And fire the thing.”
“We don’t even know what its effect is, my lord!”
“Lieutenant, everything you know is about to change.”
I’m not sure what to make of this, but if you go to Creative.com – say, looking for an MP3 player – you’ll find a teaser link to Zii.com that says “Everything you know is about to change…”
We’re withholding judgment on the Zii platform until somebody really gets a chance to use it in a final form (you can see video of it running Android here), but little did we know that Creative has more planned for the vaguely-defined media platform than PMPs. They’ve just announced that we can expect a sort of media player/e-book reader with the Zii branding sometime… sometime in the next couple years I’d say. They actually showed a unit, boasting about its color touchscreen, but apparently nobody thought to take pictures. So we’re all left wondering — but whatever you’re picturing in your head right now is probably about right.
