The iPod now has new competition. The Cowon portable media player dubbed the Q5W is now out on the market and ready to woo customers. It is Bluetooth enabled and supports Wi-Fi. In addition it has a 5 inch Hi Res Touch screen. The other software in this device includes Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Adobe’s Embedded Flash Player 7. You have the option of GPS with this device. Other than the Q5W, the P2 was recently released in response to the iPhone and iPod Touch.

The Cowon Q5W is hard disk based an available in two capacities - 40 and 60 GB. There are not many non flash memory based players with touch screens and Wi-Fi.
You can buy the Q5W online from B&H and NewEgg for $550 and $600. The 16GB iPod Touch in comparision is much cheaper, in fact, by a hundred dollars at $ 400. The explanation for the difference in price is that the Cowon Q5W has a higher storage capacity, and includes Microsoft CE 5.0, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. It also supports many file types. It is compatible with the popular video and audio codecs and there is easy transcoding software for other formats.

If you want GPS, you will need to spend another $200. So a 60 GB Cowon Q5W with GPS will set you back by $800. That is quite a bundle! So will the Cowon Q5W be able to provide competition to the iPod? Lets wait and see.