Lately there has been a strange fascination with slapping diamonds or crystals all over our devices. Take the Mickey Mouse mp3 player. For some reason, someone saw fit to cover Mickey’s ears in tacky Swarovski crystals. We’re all old enough to know that crystal in this case is just a pretty word for glass. Even if these were diamonds, it would be over the top.

Iriver’s Mickey Mouse MP3 isn’t new, but the bling is. This was done for the Japanese market. Only 500 units are being made for the new pimped out edition and they are going for 16,800 Yen (about. £75).

These speakers/moodlight/FM radio are simply way too cool to behold. They remind me of the Easter Island stone heads, you know, if aliens had mated with robots and then made art. For a dock, it really does do quite alot.

Raise and lower the volume by simply waving your hand across the infrared sensor. You can tune the radio by the same means. No need to press any buttons. Of course you can plug your mp3 player into it, or turn on the radio. If you get really bored you watch the pretty mood light glow.

If you needed proof that Star Wars was way ahead of it’s time, here it is. This new Music Stick resembles a small lightsaber. It might even be the most lightsaber like product that is not actually a lightsaber. Of course, it may just be that the manufacturer wants to capture the hearts and minds of geeks everywhere. Either way, this is a slick looking mp3 player.

It features a 2GB or 4GB storage capacity, has a small display for track information, FM radio, voice recorder and a High speed USB 2.0 connection. The formats it supports for playback are MP3, OGG, WMA and WAV (PCM/ADPCM).

Let’s face it, Terrestrial radio is nearly dead. That means it’s time to replace that old AM/FM device that you have. The MusicPal wireless Internet radio and MP3 player looks like a good choice. It also has some advantages over other wireless radio devices. For one thing, it’s smaller then many of it’s competitors, no extra hardware is required and it doesn’t require a computer to operate either. It even goes so far as to display some of your favorite RSS feeds.

The Musicpal comes programmed with a library of more than 5,000 Internet radio stations, but if you still like your MP3s, it can stream them directly from a home network. Did I mention that it also has an alarm clock? At $150 you get your money’s worth.

We all love music. Some of us so much so that we hold on to old media long after it’s time has passed. Take that box of old cassettes you have stashed in the closet, for example. You know who you are. Problem is, tapes degrade over time. Eventually, you either have to buy it anew on more recent media, or convert it somehow.

Enter the plusdeckEX. It mates with your PC via USB and the result is beautiful digital music. A 7.1 channel built-in sound card converts the analog signal from the cassette tape into a digital file format like MP3. It’s just that easy.

If you have ever wanted to combine your faith with technology, then you might want to look into what Chinese wholesaler, Chinavision has up their religious sleeve. The “Cross MP3 Player,” comes in 3 different memory sizes. 1GB, 2GB and 4GB from $22.47 to $48.14.

Priests everywhere now have a piece of technology that doesn’t have sin written all over it. Think about it. If you pull one of these things out during a sermon, your cool factor goes up accordingly. Plus, it makes the word you are preaching so much cooler. Let’s face it, you have to convert the youth. Not just religion-wise, but away from those products that depict that Apple with the bite taken out of it. (It was Eve’s fault.)

Two new PMPs by Energy Sistem are now available in Europe. Meet the the Inngenio 4000 DUET HDP M-EX and the Inngenio 5000 HDP M-EX right and bottom respectively. The 4000 model has a smaller 2.8-inch QVGA TFT LCD display compared to the 5000’s 3.5 inch, but exceeds the storage capacity of the 5000 with a whopping 6GB via miniSD in contrast to 2GB SD capacity of its counterpart.

The units understand many common formats including MPEG4, MP3, WMA, WAV and views JPG, BMP, TXT and in addition the Inngenio 4000 plays XVid and posesses an FM Tuner making it seem to be a higher end model except for screen size. The 4000 will fetch about $220 USD while the other is priced at $170 USD.

Music players are evolving slowly but surely adding features here or there, miniturizing etc. This particularly small MP3 player has a good feature set for what it is. For musicians, this device would work perfectly as a scratch pad during the writing process with its built in voice recorder to name just one of the interesting features.

The 2 tone LCD is adequate for its purpose and the navigation screen is simple. The player includes a built in speaker for when you’d rather not be wearing headphones, and hosts a 7 mode EQ to adjust the output of your WMA or MP3 files and the WAV files recorded via the built in voice recorder.

Amazon.com went full steam into downloadable MP3s today, unveiling a beta version of Amazon MP3, its new digital music download store. Most songs will range in price from 89 to 99 cents, while albums will run you $5.99 to $9.99.

Amazon MP3 features over 2 million songs from more than 180,000 artists represented by over 20,000 major and independent labels. All downloads will be MP3s which are DRM-free, meaning there’s no restrictions on what device or music management software is used to play them. Songs can even be burned to CD.

This super-thin USB Flash Card MP3 player from Brando is about the size of a credit card or just slightly larger at 85.5 x 54 x 4.5 mm and can house 2GB of listening media. It can also work as mass storage (if you call 2GB mass storage anymore) by connecting via USB to your computer.

The device can play MP3 or WMA files and has buttons that are flush with the frame that control navigating the songs. It also has a red LED light that lets you know the internal battery is charged and the player is on. You can even make a special request to have your own graphics put on the player, making it a nice “business card” MP3 player to give away to clients and customers.

If you’re looking for something thin and …

The MOSMC1319P by Ministry of Sound provides almost everything you’d want in a desktop music station. Twin speakers, disconnected from the control unit, provide a total of 20 Watts (2 x 10Watt RMS speakers) and kick out sounds from a number of sources. Hook up your iPod or inject tunes in MP3, WMA or WAV formats stored on a SD or MMC flash card or via USB device.

The micro station also includes an FM/MW PLL digital tuner for streaming radio and is compatible with all CD types and includes a 30-track programming feature. And as you’d expect these days the unit is controlled via a wireless remote.

Illustrated right is a render of the Meizu M7 touch screen miniPlayer geared to compete directly with iPod Touch. The media player is targeted for a March 2008 release with a price tag that could draw business away from Apple for all but the most die-hard iPod users. The tentatively named M7 will sport a 2.8 inch touch screen with a 16:9 480×228 resolution and supports H.264 playback. At $100, $110 and $150 for 2GB, 4GB and 8GB models respectively, the M7 is likely to be a very popular iPod clone.

While a cheaper alternative to the Apple iPod MP3 player, its lower price likely indicates this Chinese manufactured Miezu clone will lack the quality and attention to detail that the Apple players have become known for. The design concept has only recently and hurriedly been announced so stay tuned for any updates.

The ASUS R300 and R700 GPS receiver touchscreen media players are planned for European release in November. Both units share the same primary functionality with subtle advantages for the R700.

There are two differences between models. Pictured right is the R700 with a 4.3 inch screen while its R300 counterpart sports a 3.5 inch display. The R700 model includes a RDS-TMC GPS receiver for obtaining traffic data in GPS mode while the R300 does not. The remainder of publicized features are identical.

Zicplay touted this player at the IFA in Berlin as the smallest MP3 player currently available, measuring just 43mm long, 15mm wide and weighing 18 grams. It appears to have a very simple interface consisting of a couple buttons on the front that control moving tracks forward and back and also controls the volume.

The Microkey supports playback of MP3 and WMA files giving up to 6 hours of listening time on a single charge of the battery. It also connects to your PC via USB 2.0 for transferring files and reportedly has “touch screen interface capabilities”, although we’re not sure how that comes into play.

There was no pricing or dates of availability yet, but you can watch the Zicplay site for more info and we’ll let you know when we hear more.

GizMag via …

These colorful units are the newly announced ML-300 MP3 players by Korean-based MPIO. Less than the size of a credit card (28.2×19.3×65.9mm, for those that have their rulers handy) and weighing 23 grams, it supports MP3, WMA and WAV files and you get a nice-sized 10-12 hours of battery life from your single AAA battery. Also thrown in is voice recording, eight equalizer presets and a built-in FM radio.

While it’s only got a monochrome display it is backlit in a nice blue and the graphics are detailed, if a bit tiny. Two models are available in Japan, a 1GB ($43) and 2GB ($61), and in three color choices (pumpkin orange, lime green, dark grey.) Of course there’s no Bluetooth support (all your uploading is done via USB) but for this economical price point you shouldn’t care.