Yet Another IPod Rival Surfaces, but Will it Succeed

The Apple iPod has dominated the portable music market for the past five years since its introduction in 2001. This fact isn’t disputed. What is questioned about the iPod success is why? What is it about the tiny device that has made it Apples most well known and best selling product? For the past five years companies have been attempting to develop a challenger to the iPod and so far, none have been successful. The newest digital audio device to hit the market is the Samsung Z5.

Samsung as well as other manufacturers have tried to replicate what makes iPod such a success. These include central scroll wheel, their easy and fun to use hardware, vast amounts of accessories, connectability to Mac and Windows operating systems, an easy to navigate central menu, and a music store with simple and easy connectability, conveniently also owned by Apple.

Samsung’s new Z5 is specifically a challenger to the ever popular iPod Nano. The Z5 mimics some of the basic aspects of the iPod Nano. Samsung’s newest player is approximately the same size (3.5 by 1.6 inches), very similar color choices (silver or black), 2 and 4 gigabyte versions, and even the same price as the iPod Nano at $200 and $250 respectively.

The Samsung player is not the first new player to try to repeat the unparallel success of the player. Enter it in the line of multiple other companies’ attempts to challenge the king of all players. Yet another new player is set to be released soon touting even more feature than the iPod Nano, but the results just aren’t the same.