Motorola ROKR E1

DESIGN The ROKR definitely isn't a product of Apple's design team. The candy bar style body is a bit clunky and doesn't incorporate the familiar iPod Click Wheel. Instead, the phone is navigated through a five-way joystick that can be programmed to jump directly to your favorite functions. A dedicated side-button controls the volume, while an iTunes button launches the software.

FEATURES The ROKR knows all of iTunes' tricks: custom playlists, album art display, shuffle, and repeat (but there are no equalizers), and clocks about eight-hours of playback time. Airplane mode plays songs with the phone off and your iTunes songs can be set up for use as ringtones. Hang up your call and punch the iTunes button and the player picks up where the tune stopped. Motorola includes the USB cable necessary for connecting to a PC and a 3.5mm adapter so you can upgrade the headphones.

PERFORMANCE Thanks to the pokey USB 1.1 connection, it takes the ROKR nearly an hour to load the maximum of 100 songs onto the included 512MB TransFlash card. Don't count on adding storage by buying a bigger memory card since the iTunes software allows only 100 songs. To make matters worse, the memory card is buried behind the battery and the SIM card; so much for swapping cards in and out. Apple allows the ROKR to interact with only one computer. Plug your phone into a friend's PC and iTunes will erase all of your songs. Yikes!

VERDICT Slow downloads and limited memory sour what could have been an amazing product. A 4GB iPod nano and a Motorola RAZR stuffed in your pocket are less clunky and give you more memory.

www.cingular.com
Carrier: Cingular Wireless