We think it's too many pizzas ordered during planning sessions, but MPIO says it's the silhouette of an electric guitar. We'll go ahead and take their word for it. The FL500 plays for around 15 hours on a battery charge, carry anywhere from 512MB to 2GB depending on the model, and come in a stylish black body featuring a 3-line, 128x48 LCD with white LED backlighting.

If you do love the old-school iPod-inspired box look, the FY800 is basically the same player in that less daring knob-free form. The sleek FY800 can get a little extra boost if you slide an SD card into the top, giving the player a total maximum capacity of 4GB. Both players feature an organization system which mimics a computer's file management, and come PC and Mac ready.

For the 2GB version of each player, the FL500 will actually set you back a little more. $126 for a 2GB FL500, and around $102 for the 2GB FY800. No word on when they'll be in stores. – Kevin Hall

FL500 Product Page [MPIO]
FY800 Product Page [MPIO]
MPIO FL500 & FY800 are official [Newlaunches]

Image Page [Via dapreview]

Either Disney's largest shareholder Steve Jobs must be getting pretty confident that nothing can ever surpass his wildly popular iPod, or somebody is violating a copyright law or two. Even so, we're hearing the five versions of the MP3 player will be sold worldwide.

New Mpio FY700 Disney [Akihabara News]

MPIO FL400 pendant sized MP3 player [NewLaunches]

Specs and pricing for MPIO MP3 players [CNET]

We bring you some new micro-hdd DAP coolness, with the 6GB Philips HDD1630 and Sony's 8GB NW-A1200 entering our arena. If you prefer something even more compact, it might be interesting to check out the Mpio FL-400, another necklace-style type of device for pimping around with. Oh, we're sorry - you actually think this is all a tad too small? Well, take a look at the Toshiba X-series then - 60GB slimness on the go. Where have heard that before? Finally, there's the ultimate weird DAP for this month: KNC's HR-811.

Well, with the slick-looking 30GB HDD6330 already out there, Philips figured it wouldn't hurt anyone to come up with a smaller version as well. The HDD1630 is a cute little 6GB DAP that comes with a color screen and UFO landing strip-like controls (touch-based). We like that smooth blue lighting against the HDD1630's serene black background, although the screen could have been bigger, better, less-pixelated and whatnot. There's a 4GB version out there as well, should you really be interested.

Sony on the other hand, doesn't have to worry about uninspiring color screens - as far as DAPs are concerned, that is. Their upcoming NW-A1000 and 3000 players (6 and 20GB respectively) both come with a very brightly-illuminated, crisp clear yet "monochrome"-type of OLED screen. Let's not mention whole thing's resemblance to a soap bar, design-technically speaking - we'll focus on the NW-A1200. Guess what? It's an 8GB version of the NW-A1000. The end.

We've already seen some of iRiver's wearable DAP jewelry - dubbed "N10" and "N11" - but did you know that the South-Koreans over at Mpio were offering an alternative as well? That one's called the FL-3x0, and the time has apparently come to introduce a successor to said unit. They've named it "FL-400" this time, and it's smaller plus better-looking than the FL-3 series. Too bad that it'll only run for 8.5 hours per fully-charged battery. Price for the 512MB version is said to be some 160 euro, whereas doubling that capacity will require you to drop another 30 euro or so. Available by the end of November, if all goes well.

With the new iPod already being available for purchase, Toshiba would be well-advised to hurry up a bit and release that darned X-series already. It's not like this successor to the relatively successful F-model offers video playback, extreme storage capacities or anything else that could blow the iPod v5 out of the water. The most important pros are the X-series' slim appearance and a high-quality QVGA screen - but the added value of such features has been compromised by Apple as well, these days. Leaves us with an empty, hollow feeling inside as well as the knowledge of both 20 and 60GB versions coming up (labeled "X20" and "X60"), next to the already-announced X30.

To conclude things for today, here's something you'll not see every day. The KNC HR-811 from China has this rather... unusual touch to it. You know, the touch that helps it to turn into a werewolf under the cover of a round, full moon. 512MB inside or not, this thing looks like it was dropped off by a cursed species of strange-looking aliens.

We scoop up some details on PQI's mPack 500, take a look at the latest iOps DAP and witness the resurfacing of Mpio's HD400 and 500. Finally, there's a peculiar-looking MP3/CD player that goes by the name of Beond M800.

PQI set foot in the PMP market a couple of months ago - the mPack 800 was a moderately successful unit which offered a bit of everything at quite a steep price. The company is aiming for various types of customers right now: upcoming models include the pocket-friendly SD-expendable mTrix, the car-mountable (GPS-enabled) mPack 600 and finally the mPack 500. Little was known about the latter up till recently, but we managed to get our hands on most of the important details. The mP500 will include a 3.2MP camera (with digital zoom and flash light), a 5GB micro hard drive for storage purposes and a 2.2-inch color TFT that can display various movie and picture formats. On top of all of this, this device also supports a large array of music formats (among which are MP3, WMA, Ogg Vorbis, AAC and Atrac3)... But unfortunately, the sheer size of it all (comparable to that of a modern-age 20GB DAP) will probably scare away most of the potential buyers. Should come available within two months or so, although little is certain at this point.

It's likely that you've never heard of a South-Korean company called "iOps" before - one's never too old to learn, right? Anyway, these guys have compiled a small but interesting array of DAPs throughout the years. Next in line is a player called "Gyeok" (say what?) but we've dubbed it "the iOps". This unit seems to be the prime example of the Koreans getting nervous over the iPod nano's price levels. Despite a nice basic capacity of 2GB, "the iOps" only costs about 198.000 Korean Won (or $195) - that's really cheap to Korean standards. Notably cheaper than the 2GB nano even, while offering a 65k color OLED screen, MPEG-4 playback, voice recording, 17 hours worth of battery life per charge and a foldable USB pen.

Another South-Korean DAP manufacturer, DigitalWay/Mpio, has been doing quite well for months (in terms of export figures) but they kept their upcoming hard drive players hidden from the public eye all along. We managed to dig up some material on the HD400 and HD500, although little seems to have changed over time. Both units are stated to come with this 1.8" TFT-LCD Display (262k colors), play music as well as movies and offer some extra gimmicks like FM radio + recorder, line-in encoding, voice recording plus an alarm clock. The HD400 will come in 5 and 8GB flavors, whereas the HD500 will see 20GB and 40GB editions... if all goes well. Release dates are yet unclear, but we were told to "expect a launch around November".

And what have we here? An MP3/CD player? "Wow, that's really hot news! Those things are so 2001, man!" - well, wait till you've seen the design of the Beond M800. Let's just say that someone liked the shape of the lid so much, he clearly couldn't resist taking a bite out of it.

That's it's for today, folks!

Possible battery life is 15 hours, and the MPIO-One is available in 256MB, 512MB, and 1GB capacity. Price is 119, 139 and 179 respectively. No word on if it'll be released elsewhere.

Related
MPIO-One Portable Flash Player

MPIO launch tiny personal media player [Pocket-lint]