Archos Gmini 120 (20GB)

This is hot. Really. It’s also strangely underrated as a player.

For a little over Rs 11,000, it gives you great sound, a built-in microphone, a CompactFlash slot for photographs from your digital camera, both standard and on-the-fly playlists, commendable battery life and line-in recording! Why, why, why wouldn’t anyone like it?

The only thing going against it is its weight, which is a lot more than an iPod.

Not that it weighs a ton, of course, but smaller players tend to hog the limelight these days, extra features be damned.

Worse, there’s no built-in radio or photo display.

But, finally, consider this. The line-in recording function makes more sense in India, simply because so many of us have still hung on to the cassettes we had in college.

Now, you can digitise them faster than it takes to say, "Dad, can I have an Archos Gmini 120?"