Candidly speaking, we can’t honestly envision too many of you fine folks running out and purchasing one of Creative’s new ZEN X-Fi2 portable media players given the availability of such robust alternatives. That said, we’d be remiss of our duties if we didn’t point out that the PMP which shocked us at IFA is now on sale directly from Creative. $129.99 buys you an 8GB model, while $179.99 nets you 16GB and $229.99 provides 32GB. We know — that 3-inch LCD and integrated FM tuner look good from afar, but remember kids, it’s all about the UI. [Thanks, Tyler] Filed under: Portable Audio , Portable Video Creative’s ZEN X-Fi2 touchscreen PMP now on sale originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 08 Nov 2009 03:37:00 EST.

Creative hasn’t really been doing much at all for the last year. Except this, apparently: here’s an FCC filing for a Zii touchscreen PMP, which shares a name their unusual system on a chip announced in January. From the patent, we can see that the Zii is a wi-fi-equipped touchscreen media player, fitted with an “HD” camera, Bluetooth, and, well, that’s about all we know. The presence of a developer version, called the Zii Egg, seems to promise some kind of app support, though it’d be a mistake to immediately jump to the conclusion that the Zii will therefore have an app store; it could just be a dev platform for third parties who could be developing stock apps for the device. Oooooooor, as Engadget plausibly suggests , this could be a part of the first wave of Android PMPs, which would, like any Android phone, have root-access developer units

We’re not quite sure what all was wrong with the original ZEN Mozaic (Mosaic?) , but evidently it demonstrated just a bit too much Mondrian. This go ’round, the ZEN Mozaic EZ300 ditches the hodgepodge of button colors and sticks strictly to pink or black, though most everything else remains the same. There’s a 1.8-inch 160 x 128 resolution display, 4GB or 8GB of internal capacity, up to 32 hours of audio playback, MP3 / WMA / WAV / JPEG file support, an FM radio tuner, a five-band custom equalizer and USB 2.0 connectivity. It’s available now for US and UK customers for $59.99 (4GB) / $79.99 (8GB). One more (big) look after the break. [Via PMP Today ] Continue reading Creative introduces toned-down ZEN Mozaic EZ300 PMP Filed under: Portable Audio , Portable Video Creative introduces toned-down ZEN Mozaic EZ300 PMP originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 30 May 2009 19:54:00 EST

This $25 mini USB-powered zen garden circulates water around its plastic bamboo shoots, creating relaxing sounds for a peaceful atmosphere in the workplace. That, or it’ll make you want to pee. [ Akihabara via CrunchGear ]

I’d like to kiss whoever at Apple decided to do this: today’s free iTunes “discovery download” is the first movement of avant-garde composer John Cage ’s 4′33″ , which is to say, it’s 1:46 of nothing . More performance art/zen seance than actual music, 4′33″ is intended to emphasize those critical moments of nothingness in music by being composed of only that nothingness. The piece becomes whatever background sounds are present during a performance, making it probably the truest expression of Cage’s “everything is music” milieu. And if you think downloading the piece from iTunes is more on the absurd side, check out this live performance, complete with full orchestra (turning blank pages) and audience. After each movement, the coughing, the coughing