Technology companies unable to pmp their wares to consumers

Market analyst firm Instat has come out with a report that says the market for personal media players will remain 'disappointing'.

From their press release:

A recent report by In-Stat found the following:

• Early adopters will remain the primary market for PMPs this year
• The mass market is not yet willing to pay the hefty price tag for PMPs, which is approximately $400 to $500.
• PMPs are competing with other converged devices such as handheld gaming devices, smarter PDAs, and portable DVD players
• By 2009, In-Stat forecasts that worldwide PMP shipments will reach 7.5 million units.

The report title Video Content Availability Will Be A Key Factor in Portable Media Player Growth basically is an admission that PMPs are currently a device without a use. Think about it, whats the point of going through the hassle of ripping a video off a DVD to watch it on an awkward iPod type device that is more expensive than a portable DVD player hmmm.

In addition video is an immersive format so the scope to use it is less than listening to audio devices like the Apple iPod.

So it looks like iRiver won't be selling all that many PMPs, even with a fine young lady draped across the screen like the picture above.