Hoping for some advice on MP3 players.

proud2deviate

proud2deviate

Joined
Apr 5, 2004
Messages
2,712
I've been downloading music like a fiend for a while now, and I'm to the point that I'd like to listen to it without being teathered to my computer. An MP3 player would be great, but I know precisely jack diddly squat about them. I was kind of hoping y'all might take some time to edjumacate me on the subject. What's good? What sucks? About all I know (at least I think I know,) is that I need something with memory in the gigabytes range, the more the better.

Any suggestions? Pretty please?
 
Iriver H10 20 GB. This is the player I have and I love it. The link below has all the specs.

http://www.iriveramerica.com/prod/hd/h10_20gb_blue.aspx

Pros
  • FM tuner
  • FM record
  • Voice record
  • Drag & Drop file management though Windows Explorer
  • Photo viewer
  • Text doc. viewer
  • Long battery life (I get 16 hours on one charge)
  • EQ settings w/ SRS Wow
  • User updateabe firmware
  • Alot of features for the price
  • In-line recording
  • Full color screen
  • It's not an Ipod
Cons

  • Navigation takes some getting used to. I wouldn't worry about it if you haven't used any sort of MP3 player before.
  • Needs to have a removable battery like the H10 5/6GB models.
H10-20GB-blue-angle.jpg
 
Depends on what type of activity you wanna use it for. Flash based players are hardier than hard disk players.

Everyone seems to like iPods.

ipod nano...4gb max. flash based. cool looking too.

the normal ipod you can get up to 40gb...maybe more i'm not sure.

What i've been using which i just got is the sony network mp3 players. The reason i didn't take an ipod other than i don't really like apple stuff is that it didn't have an FM tuner. I love listening to the radio so the Sony was a good choice. Great battery life as well. 3 minutes charging. 3 hours playback. The software is easy to use as well.
 
You say that you have been downloading lots of music. Where are the best sites to get music? ITUNES charge a buck a tune and it gets expensive.
 
AllOfMP3.com, it's a Russian Site that has tons of music and will cost you much less then iTunes.

It costs .02 per MB and you can get your music in several formats and several bit-rates.
 
comet said:
You say that you have been downloading lots of music. Where are the best sites to get music? ITUNES charge a buck a tune and it gets expensive.
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Well, I don't know about music, but I get my freeware, .dll files, porn and other completely legal non-copyrighted tidbits via Shareaza.
 
If you want something small, get an iPod Nano. I have a black 4 gig, and it has 752 songs on it, and a bunch of pics. I could get more on, but I like the highest sounds quality. It has a colour screen, and lots of small features that are usefull, like a world clocks and a stopwatch. Its also ver small and portable, when its in you pocket, you cant even tell its there. Highly recomended.
 
There are a ton of mp3 players out there , some good and some are poop.
I originally bought a Sony that used little mini-disks , the concept seemed cool , USB connect to the pc and away you go !! or so I thought , it took literally over an hour to transfer to a disk on that thing and it had the silliest , convoluted software I have seen yet.
Ipods are all the rage of course.
I use this little jewel http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00006CXS8/002-0152809-7621671?v=glance&n=172282&v=glance this player is fine for me but some folks like a lot of gigs for storage.
Things to think about..
I like mine because you do need to use any software at all to transfer songs , simply use Windows Explorer :) , mine has a slot for mem cards , I got a 265 in it , I find that the 128 and the 256 card make enough space for me (about 70 songs) , do you really need to tote around your entire music collection ? Some folks do I guess. Mine was about 60$ when I bought it , I've dropped it several times and once in the gutter full of water , it still works like a champ plus it has FM radio if you get the notion.
You want something sturdy if your going to be carrying it around. Is price a consideration ? Is the interface easy to use ? Is there stupid software you have to install on your pc ? Some of the programs will not let you transfer mp3's without a liscense or some such.
Good luck hope you find what your looking for :)
 
I just purchased a Creative Labs "Zen Xtra" directly from creative on Ebay. It's a refurbished model. I got a 40 gig model. They also have 20 and 60 gig. With 40 gigs that should allow about 600 Cd's. It's a little bigger than most mp3 players. So far I really like it. I was looking for something to use in the car so I could have my entire collection of music with me, it always seems like I want tt listen to the one cd I left at home. I paid 159 + tax and shipping for mine. Brand new they are about $220. As far as it being refurbished I can't even tell. Everything looks brand new, no marks or scratches. I'm quite pleased with the purchase.

Jamie
 
WTFOver said:
AllOfMP3.com, it's a Russian Site that has tons of music and will cost you much less then iTunes.

It costs .02 per MB and you can get your music in several formats and several bit-rates.
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Great spot. Got several CDs last night. Thanks much.
 
I really like my Creative Labs Muvo TX. It only cost me $75 a year ago and I feel like I've gotten more than my money's worth. It doesn't have as much storage as most mp3 players, but I like the format and the lack of proprietary software. It's plug and play. Creative makes several mp3 players that have more storage as well. If I were looking to get a new player, I'd look at Creative and iRiver.
 
Another :thumbup: for the Creative brand. I bought a 30 GB zen jukebox for archiving my CD collection and was so happy with the thing I went out and bought a 256 mb MuVo to use at the gym. I'm not a computer wizard by a long shot and I found these to be fairly intuitive.
 
iriver have way better warranty than Creative.

1 year vs. 3 months...something to think about.
 
I like the Creative products, except for one thing. All of their large capacity players with hard drives only work with their software installed on your computer. Some can have new firmware installed on the player to make it appear to work as a removable disk, but once you do that it will not work at all on a computer that does not have Windows Media Player 10 (that's right, you have to have MP10 or it won't work AT ALL).

If you want to just install the small "driver" on your computer (so the player will still work on any computer with the Creative software installed), the transfer speed is about half of what a true drag-and-drop removable drive does.

I stayed away from iPods because of garbage like this. Creative is not much better, unless you only want a lower capacity flash player.

I won't buy anything that doesn't just work via USB drag-and-drop. Their flash players all work this way. It works on virtually any computer and operating system. For $200+, I am not buying something that is crippled.
 
Carl64 said:
I like the Creative products, except for one thing. All of their large capacity players with hard drives only work with their software installed on your computer. Some can have new firmware installed on the player to make it appear to work as a removable disk, but once you do that it will not work at all on a computer that does not have Windows Media Player 10 (that's right, you have to have MP10 or it won't work AT ALL).

If you want to just install the small "driver" on your computer (so the player will still work on any computer with the Creative software installed), the transfer speed is about half of what a true drag-and-drop removable drive does.

I stayed away from iPods because of garbage like this. Creative is not much better, unless you only want a lower capacity flash player.

I won't buy anything that doesn't just work via USB drag-and-drop. Their flash players all work this way. It works on virtually any computer and operating system. For $200+, I am not buying something that is crippled.
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Wow I didn't know that! That's my favorite feature of the Muvo and the reason I dislike iPods. Drag and drop is the only way to go for me.

Another brand I've heard good things about is JetAudio. Look them up on Amazon.
 
The Creative software really isn't that bad IMHO. I think its intended for people who don't really know alot about computers. For people who know what they're doing it seems like a lot of extra crap to deal with. Creative's software has the Nomad explorer that integrates into windows explorer enabling you to use drag and drop. It's not true drag and drop like a USB drive but it works pretty much the same, the downside being you still have to install the software to use it. As far as transfer speeds it seems pretty fast. Using USB 2.0 I find that it takes 1-2 seconds for an average song to transfer.

Jamie
 
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