Portable MP3 player decision

[JuMpMaN6235]

Which one should i get?

#1 MP3 Player (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=55-157-006&depa=0) Dimesnions:2.48x1.87x.5
or
#2 MP3 Player (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=55-603-402&depa=0) Dimensions:2.95x1.38x.7

im kinda leaning towards #1.... Heres some pics of #1, newegg has pics too

[XWRed5W3]

The second one looks pretty hot. But the first one has a photo viewer, ebook reader, and games? Damn. Either way, I'm not sure I trust either brand. Not to mention they're not expandable. But I assume that's not important, otherwise you wouldn't have picked these two. So yeah, maybe the first one would be better.

If you want just a straight up mp3 player, http://www.supermediastore.com/apacer-audio-steno-av220-256mb.html
It's $50. And it's a flash drive. So there.

[JuMpMaN6235]

yea i really dont need more than 256mb....... but That player you posted is pretty cheap, but i cant figure it out if it Comes w/ 256mb or you need to buy the 64/128/256/512 memory seperately... plus i really wanted the radio option

[XWRed5W3]

Yeah, it comes with 256MB. Here's the link for the 512 if you don't believe me - http://www.supermediastore.com/apacer-audio-steno-av220-512mb.html

Yeah, no radio though. Sorry.

[southpawboston]

i vote neither. spring the extra $$$ and get an ipod. 40GB is 20 times more than 512MB. or get the 60GB ipod photo and also have photo capabilities. plus you can even use it as a backup hard drive.

[Elkane7533]

Buying an iPod is like joining a cult. Everyone has it.

For me, a Creative Muvo TX FM, which is about the size of a pocket lighter with 512mb and a FM tuner, is just fine.

I'm gonna go for #2, just because i think #1 has lots of gizmos that are just not needed.

[XWRed5W3]

i vote neither. spring the extra $$$ and get an ipod. 40GB is 20 times more than 512MB. or get the 60GB ipod photo and also have photo capabilities. plus you can even use it as a backup hard drive.

I knew someone was gonna say that. First, he just said he only needs 256MB. Why the heck do you need 40GB? If you can listen to 10,000 songs, you have way too much free time on your hands. And if you have 10,000 songs, you've spent way too much money on CDs, or too much time on IRC. Second, I'm gonna assume he doesn't have all the money in the world, considering he liked the $50 one I mentioned. Third, I don't recall the iPod having an FM tuner, which he is apparently interested in.

Not trying to sound mean, but I hate it when people try to push iPods cause they're so "cool". Not that you're pushing it, you're just giving your opinion. It wouldn't even be my first choice if I wanted a HDD player. I like the iRiver better cause it has a color screen. And it has a cool black and silver textured cover. And the Creatives are cheaper.

[southpawboston]

I knew someone was gonna say that. First, he just said he only needs 256MB. Why the heck do you need 40GB? If you can listen to 10,000 songs, you have way too much free time on your hands. And if you have 10,000 songs, you've spent way too much money on CDs, or too much time on IRC.

OR, you're passionate about music and/or you're are a musician, and/or you've been collecting CDs for a LONG TIME. plus, i don't think that working 80-hour weeks qualifies me as having "too much free time on my hands". so don't judge, my friend.

Not trying to sound mean, but I hate it when people try to push iPods cause they're so "cool"

i said nothing about it being "cool". just stated what it can do, and that IMHO flash-based mp3 players are a waste of money. besides, you don't hear me knocking members here spending WAY too much time and money converting their dash lights to GT blue, just because it's "cool". or switching all their bulbs to LEDS.

[JuMpMaN6235]

im kinda with XWRED..... i really dont have $300-400 to spend on an ipod (only work 22hrs/week)... its hard enough for me to save up for some rims....But if you do have that kinda money and "you're passionate about music and/or you're are a musician, and/or you've been collecting CDs for a LONG TIME".... then i see no problem to have an ipod

[BlackElantraGT]

I would have to agree with Southpaw, flash drives are worthless. The only reason why I would get anything that had 256 or 512 mb of memory was if I wanted something really tiny to take with me while working out or something like that. In this case, both the choices he picked aren't that small, not to mention they're no name electronics.

In the end it all depends on how big of an audiophile you are. I'm not rich, but when it comes to electronics and certain things, I like to buy the top of the line product. I guess you can say I have champagne taste on a beer budget.

In this scenario, you're getting so much more for only something that cost 2.5-4 times more expensive. I'd rather spend a little extra and pick an Ipod Mini over those 2 choices. 20 GB and 40 GB maybe overkill for most people, but at work alone I have over 20GB of music from actual cd's that I've bought and that my coworkers have bought. And if you're an audiophile, 128 kbps will not do. Most of my music is encoded at least at 192 kbps. Disk space is pretty cheap nowadays. You may not be able to fill 40GB worth of music, but the Ipod could also be used a portable hard drive. I have a 256 USB key that is very useful for some files that I work on, but I wouldn't be able to fit a whole CD on it if I'd like to transfer some music to a friend's computer at work.

If you're the type that's satisfied with cheap electronics, then go for any of your choices. $100 for something with a full screen LCD display doesn't sound like it'll last very long. But if you want a better product and can delay your satisfaction just a little bit longer by saving up money (or getting money for gifts this Xmas), then I would say wait and pick ap an Ipod, Iriver, Creative Muvo, etc etc...whatever floats your boat.

Also, one other point I'd like to add is I highly doubt the first 2 players comes with a rechargable battery.

[Rory]

There's nothing wrong with getting a flash player. Flash players and hard drive players are targeted at completely different market segments and each have their advantages and disadvantages. Don't let anyone tell you differently. I personally like 40gb players because I insist on carrying every song I own (most of which I'll never listen to) everywhere I go. That doesn't mean that's the best option for everyone.

That said, I would try to stay away from the brands you're looking at. They may be good, but they very well may not. Three brands worth looking at are:

1) Rio
2) iRiver
3) iPod

You're clearly not in the market for an iPod, because of cost and they don't have a flash player. Avoid Creative and Dell (branded Creative player). They are bulky and have had a number of problems.

I think an iRiver flash or Rio (http://www.rioaudio.com) flash is exactly what you're looking for. Take a look at the Rio players. Just type in "rio" in to the search bar at newegg and you'll get a number of their players. The Rio Forge 256 and 512 seem to be generally within your price range.

The Chiba, Cali, Nitrus and Karma are all last year's players. All very good and very similar. But, all of this year's players are now a Mass Storage Class device, meaning you can plug it in via usb and move files back and forth without the Rio software, which is still very good. If you don't care about that, the Rio Nitrus might be worth looking at at it's a 1.5 gb player at a very good price right now.


The 256 and 512 Rio Forge players are excellent and also very slick looking. Also try to get a flash player that allows you to expand memory with a card slot. iriver's don't but are still very good players. The iRiver ifp-190T 256mb is an excellent player. Sounds great, is very small and is within your price range at NewEgg. It just doesn't have an expandable memory slot, like the Rio products.

Replaceable batteries (factor in this cost as you're shopping for flash players, as it adds up quickly and might be worth going up to a small-HD drive player in the long run as you don't have to keep buying batteries for them). As well, you'll quickly run out of space on the flash players. A mid-range players is a nice inbetween step, I find.

If you can stomach it and can spend a little more, look at the Rio Carbon 5gb for $209. 23 hr. battery (mini is 8hr), smaller the the Mini-Pod, substantially cheaper, 1gb more than the mini-Pod, Mass Storage Class, slightly lighter than the mini-Pod, 5-band EQ and sounds better than the mini-Pod. I'm not actually knocking the mini-Pod - it's a good player with sufficient sound quality, but it has its drawbacks, especially in battery life and no 5-band EQ. Personally, I think the Rio Carbon is the best MP3 player on the market right now of all players. And it's really slick. It's $199 at ecost.com for the next 24 hours with free shipping.

By the way, if anyone ever says, "Well, I don't need a 23 hr. battery - 8 hrs. is fine." Well, think about this: All of these batteries are Lithium-Ion batteries. They all have a lifespan of abou 300 charges before they go to about 80% capacity. So, would you rather have the 23 hr. battery that goes to 80% capacity after 300 charges or the 8 hr battery? A longer lasting battery lengthens the life of your player.

Finally there are another two players I'd recommend that few have heard of because they've just come on the market. At Radio Shack (yes, Radio Shack) you can buy the Motorola m500 (5gb) for $229 and the M50 (256mb) for $89 on sale right now!!

M500
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=42-8065

M50
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=42-8064

You'll see the $89 sale price for the M50 here:
http://www.radioshack.com/search.asp?find=motorola+mp3&site=search&image1.x=0&image1.y=0&image1=submit&SRC=1


I've used both of these players extensively and they're excellent. They're actually branded Rio products with a different shell and minor differences. The M500 is the Rio Carbon. The M50 is the Rio Forge. The M500's major difference to the Rio Carbon is that it has a replaceable Li-Ion battery (an industry first in this category), the battery goes for 39 hours not 23 (those are my tests!) and it has a *very good* FM-tuner (most FM tuners on mp3 players suck). You can also record the FM station you're listeing to, although at a lesser sounding quality (for copyright infrigement reasons). The Carbon has voice record instead of FM tuner, but it's mediocre, like voice record on most mp3 players are.

The Motorola M50 256mb with an FM tuner is basically the same as the Rio Forge in a different shell. The forge looks slicker but it's the exact same player. If you're definitely stuck on a flash player, $89 for the M50 is a real steal right now for a great little player with FM tuner and expandable memory and 5-band EQ. You won't go wrong. I've used it and will vouch for it and any of the other players I've mentioned here.

By the way the M500 and Rio Carbon both charge via a wall-wart (standard plug) AND via usb from your PC at a slower "trickle charge." The wall-wart they come with is a really small little plug-in travel charger that flattens, by the way. Not bulky.

Let us know what you end up doing.

Rory

Final Tip: if you ever buy an MP3 player with an internal Li-Ion battery, make sure you run it empty before charging fully the first few times. Full dischages. Full charges. After that, don't worry about when you recharge. This will help push the battery to its maximum length.

[mrhoaf]

First off, suggesting he buy a $300 iPod instead of a $100 flash based player is like telling him he should buy a $36,000 BMW instead of an $12,000 Elantra because the Bimmer is faster, handles better and is a lot cooler.....

Not to mention that he already said all he wanted was a 256mb flash player!!!

I would have to agree with Southpaw, flash drives are worthless.

If I had the money, I'd have bought an iPod, but my $50 flash player works fine for me..... and is DEFINATELY NOT WORTHLESS!!!

I have a 256 USB key that is very useful for some files that I work on, but I wouldn't be able to fit a whole CD on it if I'd like to transfer some music to a friend's computer at work.


um...... check your file sizes.... I rip at 192kbps and cd's are well under 100MB



Thank You Rory for making intellegent, informed, and truely helpful suggestions....

[Rory]

I rip at 192kbps and cd's are well under 100MB

I, too, rip at circa 192 (LAME Standard) and it's great. Most albums are probably between 65-75mb. The standard rule of thumb is 128bit=1mb for every 1 minute. So, a 256mb flash player could hold around 256 minutes of music at 128bit, which is about four full albums.

For flash players, I'd recommend ripping in WMA VBR (not the default CBR setting) in Windows Media Player (tools>options>copy music, I think) at the cira 65 bit setting (don't have the exact setting in front of me to quote as the VBR setting is a range and each song will come out slightly differently to maximize sound quality.) It allows you to throw a lot more music on a flash player at a sound quality that's still very good, relatively speaking. And while I hate Microsoft (I use Linux mostly now), politics aside, the lower-bit rate WMA VBR setting is very good. You can probably get around 7 albums on to a 256mb player. Much better than your old portable CD players. Not even the flashplayer haters should have a problem with that.

[BlackElantraGT]

First off, suggesting he buy a $300 iPod instead of a $100 flash based player is like telling him he should buy a $36,000 BMW instead of an $12,000 Elantra because the Bimmer is faster, handles better and is a lot cooler.....

Not to mention that he already said all he wanted was a 256mb flash player!!!



If I had the money, I'd have bought an iPod, but my $50 flash player works fine for me..... and is DEFINATELY NOT WORTHLESS!!!



um...... check your file sizes.... I rip at 192kbps and cd's are well under 100MB



Thank You Rory for making intellegent, informed, and truely helpful suggestions....

Forgot to mention that this is before the CD is in mp3 format. I often rip into wav format and burn the cd before I convert to mp3 or wma.

As far as suggesting a $300 ipod over his $100 choices, I can see your point about the Elantra to the BMW because it's 3 times more expensive, but we're talking about sub $500 items here, not a difference of $24000. Not everyone can afford a beamer. But if he can afford a $100 item, a $200/$300 is not that far away from what he can afford if he waits a little longer.

[Rory]

By the way, if you buy a 256mb player with an expandable slot, on Rio players you can throw in up to a 1gb card.

So, a 512 Sandisk SD card is $50 at eCost.om at 47.50 at NewEgg.
A 1gb Sandisk SD card is $70 at ecost and $74 at NewEgg.

So, that $90 little 256mb flash player, for an extra $70 sometime down the road when you can afford it suddenly gives you a 1.25gb player. I, personally, would still buy a 1.5gb Rio Nitrus for $149 (NewEgg) because it's designed to easily scroll through more music than a flash, sounds better because of the strong amp of a hd player, has a longer battery, etc.

But, buying a 256mb flash player now that you can expand to 1.25gb for $70 more dollars down the road when you can afford it is a pretty good darn option. That's roughly about 350 songs at 128bit and over 650 songs (2000 minutes) at the lower WMA VBR rating I suggested above.

[JuMpMaN6235]

Thanks everyone for your inputs, im not sure what exactly im going to get, ill have to think about this for a little

[XWRed5W3]

First off, suggesting he buy a $300 iPod instead of a $100 flash based player is like telling him he should buy a $36,000 BMW instead of an $12,000 Elantra because the Bimmer is faster, handles better and is a lot cooler.....

Not to mention that he already said all he wanted was a 256mb flash player!!!


I love you Hoaf. I really do.

That being said, I really wasn't trying to hate people for liking iPods. It's just that economics wise,

256MB player - $100
40GB player - $400

The 40GB looks better at first glance. But when you factor in that your wallet only contains $100, the economics suddenly become much clearer. Not to mention that iPods don't have the best sound quality, aren't the best looking (depending on your preference), don't have the best capacity/money ratio, or best anything. They're just the "in" thing right now.

My whole point was buy what you need and what you can afford. $300 or $400 is WAY more than $100 to most people.

:bowdown: :bowdown: Mad props to your 80 hour work week Southpaw - I could never do that. I hope you enjoy what you do to put that kind of time and effort. But a $400 player probably wouldn't be as much as a financial burden to you as Jumpman. I was just thinking about his needs.

[southpawboston]

Not to mention that iPods don't have the best sound quality, aren't the best looking (depending on your preference), don't have the best capacity/money ratio, or best anything. They're just the "in" thing right now.

actually, the ipod does have audiophile sound quality. it uses 24-bit DACs and stereo review magazine did a complete suite of tests and concluded that the ipod is a "genuine" piece of audiophile equipment. it not only plays mp3 format (which is known to be less than audiophile at low bitrates), but it also plays the superior AAC format as well as uncompressed WAV/AIFF format for true audiophiles. it has a 2V line-output in addition to the headphone jack, so plugging it into your home stereo or your car's aux input jack (like i do) makes it a true audiophile source unit. not trying to convince you to get one, just setting the facts straight.


Mad props to your 80 hour work week Southpaw - I could never do that. I hope you enjoy what you do to put that kind of time and effort.


thanks, i actually don't work 80 hours/week anymore, but i did for six years in grad school, when i acquired much of my music. i'm down to about 50 hours/week now ;).

[Onelove5683]

I love you Hoaf. I really do.

That being said, I really wasn't trying to hate people for liking iPods. It's just that economics wise,

256MB player - $100
40GB player - $400

The 40GB looks better at first glance. But when you factor in that your wallet only contains $100, the economics suddenly become much clearer. Not to mention that iPods don't have the best sound quality, aren't the best looking (depending on your preference), don't have the best capacity/money ratio, or best anything. They're just the "in" thing right now.

My whole point was buy what you need and what you can afford. $300 or $400 is WAY more than $100 to most people.

:bowdown: :bowdown: Mad props to your 80 hour work week Southpaw - I could never do that. I hope you enjoy what you do to put that kind of time and effort. But a $400 player probably wouldn't be as much as a financial burden to you as Jumpman. I was just thinking about his needs.



then how about a compromise? the 20gig mini ipod for like $250 or even less

[XWRed5W3]

This is an even better compromise -

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0002AZNKA/ref%3Dnosim/techbargainscom/104-2577445-5443920

40GB for $200.

Now I have no idea on quality or anything like that, I just saw this like 2 seconds ago. But it looks good on paper.

[obsidiangls]

I agree with those above. I have a 10 GB hardrive/MP3 player. I filled it up with just Cd's I own. The one I bought has a swappable hardrive so I can expand it when I have time. Its a D-link and I don't think I spent more that $110.

[jameswing]

i vote neither. spring the extra $$$ and get an ipod. 40GB is 20 times more than 512MB. or get the 60GB ipod photo and also have photo capabilities. plus you can even use it as a backup hard drive.

Actually it's about 78% more.

[southpawboston]

Actually it's about 78% more.

actually, we're both wrong.

i was wrong about 40GB being 20 times more than 512MB. it's actually 80 times bigger, or 8000%.

i base 40GB as being 40 x 1GB. 1GB is typically 1024MB (2 x 512MB). so i'm calculating 40GB as 40960MB. that's 80 times 512MB. but if you consider 40GB to be 40000MB than it is 78 times more than 512MB, or 7800%. 78% bigger would be 911MB. you're off by two zeros. ;)

[BlueRush]

Way To Many Numbers Man!!!!

[ButterBean]

Here's one that you can look at, I've got the 40 Gig HD version, but they have a version that is 256 flash memory, and later you can upgrade the to the HD by just buying the backpack.


http://www.neurosaudio.com/store/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=DigitalInnovationsCatal og&category%5Fname=Neuros+Players&product%5Fid=4021500

http://www.neurosaudio.com/images/player_bl_01.jpg

Friend of mine bought an IPOD to try out, this one is a bit bigger than the IPOD but it's about $100 less and has more options IMO. The sound is a little bit better than IPOD again that's just a personal opinion.