Hi,
In the shops around here portable mp3 players tend to be behind 1/2 inch thick polycarbonate (so people do not steal them) so testing them is impossible. Well why would you want to hear how they sounded or how much they weighed anyway!
Which portable mp3 player do you use for jogging ?
(ps i tried jogging with a portable cd player sony DEJ955 with belt strap but it's too heavy. good sound though)
In the shops around here portable mp3 players tend to be behind 1/2 inch thick polycarbonate (so people do not steal them) so testing them is impossible. Well why would you want to hear how they sounded or how much they weighed anyway!
Which portable mp3 player do you use for jogging ?
(ps i tried jogging with a portable cd player sony DEJ955 with belt strap but it's too heavy. good sound though)
I bought a Samsung YP-MT6X 512 MB MP3 Player about a year ago and love it! It's a tiny thing- only 1" X 1" X 2.5" and 1.5 oz. It uses 1 AA battery that lasts an incredibly long time. I use it when working out and because it has flash memory(non-removable), it's obviously never going to have any skip problems during activity. It's got a USB 2.0 interface for fast transfer from your PC. Another cool thing is you can use it to store and transfer any types of files. It even has a built in FM tuner. I think I paid a bit over $100 USD when I bought it.
Apple has done such a fine job of making IPods seem like a standard, people forget there are other choices that are just as good, if not better.
Matt.
Apple has done such a fine job of making IPods seem like a standard, people forget there are other choices that are just as good, if not better.
Matt.
I bought an RCA Lyra RD1022A 64meg player last year... yes, a mere 64megs, but it has an SD card slot, so I immediately stuck a 512M card into it. It takes 1 AAA battery, so you can swap batteries in seconds (instead of having to plug it in for hours to recharge), and battery life is something like up to 20 hours. It plays normal MP3s (including VBR), and WMA. Plug it into a standard mini USB cable and it shows up as two drives (if you have an SD card plugged in) in Windoze Explorer, so you can just copy files over.
It's about the size of my two thumbs together; it's big enough to grip comfortably if you want to carry it in your hand, or it's got a swivel to attach it to something, or it comes with an armband holder. The battery door is a bit flimsy, but the buttons are rugged and nearly impossible to activate by accident, and after 18 months of near-daily use nothing has broken. The LCD display shows filename or MP3 tags and running time, etc.
The headphones it comes with are junk; buy something nicer like the Koss "The Plug" or whatever you favour. I've used mine with Sony MDR-V900's (not for cycling though); the Koss Plug's are maybe 75% as good for 1/10 the price.
It resumes from the last file you were playing, but doesn't remember the position within the file. This is annoying since I listen to a lot of long DJ mixes and podcasts, but considering how well it does other stuff, and how cheap it was, I can tolerate that. while I wait for the "right" player to come along. (I suspect Sony players will have that feature, since their CD & MP3 Walkman do, but you'd probably be stuck with their "Memory Stick" for expansion if any.)
I didn't evaluate many other players, other than a no-name thumbdrive style player, and a Panasonic which had some kind of copyright protection and wouldn't play ordinary MP3 files.
It's about the size of my two thumbs together; it's big enough to grip comfortably if you want to carry it in your hand, or it's got a swivel to attach it to something, or it comes with an armband holder. The battery door is a bit flimsy, but the buttons are rugged and nearly impossible to activate by accident, and after 18 months of near-daily use nothing has broken. The LCD display shows filename or MP3 tags and running time, etc.
The headphones it comes with are junk; buy something nicer like the Koss "The Plug" or whatever you favour. I've used mine with Sony MDR-V900's (not for cycling though); the Koss Plug's are maybe 75% as good for 1/10 the price.
It resumes from the last file you were playing, but doesn't remember the position within the file. This is annoying since I listen to a lot of long DJ mixes and podcasts, but considering how well it does other stuff, and how cheap it was, I can tolerate that. while I wait for the "right" player to come along. (I suspect Sony players will have that feature, since their CD & MP3 Walkman do, but you'd probably be stuck with their "Memory Stick" for expansion if any.)
I didn't evaluate many other players, other than a no-name thumbdrive style player, and a Panasonic which had some kind of copyright protection and wouldn't play ordinary MP3 files.
Banned
Joined 2002
Id have to say that the apple Ipod has it beat
http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wo/1.RSLID?mco=521E86EF&nclm=iPodx
http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wo/1.RSLID?mco=521E86EF&nclm=iPodx
For a long time it was cool to buy Apple products. Now that they have broken into the mainstream, they have definitely become uncool. It's sort of weird... POD people are going to spoil the fun for the rest of us. See video linked here:
http://news.zdnet.com/2036-2_22-6035707.html
256 MB is plenty of storage for any running except maybe a marathon, but it may be hard to find a player with only 256 MB any more. There are lots of players out there that don't require that you buy all the music from one source and allow you to burn the music to CDs so you can listen at home and in your car also without having to pay for another copy. Just look for the acronyms "itunes", "DRM" (digital restrictions management), and "WMA" to know what not to buy.
I have a creative labs 256 MB player with FM radio that gets about 15 hours play time on a single AAA battery and sounds OK. It came with an arm-band for carrying while jogging, etc. The ear buds don't fit my ears well, so whatever you get, I'd suggest getting some of the headband-type, stick-into-your-ears phones. They stay in place no matter what you do.
I don't think sound quality will be an issue with anything on the market. Iriver makes some really nice players.
I_F
http://news.zdnet.com/2036-2_22-6035707.html
256 MB is plenty of storage for any running except maybe a marathon, but it may be hard to find a player with only 256 MB any more. There are lots of players out there that don't require that you buy all the music from one source and allow you to burn the music to CDs so you can listen at home and in your car also without having to pay for another copy. Just look for the acronyms "itunes", "DRM" (digital restrictions management), and "WMA" to know what not to buy.
I have a creative labs 256 MB player with FM radio that gets about 15 hours play time on a single AAA battery and sounds OK. It came with an arm-band for carrying while jogging, etc. The ear buds don't fit my ears well, so whatever you get, I'd suggest getting some of the headband-type, stick-into-your-ears phones. They stay in place no matter what you do.
I don't think sound quality will be an issue with anything on the market. Iriver makes some really nice players.
I_F
, the £15 players are as good as any, and you've not lost much if it gets stolen or damaged.Just got a Creative Nano Plus for about $60. It is 1 meg, very small, and sounds good. Runs on a AAA for 15+ hours. The interface is not as nice as the Ipod but you can organize your music in folders. This is a big plus over the 128k Iriver that I previously used. I select a folder with an hour of music and I'm good to go. For my needs (workout tunes) the Creative works great.
Banned
Joined 2002
windsonian said:
What on earth is that meant to mean?
The iPod plays the following formats:
Apple Lossless (proprietary)
mp3 (open)
AAC (open)
AIFF (open)
WAV (open)
AAC with "Fairplay" DRM. (proprietary)
Competing players tend to play:
mp3 (open)
WMA (proprietary)
WMA with "Plays for sure" DRM (proprietary)
WAV (open)
Some players, notably iRiver play in addition (I believe):
Vorbis (open source)
FLAC (open source)
With the iPod, Apple Lossless and AAC+Fairplay are the only proprietary formats. With the competition, WMA with or without "Plays for sure" DRM is proprietary. You could argue that WMA with DRM is more proprietary than Apple's DRMed content since Microsoft control both the CODEC (WMA) and the DRM (Plays for Sure). Quite why so many competitors steer clear of AAC (which is just as "open" as mp3) is beyond me; if they had any sense they would realise that if they want to capture some of the market away from Apple, it would be a good idea to offer a player capable of playing back the format that most iPod users have their entire music library encoded to (iTunes rips to AAC by default).
That ZDnet video was pretty good (I hate DRM), except it fell into the usual FUD trap: just because a device can play a certain type of DRM restricted files, does not mean that that is the only stuff it can play. If you get an iPod, there is absolutely nothing forcing you to buy any songs from iTunes (the only place you can get AAC+Fairplay content). The editor suggests that people "don't buy this C.R.A.P.", referring to the hardware, but really, he should have been talking about the content. It is almost impossible to buy an mp3 player that doesn't support one type of DRM, be it Microsoft's, Apple's or Sony's. If you don't like DRM, don't buy any protected content.
Yes, some players offer other completely open codecs such as FLAC and OGG, but what does that get you? FLAC is no better that Apple Lossless or WMA Lossless, and OGG is no better than AAC.
As for the "proprietary interface", I don't really know what you're trying to say. I suggest that you read this article, which includes a good explanation of what it means to be proprietary.
Hi,
I went to another shop in town today. I searched through the electronics section but I couldn't find the mp3 players. I asked the shop assistant and he walked me to one of the internal concrete pillars. In two pillars about 10metres apart one pillar contained ipod's, and the other pillar contained the rest. The mp3 players were set back about 40cm from 3/4 cm glass. The shop assistant said "ask if you need them out". 'big' ipods weren't even on display just a cardboard ipod thing saying don't steal music.
In the other shop I found out they don't allow listening of mp3 players because apparently the earphones get full of people's wax. But atleast I got the mp3 out and tried out the buttons !
I went with the Ipod shuffle 512MB. Reminds me a bit of lego bricks!
Actually I'm pretty impressed with the sound . Better than I expected
I went to another shop in town today. I searched through the electronics section but I couldn't find the mp3 players. I asked the shop assistant and he walked me to one of the internal concrete pillars. In two pillars about 10metres apart one pillar contained ipod's, and the other pillar contained the rest. The mp3 players were set back about 40cm from 3/4 cm glass. The shop assistant said "ask if you need them out". 'big' ipods weren't even on display just a cardboard ipod thing saying don't steal music.
In the other shop I found out they don't allow listening of mp3 players because apparently the earphones get full of people's wax. But atleast I got the mp3 out and tried out the buttons !
I went with the Ipod shuffle 512MB. Reminds me a bit of lego bricks!
Actually I'm pretty impressed with the sound . Better than I expected
cheap... 15 pounds?????
i bought an EMPREX mp3 player 15 usdollars at FRY'S
for storage i bought a 1 gig sd card at supermediastore.com and
..... everythng seems to be working just fine, same sound as an ipod and much smaller........
an mp3 player without mem should actually not cost more that 2 or 3 bucks... but that's anther story for another forum
Jean-Pierre
i bought an EMPREX mp3 player 15 usdollars at FRY'S
for storage i bought a 1 gig sd card at supermediastore.com and
..... everythng seems to be working just fine, same sound as an ipod and much smaller........
an mp3 player without mem should actually not cost more that 2 or 3 bucks... but that's anther story for another forum
Jean-Pierre
Re: cheap... 15 pounds?????
Hi,
As the temperature has cooled down a bit in the UK I decided to train this evening quite hard.
It was a pain to get the earphones to stay in when I upped the pace to a run but got there eventually. I must have strange ears!
I assume it uses the same chipset as the shuffle!
I'm not sure what kind of output stage the headphone driver has in the Sigmatel D-Major chips http://www.eetchina.com/ARTICLES/2005NOV/PDF/App_Brief_Flash_MP3_7_1.PDF. 0.05% THD .
http://daponline.free.fr/stmp3410-pb-5-0.pdf
Class AB ?
"The iPod shuffle's near-perfect rendering of the square wave means that it uses push-pull output instead of the single-ended, capacitor-coupled output found in just about every other player." http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1777890,00.asp
This chip series is in alot of players !
uvodee said:
Hi,
As the temperature has cooled down a bit in the UK I decided to train this evening quite hard.
It was a pain to get the earphones to stay in when I upped the pace to a run but got there eventually. I must have strange ears!
I assume it uses the same chipset as the shuffle!
I'm not sure what kind of output stage the headphone driver has in the Sigmatel D-Major chips http://www.eetchina.com/ARTICLES/2005NOV/PDF/App_Brief_Flash_MP3_7_1.PDF. 0.05% THD .
http://daponline.free.fr/stmp3410-pb-5-0.pdf
Class AB ?
"The iPod shuffle's near-perfect rendering of the square wave means that it uses push-pull output instead of the single-ended, capacitor-coupled output found in just about every other player." http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1777890,00.asp
This chip series is in alot of players !
Well, as far as my understanding of iPods go, the only way to copy the music onto them is through iTunes. Correct me if I'm wrong, because I don't actually own one. Therefore you can't copy music on (for listening at least) without first installing iTunes.HarryDymond said:
What if you're not at home, and don't have your iTunes CD with you?
windsonian said:
There are third-party freeware and shareware solutions for copying music to/from iPods. I've never used any because I like iTunes.
windsonian said:
?? If you are not at home, you can't use any solution to transfer your music to your player, because you aren't where your music is. (unless you keep your music on a laptop and have your laptop with you)
OK, not proprietary then, but you know what I mean. Other products (iRiver for example) just use a windows draga and drop.HarryDymond said:
HarryDymond said:
Incorrect.
Perfect case: A mate of mine recently went overseas. He just bought a new iPod to take with him. I helped him transfer a bunch of his CD's to mp3 form and burn them, so he was only carrying 7 or 8 CD's, not dozens. Because he's travelling around a bit, he won't have a PC that's his to install software on. A drag and drop solution would be infinitely better in his case.
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