Decent MP3 Player?

[Wrathcaster]

I'm planning on buying an mp3 player soon, but I'm a little bit cautious about doing so before figuring out the market. So far I've checked out the whole ipod thing, the newer creative players... And that's about it. I'm extra cautious with companies I don't recognize or haven't heard of when it comes to making larger long-term purchases. I'm looking for min 1 gig of HD space, I guess that's the only criteria. Anything under like $200 would be pretty cool, but if it's a bit more to not get a piece of shit, I'd be willing. I'm sorta skeptical of review sites when it comes to these things, but I figure more than one of you have quite a bit of experience with them.

[Mir]

I've been using a creative nomad zen xtra for 3-4 years now and its great, i love it. It's the single greatest device i've ever gotten. Better than a walkmen, cd player, cellphone etc. It's about 250 bucks and it's 30 gigs. The one I have is the third i've owned, not because they fall apart, but because I'd rather not restrict myself by worrying about how I treat the thing, and I litterally take it everywhere and listen to it for many hours every day. As you'd expect this raises the chances of it dropping on the floor etc. The greatest part is that, while it usually takes 2 weeks to a month of turnaround time, you can just email creatives customer serives for a REM repair #, then mail the thing back to em, and theyll just send you a new one.

All that being said, if I were to shell out the actual cash again to get a new mp3 player, I'd buy an ipod...most likelt a nano. For starters I have ~2000 songs max on my mp3 player at any given time, which is more shit than you could ever possibly care about over a long period of time, and that takes up about 1% of the space on the HD. Now I'm not the kind of person that would use my mp3 player to hide files, transfer files, or back up my computer HD so that isn't really a nessecary feature to me. The big downside of creative mp3 players is that in order to plug em into a computer the computer needs THEIR creative software package installed. This pretty much limits you not only to your own PC only for using it, but it also means that creatives dont work with Macs as the software isn't supported for the Mac O/S (at least as of 2005 it still wasn't).

So thats what you need to concern yourself with. How big do you REALLY need it to be, and do you need or want to have cross platform usablity (or even the ability to load it up onto any computer other than yours). As for Apples repair/replacement policy/warranty...I have no idea, but creatives does rock and is lifetime.

[Crystara]

My wife has a Zen 40 gig, and aside from the annoying software thing it is a nifty device which has served me in moving around large chunks of data more then once. I get around needing the software on each computer by just carrying around the two programs it needs on a flash drive and installing it when needed, takes a minute or two is all, the two are about 40 megs together.

They really should make it function like a flash drive though in it just being plugged in allows access to it, although I wouldn't be suprised if there was a mod out there that already did this.

[Ham n Cheese]

ipod nano - flash memory ftw

[Bralkan]

I've been using my iPaq as a video / mp3 player for about 3 years now. A little longer. Works well; You have to buy your own memory cards but those are cheap these days. Recently, its developed a problem with the headphone jack not sitting properly so its probably soon time its retired. The thing I like most about it is all the extra shit I can do with it over and beyond even a video ipod. You trade some $ and storage room for it.

[Braen]

I really like my Nano. Holds tons of music (or enough to last for a long while anyway) is nice and small.

the 2 gig is like 200 and the 4 gig is 250 i believe

I use it on the road with my FM transmitter.

Only issue is that it gets scratched up too easy.

[Mkopec1]

The Dell MP3 players are good too, my brother has one, the 20 gig and he loves it. Its a bit bigger than the Ipod, but the $150-200 savings is well worth the added girth, which isnt too much bigger. also you can do actual MP3 files, not that prporiatary Itunes format.

One thing to note though about the Dell MP3 players is the earbuds they come with are garbage and need to be replaced with something better.

But yeah, value wise you cannot beat Dell MP3 Player.

[Ham n Cheese]

uh you can add .mp3 files to ipods.

[EnigmaticParadigm]

Yup, I've loved my iPod mini many a time. We find out what we're having on Tuesday.

[Kevincheese]

I think my iPod's battery just died =(

[xeg_IS]

I've had an Ipod for about 1/2 a year now. The technology is great but the quality of the materials is pure shit. I would say in about 1-2 weeks it had some decent scratches on the plastic layer covering the lcd. It is now a lot worse. And I'm not the only one.

I've also read a lot about shitty battery life.

Wouldn't buy again. Never have been an Apple fan, and I thought I'd give them a chance. No more.

[Njorls]

My 60GB iPod Photo just died after 6 months. It would fail intermittently (every other week) but finally kicked the bucket for good. It's real nice when it works, but if the replacement they send back fails after 6 months I won't be getting another.

iPod isn't compatible with Napster and Microsoft's new online music store where you can download as much music as you want to your player for a flat monthly fee. Consider getting a Napster/Microsoft compatible one if you want to use that service.

[Benito Fireslinger]

you guys must be hell on your ipods. Mine has yet to screw up and i just have the wear scratches on the front and back.

Polywatch or whatever its called will get those out though.

[Kevincheese]

Pfft who pays for music.

[khanibal]

Ipods hate me, and I hate them.


I'm on my 5th one now. Thank god for the applecare protection plan! First pod I had lasted maybe 2 months before it started overheating. Replaced it for my second that died after 3 months, replaced it for my third that died after 3 months, replaced it for my 4th that died after 6 months (barely used it) and now I have my fifth replacement that has yet to leave the factory wrap since I'm selling it on ebay.

fuck you apple