Which portable MP3 player?

[Marcy]

Hello!

I wanna buy a portable Mp3 player but I am not sure which one is the best for me. At the moment I am trying to decide between the JukeBox Zen, JukeBox 3 or the iPod. Is there a difference between the JukeBox Zen and the Jukebox 3 except the size? Are they both good?
And what can you say about the iPod compared to the Creative players?

thx a lot
Tim

 

[igorthebad]

Don't think twice about it- get the iPod. It is actually smaller than the Creative thing- which has pretty crappy sound quality too. I'd get the iPod for Mac together with xPlay because the Musicmatch plugin sucks.
Never mind the higher price- it's worth it!

-Igor

"Behind every great man, there is a woman"

 

[Marcy]

I there gonna be an iPod with which one can record? That's a feature I'd really like to have. Are their any other reasons except the crappy sound why I shouldn't buy a Creative Player?

bye Marcy

 

[dmcmahon]

The iPod is pretty bloody expensive, though. I looked this weekend and for the 20G players, the iPod is like $500, while the Creative, Archos, and Rio are all in the $350 range. Another problem with the iPod is that it requires a firewire connection, whereas the other work with USB. I'm thinking about getting a player as a gift for my girlfriend, and her PC doesn't have a firewire port (so I'd have to buy a board, too, if I got her an iPod). A key consideration that is hard to judge without experience is the software and reliability. Earlier this year she bought one of the larger Creative products, and the USB drivers were terrible, they constantly locked up and she eventually returned it. Anyone know of an article that does a comparative review of the most recent crop of players?

 

[igorthebad]

Well, until Apple updates the iPod's hardware I think it's unlikely it'll have a "record" function. As for the price issue... it's your budget, not mine...
Even though you might look at the 20Gb Archos or Nomad and think they're a bargain... they're not. First of all they're nowhere near the iPod's sound quality and are twice or thrice as big as the iPod. Another point you might want to take into consideration is service- I returned my iPod after it broke (within 30 days of purchase) and was not asked ONE question for an exchange. Finally- think about this- do you REALLy need 20Gb storage?- that's about 20,000 minutes of music or 333 hours! I have the 5Gb model with 508 songs and my hard disk is less than half-full! (actual capacity is 4.6Gb, not 5Gb).
If you're still worried about space... encode your MP3 collection in 64KBps quality and you've got double the space... and it still sounds great on the iPod.

Cheers!

-Igor

"Behind every great man, there is a woman"

 

[Rob423]

what the hell are you talking about how does the creative have crappy sound?


This Community is like a Second Family!!

 

[pbaze2222]

Try www.sonicblue.com you can get an mp3 player w/ 128mb memory (which is plenty of space for a good play list) for around 179$ - expandable to 512mb. I'm looking into a sports version so I can exercise w/ it.

The ipod is cool but like you said a bit expensive & I don't think it's made for exercising with & it's 3x heavier than the RIO mp3 players. More space/bigger always sounds better but I personally don't mind updating my playlist once/week.

 

[umheint0]

The best ones are solid state memory mp3 players (ie they have a rom chip inside, not a hard drive), because they are lighter and less vulnerable to impacts. They are the best for everything. I have the original PMP300 (the very first mp3 player), and it's been great, but only with 32mb. I'm going to upgrade to 128 with a 512mb chip, and that will be more than I'll need for as far ahead as I can think.

XP 2500+ Barton
A7N8X Dlx
2x512MB Corsair PC3200
ATI 9700 Pro
16x DVD-ROM
2x80GB 7200RPM Maxtor
Onboard audio