A quality MP3 player that will not crap out on me...

[Bryan316]

Allright folks, educate me.

I like the Zune, the Sansas, the Ipod Touch, the Ipod Nano, that Cowon S9....


Who likes what. Who hates what, and for what reasons.



And Go.

 

[eppst1]

I have a 4GB Sansa clip. It's really nice and small, works perfectly for what I use an MP3 player for - mainly working out, doing yard work, and traveling. I think you can find them for around 40-50 beans.

 

[Heavenly Call]

My iPod 80gig is going on 4 years old now without one single problem (except when my dumbass let the battery completely die) but it only cost $20 to get it repaired. It has taken 10 plane trips, multiple beach walks, dozens of lawn cuts, 2 drops, and an accidental abandonment in the blaring sun for 4 hours and it still works just like the day I got it! I LOVE the iPOD!!!!!!!!

 

[Reverend Su]

i have an 80 gb Zune and i love it - it's about a year old and it is as good as when i first bought it

but i am also iChallenged, so i don't know anything about iPods...i'm biased, if you will

 

[madFive]

I use the Creative Zen (mine's 32gb - not sure if that model is still available) - I prefer Creative players because they don't require any proprietary software to load your music up (no iTunes etc). It works just like a flash drive, you drag your music from your hard-drive onto the player and it just automatically knows what to do with it. No logging all your music into a superflous library, no waiting on the program to process every single track etc. And if you want to use it as simply a nice large portable file storage device, it works for that too.

I personally will never buy another iPod (had a shuffle once and I hated it) simply because I absolutely hate iTunes. And my understanding is, the software you have to use with the MS Zunes is even worse. Can't speak for any other brands, as those are the only ones I know.

 

[eppst1]

The Sansa clip also is a drag and drop type of player. No need for software to load the music.

 

[Jibrille]

If you're worried about them crapping out, go with a flash memory player. Meaning no iPod Classic, no Zune 30/80, and anything else with a hard-drive (the spinning disks mean it's more likely to have issues with constant use). Luckily what you are listing all seem to fall under the flash memory type.

I've heard a lot of good things about both the Sansa Clip & Fuze. The Fuze, especially, because it has an expansion slot so you can add space with a microSD/SDHC. Spend less on a lower capacity version and you can toss in an 8gb, 16gb, or 32gb SDHC memory card (supposedly this is format is "limitless" but they haven't gotten THAT large in size yet and 32gb is expensive). Unlike some other expandable memory players, this one integrates the internal and expanded files.

There's been a rumored touchscreen Zune called the ZuneHD. The "leaked" pictures are pretty nice looking but thus far most companies attempts at touchscreens haven't matched the iPhone/iPod Touch from anything I've been able to try out.

 

[KingsGene]

Archos Gmini FTW

 

[halcyonwayband@aol.com]

I'd definitely go with the iPod. I've got a 5th gen 80gb, and I had it for nearly 4 years before it had a problem. There's a known issue on those where something works loose off the logic board and you don't hear any audio when it goes bad. I called Apple on Saturday and asked if it could be fixed. They're sending me a new one....for free. Mind you, it's 2+ years OUT of warranty, and I was willing to pay for a repair or go buy a new one. And although I have a pretty heavy silicone skin on it, I use it at the gym, the car on a couple of car kits, the sauna a BUNCH of times (wet and dry), travel, etc etc. I've had 5 and love them. I'd never want to deal with a Windows based MP3 player of any sort, based on my disatrous experiences with Windows Media Player and stuff.

 

[sccaldwell]

Allright folks, educate me.

I like the Zune, the Sansas, the Ipod Touch, the Ipod Nano, that Cowon S9....

Who likes what. Who hates what, and for what reasons.

I'm on my 5th iPod, and I've upgraded for two reasons:

(1) Need more room (10GB -> 30GB -> 120GB)
(2) I've bought two iPod Shuffles....the first (the original 512MB shuffle) to wear while exercising, and the second (1 new 2GB model) to replace the original one...again, purely because I wanted more space.

I still have all five iPods, and all five work perfectly, and I've done no battery replacements. Even the 10GB still holds a reasonably good charge. The iPod sync process with the computer has always been seamless and super-easy for me, as well.

Oh, I also own an 8GB iPhone, and love it, too.

As far as iPods go, here's my advice (mostly applies to non-iPod models too):
-Buy the biggest capacity you can afford, of whichever model you choose. (See my item #1 above)
-If you travel much (esp. via plane or commuting on a bus/train), watching videos on the iPhone/iPod Touch is *awesome*.
-If physical size of the device matters much, buy the 16GB iPod Nano.
-If you can foresee your iPod taking some abuse, avoid the iPod Classic. It has a hard drive, and while I've dropped all 3 of mine numerous times with no ill effects, the hard drive ones WILL be more susceptible to failure if dropped.

Happy shopping!

Craig

 

[VenomGA]

I have a 30 GB iPod
Upgraded to a 160 GB iPod because I need more space
Also have a 32 GB iPod Touch because of the Applications you can put on there and the wireless internet

I love all of them!! My wife has had 3 as well and never had a problem. Between the 2 of us and our kids, we probably had 13 different iPods with ZERO problems just upgrading to bigger ones that hold more or do more.

 

[rushzil2112]

I have the 60gb from a few years back and have no probs with it. The ear phone jack only comes in the right ear now, but I use the remote thing with it, so it causes no probs for me. I want to upgrade once I have the money to the highest capacity one there is, 60gb just isn't enough. The ipod is what I will always buy for my mp3 player needs.

 

[FatesFan]

80 gig ipod here. I have had others but this is the way to go. If you dont need that much hard drive, the ipod touch is nice as well. My kid has an ipod touch.

 

[spag]

I have a WELL WORN 60gb Ipod from a while ago. I forget which gen, when they called it a "video ipod." It looks like complete hell, as I don't have a case, throw it in a backpack, pocket, car console, wherever. Never a fault.

I bought one of the last gen classics, 160GB, when Apple closed them out. It's sitting safe, unopened in a box for the day this one croaks, but I may be holding on to it a very long time....

 

[lignicolos]

The zune hands down. I have an 80gb and my girlfriend has a 4gb one. They rock. I went from an ipod to my zune and i'll never look back. The unit itself is sturdy and the interface on the player is much better in my opinion.

 

[Magius]

I have an 80GB iPod Video, a Creative Zen V 4GB, and A Phillips GoGear 2GB.
The only problems I had with the iPod were all new user issues. I'm diggin' it now. I didn't like iTunes either to start with, the defaults suck. However, if you learn to actually use iTunes, and set it up the way you want it to function it's a really good program

I keep the Zen as a small back up. Creative software, if you choose to use it, has a convenient feature. It will convert your lossless >192 kbps files to smaller wma files during the transfer. That allows you to put a lot more files on the player while leaving your origional files intact. You can just drag and drop if you don't want to use the software.

The GoGear uses AAA batteries, so if I won't be able to recharge for prolonged periods I still have a viable player.

 

[TheLongshot]

I've had an 8GB Sansa e200 for a while now and love it. One of the reasons why I love it is because I can put Rockbox on it. I sync it up with a random selection from my MP3 library every once in a while.

 

[Pellaz]

80Gb iPod here. No problems whatsoever so far and it's about 75Gb full of stuff (almost all music, not video). I use it mostly in the car and that's where it typically lives unless I'm parked in the city somewhere.
I also sometimes use it as a backup on WREKage, since the radio station has auxiliary inputs into the control console.

My sole complaint is the necessity of using proprietary software, i.e., iTunes. It's not a horrible program but it's not great either. Also, I've had problems putting video files on it successfully, but that's no biggie because its first role is as a music machine.

 

[Soundscape]

I'm never buying an ipod again. I had a Iriver (off ebay for $70) for 11 mos, it died, then a Creative Zen (off ebay for $80) for 13 mos..it more or less stopped working..then I got a replacement battery and it worked for about 2 more months..then totally died. I then got a Zune (off ebay that was refurbished) and it broke in 30 days, lol. The 120g Ipod I just bought and returned in 10 days was a headache. Loading in all sorts of files I had no interest. No copying + pasting. And the sync function never worked in Itunes. I d/led a plugin for WMP, but even that kept freezing me up and giving me messages that the device was corrupt.

These things don't last for years..at least for the 1500+ hours a year I would require. I almost have come to the point I'd rather buy a notebook computer to load mp3's onto, to bring to work to listen to music, lol. Or at least buy 2 devices, that way if 1 brakes, I would have a spare.

 

[JenniferLynn]

I'm an iPod owner... no idea the gen; but it's the first release of the video iPod n' black... I got no complaints..

I do agree with Magius tho - if you take the time to learn it, you can implement the program better... I've had it for atleast 3 or 4 years, no issues at all...

I guess it's really all what you like/ want in a MP3 player