I had an ipod but somehow lost it a few months ago. I was running low on funds so tried using my CD walkman. It sounds great, but it hardly fits in your pocket and can easily turn off by itself if it moves too much. I tried using a cassete walkman but the sound quality usually sucks really bad and sometimes it just turns off for no reason at all. My last choice was to buy a cheap used MP3 player and I have to say it's way better than all of the above. You don't have to use itunes with it, it has a very advanced EQ feature, it doesn't have that annoying white background and it just sounds good as long as the song is 320 kpbs but then you have to take into consideration how much money originally went into the mixing and mastering process of the album. A lot of music in the last 15 years is so loud and has so much static, that no matter what kpbs it's in, it sounds horrible. That's the "loudness war" for you.
And I agree, Apple is a monopoly and most of the people who use their products are obnoxious. That's capitalism for you. It's very obscene how so many peope have to have an ipod rather than an MP3 player that's pretty much the same but much less expensive; seemingly just for deh lulz. How do you feel about Sony? I know Sony isn't much better than Apple but I swear I have never had a bad product from Sony. Whether it be CD players, headphones or whatever, Sony makes damn good products.