piismyname

They say it's not the size that counts, but how you use it. Well, I say that's true for MP3 players as well as other things. It seems to me that everyone is concerned about this MP3 player having N features, or this player hold XX gigs of songs. But rarely does anyone seem to care if it will fit in their pocket! Am I the only one looking for a -small- MP3 player, and who is willing to not store every possible song in the universe on it at once?
If I'm not the only one, anyone have any good suggestions?


-p

brandon11983

http://www.apple.com/ipod/

My 4th gen 20 GB fits in my pocket perfectly and the interface could not be easier to use. If you are really anal about it being tiny, then check the iPod Mini.

__________________
Well behaved women rarely make history.

Jeff

I've got a Dell DJ. Fits perfectly in my pockets.

If it doesn't fit in your pockets, your pockets are waaay too small.

__________________
For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.
--Charles Bukowski

powerclown

RioKarma
The one, the only.
I've seen the light.

Bionic Monkey

The new gen of iPods really are suprisingly small and light weight. Go with the iPod Mini only if you're looking for the absolute smallest available player (then why wouldn't you go with flash based?). But for $50 more, you gain 16 gigs more space, and a player that will fit in your pocket with ease.

bitrunner

I was shocked at how small my HP Ipod was when I took it out of the box. It will fit in a pocket real easy!

Speed_Gibson

The support for Ogg-Vorbis and FLAC place it much higher on my list than an iPod; still on the 'I want but do not really need' list whenever money is there for it.

__________________
Started talking to yourself I see.
Yes, it's the only way I can be certain of an intelligent conversation.

Black Adder

hirosada

Yeah the Karma was my first choice, but I didn't need that much space, so I went with a Rio Nitrus, and imediatly after the fucking Rio Carbon comes out. They are nice and small, the Nitrus is 1.5GB and the Carbon weighs in at 5GB. Yeah my Nitrus may have a uh.. "drive problem" so I can exchange for the Carbon.

sadistikdreams

This all may be true, or I'm just biased, but get an iPod.
Be sure to check out the discounts for students/teachers/faculty at the apple store.

__________________
"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone.
The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials."
-Lin Yutang

hearts, by d.a.

skaven

If you're not hell-bent on storing gigs and gigs of MP3s on your MP3 player, you might consider the Creative MuVo TX FM. It's about the size of 3 AAA batteries laid side-by-side. It's like a USB pen drive, so you just plug it into your computer, drag-n-drop your MP3/WMA's, then plug the battery in and go. I got my 256M model for under $100.

http://us.creative.com/products/prod...0&product=9672

absorbentishe

I've got an RCA Lyra, 128 m, with an additional 128 card. It holds about 60 songes, or about 4 hours of music. It's small, and the battery lasts a while.

Redlemon

So, how many songs are you planning to fit? That'll narrow down your choices.

maleficent

I had one of those and loved it -- was really tiny (the purple annoyed me) but it had a built in FM radio and MP3 player...

I upgraded to the HP/Apple IPOD - which is slightly larger than a deck of cards -- goes in every pocket I have - and I love having all the music there -- rather than picking a bunch of songs to travel with.,

__________________

Scipio

The ipod doesn't support wma. That sucks, and the riokarma looks rather good. It also comes with superb earbuds from what I can tell.

__________________
"Erections lasting more than 4 hours, though rare, require immediate medical attention."

oblar

you can easily limit your possible mp3 player choices by just listing the things you do not wish to go without.

you have mentioned size matters.. If you are referring to data size, then you probably will wish to go with a hard drive based player (or a very large compact flash card... ~4GB). If it is physical size, then you might wish to go for a flash based player so it will be the size of a credit card or smaller.

in my experience, if you are just worried about it fitting in your pocket, then almost all of the players will fit that requirement. The only ones that don't seem to are the newer Media players, which I dont see much need for personally.

as many seem to bash ipod for not supporting this format or that format.. if your music doesnt include wma or ogg, then more than likely the lack of that feature won't matter, but if you have nearly all a single format that isnt always supported you can limit your choices even further..

i generally wouldnt consider converting all of your music, since that will be a very time consuming task.

bingle

Yeah, Rio is now owned by Dennon-Marantz, who are high-quality audio guys. They really made the Karma the player for those who appreciate quality in audio, and you can tell. The earbuds are very nice, and it also has support for FLAC (for people who can't even bear a little loss of quality) and Ogg (for people who want high-quality compression). It also comes with a dock that has RCA out, so that you can hook it up to a home stereo. (The RCA cables it comes with have gold-plated connectors, too). It uses a database storage method, so you can access your MP3s by title, genre, artist, album, year, or other information. The only thing it really lacks is the drag-and-drop file transfer benefits of other players, but it's a music player after all, not a USB drive.

All in all, I have no clue why anyone would buy an iPod for more money than a Karma - I guess they're more stylish, or cooler, or something. But I'd rather have more functionality than more style.

Bingle

Jeff

Yeah, I'd agree completely. Unless you're obsessed with image, this statement says it all.

__________________
For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.
--Charles Bukowski

oblar

Jeff, Bingle: personally, I don't like the Karma's UI.. The UI is the main reason I see to purchase an iPod. There just isn't enough of a price difference between Karma and the iPod for me to even consider the Karma with its current UI.

bal8664

I suggest going to the store and trying out all the ones they have. Personally i would get the ipod mini.

LLL2

I been checking out Iriver for sometime now.I just don't want to drop 400 on something that not going listen to that much yet.


Here's the link for it

iriver.com



This must be the new one

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...150-034&depa=0

I really like this one though ,small too,or the picture makes it look small

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...150-018&depa=0

brandon11983

What functionality does the Karma have that the iPod does not?

__________________
Well behaved women rarely make history.

Jeff

This is a great comparison here

http://www.rioworld.org/yabbse/index...;threadid=2179

Notice the link a few posts down that shows the superior sound quality of a Karma over iPod too.

__________________
For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.
--Charles Bukowski

bingle

Well, I don't have a problem with the UI, but that's a matter of personal preference so I can't really argue. However, I still think there are much better players out on the market than the iPod. I've read a ton about MP3 players and done a lot of research, and I still think that the iPod is one of the worst deals you can get. It's just got phenomenal marketing. If you look at any of the offerings from other companies, they almost always beat the iPod on features (which is important to me - most of my music is in Ogg, I like listening to gapless albums, I like listening on my home stereo.. an iPod just wouldn't do most of what I use an MP3 player for).

Bingle

bingle

I dunno about that posting - it's out of date, and the guy comes off as a little bit of a prick.

The most important features to me, in no particular order:

Support for better audio codecs, including free ones like Ogg and FLAC.
Support of gapless playback, including removing the gap in mp3 files.
Superior audio playback quality.
Bundled with a docking station with RCA out, for high-quality playack over home audio setup.
Up to 50 dollars cheaper, even without a rebate.
Smallest HDD-based mp3 player on the market.
Storage by ID3-based database, allowing you to access your music in many different ways
Longer battery life.
The dock supports transfer over USB2.0 and Ethernet, in case you want to access the player remotely.


Really the only thing it doesn't do is integrate with iTunes... (or play WAV files, but why would you want to play WAVs when you can play FLAC?))

Bingle

brandon11983

My thoughts on the comparo:

Value: This is a non-issue anymore. A 20 GB iPod can be had for $299, or $269 with the student discount.
Codec support: I can't bash the independent codecs like Ogg and FLAC, as I have not used them. And who really gives a shit about WMA?
Size: Non issue. My iPod fits very comfortably in my hand, even with a roll of headphone cord with it.
UI: I don't see anything wrong with the iPod's interface. I too can find a particular song out of thousands in a matter of seconds.
On the fly playlists: iPod can do it.
Battery life: Non issue. Does this really matter? How long have you been on the subway for 15 hours? I get at least a weeks use out of my iPod, charge it up overnight, and I'm good to go again.
Sound quality: Probably a non issue for most people. I don't think many owners are going to be able to discern minute details in sound quality using the included earbuds that they do not replace.

__________________
Well behaved women rarely make history.

bingle

Well, OK, the flaws in the iPod don't bother you... I still don't understand why you'd want to pay 50 dollars more (or 20 with a student discount) for something that is worse, even if the differences don't bother you much... Why not pay less for more?

Bingle

brandon11983

The thing is, I don't see them as flaws at all. I don't consider it to be worse than any other player for any reason. There is not a single thing (not one) that I do not like about my iPod. I wouldn't trade it for 2 Karma's. And not simply because they are not Mac compatible. iPod is an Apple product, and that is evident in every aspect of it.

__________________
Well behaved women rarely make history.

oblar

To me, audio codecs don't come into play very much although I do agree, a wider range is nicer.. FLAC, I don't have anything that uses it, or will I.. The tradeoff in space vs quality is too great.. ogg.. wouldn't be bad.. perhaps at some point they will release a firmware update (doubtful, I know)

the gapless playback, I could see where that is a major plus.. I'm generally not too concerned with that.. if I were listening to many different songs that flowed into one another, it would be a different matter... to you, that being a quality you seek, I would see why the ipod isn't the top of the list.

superior audio quality... well, I dont think my ear is trained enough to notice the difference between Karma and ipod, personally

docking station with RCA out I did have bundled with my ipod.. so that point is moot.

hmm 50$ cheaper... not a huge deal when I am comparing other items (plus I was able to grab mine with a fairly hefty rebate, so the price was closer to equal).

the rio is smaller, but again this comes to personal preference, I prefer the size of the ipod... just fits more comfortably in my hand.

storage by id3 database... i think ipod does this... longer battery life... as mentioned before, I think if a music player can last a good solid 5 hours then i am content.

the dock does support USB2.0 transfer, as well as firewire... the ethernet, although it would be a neat feature, I have read that many people get annoyed with the way Karma supports it... I think I would be in that group... setting up ethernet with a d-pad like device ... ugh..

--from reading your post, I would have to agree that the ipod isn't for you... but that is maily because there are alternatives that meet more criteria that you listed.. to me, the only things the ipod doesn't support I really see no need to have... (well, other than gapless playback.. that would be a nice option, but nothing essential)

btw, i echo the sentiments that being able to play WAV and WMA is rather silly.... I really dislike both of those formats, but at least WAV has its place.

bingle

Well, that's what FLAC is for - no loss of quality but smaller size than WAV.

So I guess everyone is happy with their iPod, but aside from the UI thing I haven't really heard any reasons why it's better. But people seem to be convinced, so I guess I'll give up :-) I tend to think of the iPod as... designer clothing or something. It's the same stuff you get elsewhere, but with a label and a bigger price tag.

Bingle

sudec15

Does the ipod play illegal mp3s? Is licensing a problem with the ipod?

pixelbend

It will play any mp3 or aac file you throw at it. You don't have any "illegal" mp3s, do you?

__________________
But I don't want ANY Spam!

ratiocination

Man the Ipod is too common for me.. the creative is too tacky. the rio just doesnt look right.. now i may sound crazy but how about this :



It's the Philips HDD 120. I think it's got a 40 GB capacity. it functions as an external hard drive, mp3, wma player and it's worth the money you pay for it. excellent battery life. the buttons look a bit tacky but on the whole, it looks way classier that its competitors. the software program for windows is not user friendly, but it still works.

pixelbend

Reminds me of this<P>

__________________
But I don't want ANY Spam!

ratiocination

lol yeah .. wanna get my hands on one of those

narf!

There's an mp3 player called iFP-799T 1GB MP3 Player with FM Tuner and Voice Recorder, from IRIVER. ITS REALLY SMALL! and holds 1gigs, plus an fm tuner, and has a voice recorder. Check out the stats at this address:
http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/deta...ource=EWB06582

narf!

oh, here's the pict of the iriver one.

biznatch

hmm...I myself own a IHP-100 from Iriver. great. 10 GB of any kind of files(it's recognized by windows as a mass storage device, if you will, an external hard drive).
You browse through your audio files just like you browse through explorer. files, folders...
I didn't have to install the driver. It was automatically recognized by windows.
pretty cool stuff that made me choose it over the ipod...it is able to play most type of audio files...(iPod can't even read WMAs.)...It has a AM/FM radio tuner in it, and a microphone...
also a second line-in, and optical lines in and out.
approx. same size as the 40 Gig iPod, with more stuff...
there's also a 20 Gig version available.
and I think iPod is too cliche...everyone on the subway, in the street, evrywhere, has it, but I wonder why...
the bass sounds awful on it(the earphones fart in your ears), you can't upload from your iPod to a computer, you have to use iTunes...
bleh. I don't like it.
My friend had the Lyra...pretty cool, nifty and small machine. I like it too...
well...Iriver makes cool stuff and are coming out with even cooler stuff..so check out their site for mp3 players of all shapes and sizes.

jorgelito

What's "gapless playback"?

Man, I wish someone would make a player that supported all codecs/formats, and were user-friendly, easily uploaded and downloaded too. This reminds me a little of the VHS, BETA wars from the 80s. There should be a standard, or at least compatibility. I am still waiting...

bingle

The MP3 format, unfortunately, specifies a 3-second gap between tracks on an album. There are some albums that are constructed to flow from one track to the next seamlessly, and adding a 3-second gap ruins the album. Ogg and other formats don't suffer from the same problem, but some MP3 players insert gaps anyway.

The Rio Karma not only respects the gapless playback of supported formats, it also can remove the gaps from MP3 format files during playback! So if you have a Pink Floyd album in MP3, it will work just fine on the Karma, but you'll hear pauses between tracks on the iPod and other players.

This is a non-issue for anyone who doesn't have gapless albums (or who doesn't listen to tracks in album order). I don't really know how frequent those albums are in the wild, but I have many that are ruined by gaps. They're mostly "theme" albums, like Sgt. Pepper, Abbey Road, almost anything by Pink Floyd (esp.The Wall), any rock operas (Tommy, S.F. Sorrow)... If you have anything like that, it might be a problem for you!

Bingle

Edit: I did some research, and the iRiver 100-series players support this with a firmware upgrade. The 300-series probably support it out of the box.

bingle

Yeah, I think the iRiver players are the best on the market. The only problem is that they're quite pricey, but if you have the money they've got the best feature set.

I didn't realize that they've also got optical audio out - that's a great benefit right there. My only other dream feature would be a base with an IR (or RF) receiver so that I could sit on the couch and play my music with a remote.

Bingle