Which MP3 Player should I get? :Confused: & What do you make of your present player

Its Friday night down college way, I’ve got stuff to be reading for Monday, and NO TUNES. The (ingenious) elastic bands and superglue mechanism formally holding my portable CD player together has packed in, and as a result, my life is a lot worse. Believe me – a week without music and the world becomes un-damped.

Having just signed up for broadband (at last) and with some spare cash left over from doing the devils work in a holidayless summer, I think the time is right to get with the kids, do the new thing, and make the plunge into the portable MP3 player world. As a latecomer to this world, and in the knowledge that lots of teched-up New Order fans out there will know it well at this stage, I’ve decided to ask:

WHAT PORTABLE MP3/4 PLAYER SHOULD I BUY?

I hope to get around 600 CDs worth onto it, but at a push that could be reduced down to 400 or so. Basically, I’ll be needing lots of GIGABYTES, and one of these fancy pants NANOs wont cut the mustard. For my sins, I’m still in MICROSOFT land, running on XP.

At the moment, the 60GB I-pod is top of the list. People are telling me that the SONY player is cheaper and with well compressed 20GB I’d be in business. Creative Industries seem to have a lot to offer too.

Basically, and advice would be appreciated – espically of the “I got this player and this is what I think of it”.

Thankee!

Go with Creative! Those guys have been making the finest soundcards over the years! Creative won several awards for it's quality.

Ipod's are pretty, but not meant for audio nuts. If you are looking for something to impress your friends with it's design, i suggest you get an Ipod...

If you want to record something: Creative wins. The jukebox3 is worldwide famous for it's recording abilities. Best recording option is above CD standard (@ 48Hz/16bit audio). Perfect if you record live music.). You can also record in MP3 format from 64kbs to 320kbs (i think). I have one my self for nearly 3 years and still works ok (needed a repairment with the headphone jack, but i didn't mind much).

Also, Ipod (apple) is trying to kill "physical" music (CDs, etc)in favour of Mp3 and such lossy formats. Join the fight against shitty compressed music

my 2 cents. I'm anti-ipod, so i suggest you get a 2nd opinion

EDIT: i bought a 20gbs jukebox. But i later bought a 40gbs seagate HD for it... You can buy a 100Gb HD for it from what i've heard!

go with Creative man

I have a Creative Zen Micro and love it. Would have got a bigger capacity one if I hadn't got it for only £70 by using my Nectar points.

Nectar Points? Tut Tut.

Thanks for all the advice and tips. I actually went looking today, and am even MORE confused. Creaives seem to have a good package - but are less user friendly.

the 100GIG (should that be a 1Tera?) Sounds fantastic.

The Willy Loman down sony way did a good job selling ATRACK.

Im gonna think it over.

I asked in every outlet "how long is a song" - because most adverts say "10000song capacity" etc, and NOBODY could tell me. Seems fishy. There could be a legit 40% variance at least. Time for some EU regulation I think.

I'm happy with my ipod, but I'm not a techie so my opinion doesn't count for much. It took me a while to stop putting the shiny toy in my mouth. However, I do think an important thing to consider is your pc ( i take it you have a pc rather than a mac, or else this would all be redundant) and what software you are comfortable with. I like using limewire and itunes so it works for me, but if its not intuitive for you then go with creative i reckon, as a specialist they will be in it for the longhaul.

If you are not a stickler for music quality and dont care to really hear every single faint note that is played, then just go for an ipod since they are the most user friendly and the best looking.

CAKE - CLOCK - ZWART wrote: The Willy Loman down sony way did a good job selling ATRACK.

I know next to nothing about mp3 players in general, but I just received a 60gb iPod as an early birthday gift and I'm quite pleased with it. I can record my CD's onto my computer at any mp3 quality ranging from 64 to 320, so there's no need to have more quality loss than necessary. I don't buy digital albums or anything like that - I just like using my iPod because it's easier than selecting 5 cd's to take with me on an excursion and having to replace them each time I want to listen to a different album. It's also significantly smaller. But go with what strikes your fancy - it sounds like the Creative ones are good, too!

sound quality is important but do the others really offer a feasible better alternative to iPod?... you are just listening on tiny earphones no matter what, and battery life is a major issue.

my biggest beef against my iPod Mini is the battery drains so fast, but I listen at full blast. If I let it sit a couple of days the battery drains alot even then, which is annoying, still better than messing with disposible batteries by far.

iPod doesnt give you much options as far as how you want to compress your music, but then is easy as hell, really too streamlined, kinda fascist

Creative for me

The rest are shite, although in fairness I've never used them

Hope this helps