Looking for an MP3 player with some particular features...

Factual Questions
1

Apologies if this is the wrong forum. I wasn’t sure if this should go here, or in IMHO, or perhaps even Cafe Society, but I decided to put it here in GQ because I’m trying to see if anybody knows of an MP3 player with some particular specifications. If it should be moved to another forum, please do so. Thanks.

OK. So I’ve been using a Rio Forge 512 for a couple years now; I haven’t been able to find a replacement model that did everything I want. Sadly, though, my third Rio Forge 512 is now dying, and I’m getting a little tired of this.

The first one died a hardware-related death for some unknown reason and just wouldn’t turn on anymore.

The second one had something similar happen; while plugged into its USB connection, it actually let out a puff of smoke, and took my (at the time) only 1GB SD card with it. Grrr.

Now this third one this one has started freezing any time I play an MP3 or WMA file on it (it still works for Audible files, oddly enough). So I’m trying to find a player that will do what I want, but … you know … a newer model.

Here’s what the Rio Forge 512 does that I like:

  1. It supports Audible files. I mainly listen to audiobooks on the thing, and this is a vital feature for me.

  2. It runs on a single AAA battery. Since I use it a lot, often far away from a wall socket, this is also a vital feature. I don’t need to recharge an internal battery, I can just pop in a new AAA from my pocket. (Well, technically a freshly-charged AAA from my pocket. But whatever.)

  3. It indexes the files by ID3 tag (and the WMA equivalent, I guess) so you can play them by album, author, genre, date, etc. Some players, like the cheap RCA Lyra players I got for my daughters, just read the filename and play it back in alphabetical order – I hate that. Sure, a player like this takes longer to boot up when you’ve added or removed songs, since it has to scan through and index the new stuff, but it’s a very handy feature.

  4. It’s flash-based, not hard drive based, which saves power. It doesn’t have much internal memory (512MB, which is obvious from the name of the player) but …

  5. … it has an SD slot; currently I have a 4GB card in there, which is very handy for big audiobooks.

  6. It supports secure WMA files, which is important for me since that’s how the audiobooks are distributed from both my local library district and from NetLibrary.

  7. It supports bookmarks. This is the most important feature to me – my Sandisk Sansa m260 would be great if it just did this. In any file, MP3, WMA, or Audible, I can bookmark my current location (it can save up to 10 bookmarks) and return to that place whenever I want. It’s not very useful for songs, but it’s a lifesaver when you’re dealing with 8-20 hour audiobooks.

I have an iPod Video, with the 30GB hard drive, and that’s one of the few players I’ve seen that also supports bookmarks. But of course it has an internal battery that lasts about 5 seconds, and it doesn’t support WMA files.

And as mentioned, I have a Sandisk Sansa m260, which has 4GB of internal memory and would be great if it just had the bookmarking feature. It saves your place in Audible files, but not in MP3 or WMA files, which is really irritating.

So … does anybody know of any player that is comparable to my trusted ancient Rio Forge 512? I’ve been looking for one for a loooong time, but I haven’t found anything. I would be eternally grateful if somebody could point me towards one … assuming one actually exists.

2

Can’t help you on player suggestions, but I might be able to broaden your horizons just a bit. Podiobooks has free audiobooks for download, so if you’re primarily interested in having a book to listen to, and not necessarily a specific book to listen to, then if you find a player that meets all your requirements, but won’t play audiobooks, you might be able to overlook that.

3

Oh yeah, thanks, Tuck[sup]1[/sup] I did know about that place – Bill DeSmedt, who used to post here under the name jenkoul, turned me on to it when he released his book Singularity there last Halloween. It’s a really cool site, and I highly recommend that everybody interested in audiobooks go there. And Singularity itself is a great book, too, if you like sci-fi and speculation about the 1908 Tunguska meteor strike; the web site http://www.vurdalak.com has some information on the book and its intriguing conjecture.

Still, I also need Audible support because

a) I have a couple hundred books in Audible format,

b) Audible’s format lets me listen to books at an 8kbps bitrate instead of the 32kbps bitrate I prefer for MP3/WMA, which means I can fit a lot more books on my player, and somehow Audible’s quality at 8kbps is no worse than the 32kbps MP3/WMA files.

c) Audible has a really nice selection.

I guess if it came down to absolutely no other choice, I could always convert my Audible books to MP3 or WMA, but that would be a big hassle and increase the size of the files by 4x.

Anyway. Thanks for reminding me about Podiobooks – I need to check up on their new releases.

[sup]1[/sup]Hmmm … I forget if that’s the appropriate nickname for you. Oh well. I expect you’ll let me know if not. :wink:

4

Bumping just because I’m interested in the question. Something with most or all of those features would be of interest to me too, for getting some WMA audiobooks from www.audiobookstanddl.com or places like that.

The only player I’ve used with a specific bookmarking feature is my creative zen micro - but that’s hard drive based with a customized lithium-ion battery, and doesn’t seem to do too well with being played on the go. (I use it mostly with its traveldock as a small plug-in AC stereo next to my armchair with thousands of songs on it - also useful for taking to libraries or hotel rooms for a good source of tunes while I’m writing.)

Have you tried searching through mp3 player reviews at cnet or similar places??

5

That’s a pretty big set of specialized requirements and I think you’re going to find it difficult, if not impossible, to find a player to match all of your criteria.

SD card slots have always been relatively uncommon and they seem to be increasingly replaced in favour of MicroSD slots. Audible support will further narrow your field and, oddly, bookmarking capabilities could possibly be your biggest stumbling block. For whatever reason, bookmarking is only sporadically supported. I think this is particularly ridiculous considering the huge popularity of audiobooks, podcasts and other large files.

I have no specific recommendations but I’ve found DAPReview and Anything But iPod to be excellent resources for digital audio player news and reviews.

6

Thanks for those links Hodge. And I agree that the list is long… for my own purposes I’d love to see any player with 4, 6, 7… and some kind of decent battery situation. I’m not hung up on having one player that’s all things to me - I’ve got players that are good with audible, and players that are good at organizing content, (not that I generally play that way.) And I don’t have any issue with customize batteries as such, as long as they’ll hold a charge for a decent duration.

7

Thanks for those links Hodge. And I agree that the list is long… for my own purposes I’d love to see any player with 4, 6, 7… and some kind of decent battery situation. I’m not hung up on having one player that’s all things to me - I’ve got players that are good with audible, and players that are good at organizing content, (not that I generally play that way.) And I don’t have any issue with customize batteries as such, as long as they’ll hold a charge for a decent duration.

8

The Creative Zen V and Zen V Plus claim to support Audible, is flash based, and available from 1 GB to 8 GB. Not sure about the bookmarks, but if the Micro had them, perhaps the V does too.

9

Interesting! Supports video too, and I’ve been thinking about getting a portable flash unit that can play video.

And they’re available at some neighborhood Futureshop locations! Maybe I should grab one, see how well it handles with bookmarking and other stuff, and return it in 30 days if I’m not completely wowed.

10

If you act quick the www.woot.com thing for sale now is san disk mp3 player. Audible, AAA battery SD card for $30 plus $5 shipping in the US. But you only have until they sell out or midnight central time.

11

All the Creative Zen players I’ve tried have supported bookmarks (not exactly like mine, but similar) but I’ve never tried those. That could be what I need, Dag Otto. Thanks! I’ll take a look.

12

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention – I have that one too, the e140. It, like the m260, would be perfect if it wasn’t for the lack of a bookmark feature. I just don’t understand why everybody doesn’t have them – Sandisk even opined, when somebody on their knowledgebase asked if it would be a possible future update, that they didn’t think it would be feasible. I don’t understand what the problem is, though; it seems pretty straightforward to me, and since they already save your place in an Audible file, it ought to be even easier for a Sansa to add a full bookmarking feature.

13

Try woot.com they have a good one I think for 29.99