ok, I’m thinking about getting an MP3 portable player to use on my Motorcycle. I just don’t know much about them. What I’d like to know is how much music they hold. I’d like something that will hold around 20 hours of music. I’ve heard of them doing it but don’t know for sure. I’ve been looking around and they tell you price and how much memory they have but not how much it will hold.
so I guess my questions would be:
how big is a “typical” song, around 4 mintues, in size in MP3 format?
if I get something with 32 megs of RAM what does this mean? is this what stores the music or is there a hard drive on the player.
can I get a player that will change what ever holds the music easy so that I can take like 40-60 hours worth of music.
what’s the typical price range, I’m hoping to spend 300 or less.
do they have players that will take an outside source of power, ie 12volts so I can run off the bikes power.
I have looked for info but really haven’t found much and I’d rather get the info from here than someone at the store who will either not know as much as me or will try to get me to buy something that I don’t want need.
actually now that I think about it I don’t need a portable one, though that is prefered, so any info on a smaller home type is welcome too.
As far as quality to quantity, at 128Kbps, (CD Quality), figure approximately 1MB per Minute. A 4 minute song can be around 4 MB in size. Give yourself some room though.
With 32 MB Ram, you can easily fit 20 minutes of music on there. You want 20 hours???
For $300 your’e likely to get something with 64 MB Ram, and it’s flash Ram most likely, so you can replace the music/files as you wish. Most portable players will run on a triple A battery.
I haven’t looked myself yet, but if you can find the ones that go in cars, you’re more likely to find something with a larger drive, so you can fit hours rather than minutes worth of music.
There are some devices just starting to come out that are just portable discman-style CD players, but in addition to playing regular music CDs, they play data CDs (CD-Rs) with MP3 files stored on them. One of those can easily hold 15-20 hours of music. In order for it to be of much use, though, you need access to a computer with a CD burner installed.
Hey this might have been exactly what I was looking for. plus it’s pretty cheap, just need a HD for it and they aren’t that expensive. thanx for the link. the reason I had to ask is because someone told me that you could get them that would store 20 hours of music on it and they are the size of a walkman. I wasn’t totally convinced so had to ask.
Portable flash-based player
Examples: Rio 300/500/600, Nomad, Lyra
Price: $150-$300
Storage: 30 minutes with a 32 meg player, 1 hour with a 64 meg player. You could get a 200+ meg flash card, but that would be silly considering the high cost per megabyte for flash cards
Advantages: No skipping. Ever. These players have no moving parts so it’s just not possible for them to skip. Incredibly low battery usage. They are, for the most part, light and small. Great for high-volatility situations (i.e. jogging, riding a motorcycle)
Disadvantages: Lack of storage space, price. You have to be at your computer to swap songs, unless you carry around lots of flash cards (again, silly)
MP3 CD player
Examples: Genica, MamboX, Pine, RCA (in development), Philips Expanium (in development)
Price: $99-$250
Storage: ~10 hours per disc
Advantages: Massive storage space. Easy to carry around lots of music with you: just bring more discs. These players also play regular music CDs. Relatively cheap.
Disadvantages: You need a CD-R. Skipping is possible, though it is less frequent than with audio CD players because more of the song can be buffered in memory.
MP3 Harddrive-based player
Examples: Nomad Jukebox, PJB-100
Price: $500-$700
Storage: ~100 hours for a 6 gigabyte HD
Advantages: Even more massive storage space. Somewhat more portable than the MP3 CD players, though the Nomad Jukebox is exactly the same size as a basic CD player. Great to use in your car.
Disadvantages: Astronomical price to go along with the astronomical storage space. Also, the hard drives are basic laptop HDs that are prone to hardware failure. You probably wouldn’t want to jog or ride a motorcycle with one, but it would depend on how smooth the ride is.
I decided to go with the Rio 500, and I haven’t had any regrets about plunking down $270 for it the day it was released. I’m probably going to purchase a CD MP3 player such as the RCA or Pine (don’t recall the model numbers)
If you need more help, check out www.mp3.com and especially the hardware bulletin boards there.