MP3 Player...

In My Humble Opinion
1

What I most want is an MP3 player where I don’t have to muck around with some new software application, but can just plug it in to my computer with a USB cable, and it will act like a new Windows directory. I just drag and drop files to it, eject it, and walk around and play music. Where I control files by using the file name – “00001 Bach Bagatelle.mp3” rather than by song “title” in the mp3 metadata. I do not want to have to get I-Tunes or whatever.

My camera simply opens as a Windows directory. My phone simply opens as a Windows directory. MP3 players?

I also would like an FM player attachment, so I can listen in my car. Tune the radio to whatever off-channel freq and go. (Logically, a power adapter for the car’s power outlet would be good. Nobody calls 'em “cigarette lighters” anymore. Heh.)

Recommendations? Or am I asking more than the manufacturers offer?

2

I don’t have one, but I did get to play around with the Sony E series mp3 Walkman a few weeks ago when I was shopping for headphones. It looks like it might fit your needs and includes an FM tuner. Seems like a solid player.

Link is to the 16GB player. 4 & 8 also available.

3

THIS is what you want. Unfortunately, they don’t make them any more and I wouldn’t take the risk buying this one; the guy right up and says it doesn’t work. It’s a bit on the large side, too, which isn’t good. But, I had one back when they did make them (2003), and it only broke down this year. If I had $30 to throw away right now I’d probably buy this one anyway, in hopes that I could make mine work again. The only thing is that it did require its own software program to use it, but the built-in FM transmitter was awesome.

If you can live without the shuffle option, THIS is a good low-cost option; I got mine for $10 at a thrift shop. The up side is that it uses any USB flash drive or SD card you probably already have. The down side is that it only works in the car, and of course that it doesn’t have a shuffle option (that I’ve managed to find at least). The sound quality is excellent in my car at least, and it can be set to any channel on the whole range of FM radio. It also has a standard headphone jack, so you can plug in any other mp3 player you might have; the downside to this, I’ve found, is that the bass in an mp3 player designed for headphones is sorely lacking, and therefore you won’t get much (if any) bass when listening to your player through it in the car.

I currently use THIS as my portable MP3 player for non-car use. Up side is that it works exactly like an external drive, in that you just plug it into your computer’s USB port and it auto-detects, so you can just drag and drop your files into it, or plug in a micro-SD chip with your music on it. It also has the ability to play .avi files; the small screen is juuuuust big enough to make watching them worth the bother since I don’t have a tablet or anything. The only problem is that most of the video files I… obtain… from the internet aren’t in the proper format; however, a few minutes with a converter program solves that problem. Like I mentioned above, the bass is pitiful when plugged into the FM transmitter, or I’d use its shuffle option more on car trips. It’s also got a built in video camera but frankly the quality sucks, so I don’t use it for that.

I haven’t been able to find any MP3 players with built-in FM transmitters, like the Neuros had. There are plenty of options to transmit FM from a player through the headphone jack, such as THIS or THIS or even THIS one, specifically for iPods, but I haven’t tried any of them. I suspect that you’d have much the same bass issue, however, but again that’s pure speculation. You may find they’re just what you’re looking for.

Good luck!

PS: Not a shill for Ebay, it’s just an easy way to show you what I’m talking about without having to track down each product’s website individually.

4

Looks pretty good. The “Easy Media Transfer” description sounds promising, although I am slightly dubious at the need to install their software to manage it. Thank’ee! I’ll investigate this puppy further!

5

Lum! simulpost! Thank’ee Phnord Prephect (spiff name!) Hey, for the prices being asked on Ebay – $3.95? – how can I lose?

ETA; “Shuffle” is really low on my list of priorities. I mostly prefer to choose what I want to listen to, rather than spin the big wheel of fortune. So not having a shuffle option is no drawback!

6

If you’re talking about the Eclipse player (my current mp3 player), you don’t have to download or install anything; your computer will auto-detect it as if it were any other external storage device.

If you’re talking about the Neuros, again… it doesn’t work, and they don’t make them anymore, so don’t buy it!

Edit: Ooops! I thought it was odd that you responded so quickly; I see you were talking to Dag Otto instead! D’oh!

7

I have a Sansa Clip+ 8GB and love it. It is simple, easy to use and Windows detects and treats it like another storage device when plugged into the USB. Drag and drop, or sync with WMP. It has a small screen, easy controls, and easy to understand menus.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_3_5?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=sansa+mp3+player&sprefix=sansa%2Caps%2C279

8

Look into installing the Rockbox replacement firmware on one of the MP3 players it’s available for. My main MP3 player is a cheap SanDisk running Rockbox, and it works like you describe (drag-and-drop files or folders to it just like a Windows directory, eject, and play).

9

Seconding the Sansa Clip. But it does sort stuff with the metadata. You don’t have to have Itunes (or any other media player) to change that. There are plenty of free tagging programs. I use TagScanner (as a portable app) and it lets you rename to match the metadata or generate metadata from the filename.

10

Sansa players will act like a drive in Windows just as they are if used as in the MSC (UMS) mode.

Rockbox does give some nice features and a different interface on the player for the players it installs on.

there are a number of player attachments which plug into the cig lighter socket and transmit a radio signal. you can find them with a jack to connect to the headphone jack on the player, a USB port or a memory card reader. i’ve got one that has all three, so you can load the memory card with mp3 files and it will decode them. it has a small remote so it can be operated without looking at it.

11

I personally liked the Sansa mp3 player. I don’t remember the one I had exactly but it had radio on it and room for an mini sd card. I also have a Ipod which of course it is amazing it can do so many things other then just play music. Well when you get a mp3 player I hope that I make it in to it. I am a singer my music can be found on Itunes Spotify and many other places. You can even Google my name and it will pop up

12

I have a Sansa Clip as well, works fine for what I use it for which is mainly running. As long as shuffle works I’m good.

13

Another vote for the Sansa. I got one as a gift years ago - it takes a AAA battery - that is how old it is. However, I use it for running, cycling, and snowsports - it has taken a beating, been rained on and sweated on; and still keeps chugging along. It also has an FM tuner and voice recorder. File management is like any other folder in Windows explorer. I will use it until it gives out, if it ever does.

14

I’ve been very happy with the Sansa products but it looks like they mainly just have the Fuze and Clip these days. I miss the “e” series players that the Fuze replaced.

15

I like the Sansa + Rockbox combination too. I’ve been listening to a lot of audiobooks lately, and Rockbox is the only way I could find to get a “jump back or forward by x seconds” feature (that is, with a single press of a button - I know that most MP3 players let you seek through a track with a long press, but that’s too fiddly and error-prone). Very useful if you didn’t catch the last sentence or two.

Rockbox is great for audiobooks actually. It’s very configurable. The Sansa is a nice little player even without Rockbox, though. It replaced an iPod Nano 6, which was cute but ergonomically a nightmare. Touch-only interface on a mini MP3 player? Bad idea.

16

BEWARE !!!
I got one of these Sony Walkman’s for my girlfriend. It is a solid unit. But I found a serious annoyance when dealing with files I had converted to mp3s (ripped from CDs). You can drag and drop, and there’s this fancy software (for your PC) to help you organize your files. BUT this software relies on the meta-data included in each file - and does not use the directory structure you may use as you dropped the files onto the unit.
So if your mp3 files don’t have the meta-data, ALL your files are “organized” into this “unknown artist” “album”. If your files have generic filenames like “track01”, “track02”, etc., you will see numerous "track01"s even though they are located in different folders on the unit. The reason this becomes an issue is when you want to use this software to create playlists.

Without the meta-data, all files are associated to this “unknown artist” (default artist). I finally got online with a Sony tech. support, and she confirmed this behaviour of the software. The software is reliant on the meta-data stored in the files.

It may be possible to use some other software to create the playlists. I don’t know the format of the playlists, and not sure how the unit organizes them (whether they’re all in the same folder, etc.)

To workaround, I renamed my files something unique so that I could identify them. But this is a pain for every CD you may want to load. I am considering writing a program that will either 1) insert specified meta-data, or 2) rename the files based on the folder name. But I haven’t gotten to that yet.

17

I like Rockbox for audiobooks (and podcasts) because I can easily set a bookmark in the middle of a long file, and because I can increase the playback speed (without increasing the pitch).

18

there are mp3 tag editors with which you can make/change the meta data for a file. you can do all the files in a folder or selected files. plenty of these already exist if you don’t want to write one.

19

First, thank you, everyone, for a lot of great advice, which I will now need to think on!

johnpost: ooh! Write one myself? How? Say I wanted to do this in Visual Basic Express; how do I “see” the mp3 metadata in an mp3 file? How do I “open” an mp3 file, and how do I address the fields? (Currently using “Tag & Rename” and it seems to work.)

Thanks again, all!

P.S. one of the main reasons for this is I got a disk full of old time radio mp3s. The good part of this is that the sound quality is already pretty poor, so high fidelity isn’t at the top of my “must have” list!

20

The Sansa Clip is great.

The only two drawbacks is the “clip” is weak and will bust after about three months.

The second is the display washes out in bright sunlight. I use mine to run and it’s so annyoing to have to find shade to read it.

It’s not a smooth scrolling like an iPod, but after I lost my iPod, I said, “never again”