Last year, I bought a simple Mp3 player which held 128MB, and while that has been alright for the gym, I would like something with some storage. I’ve been lusting after an Ipod for a while, but I’m still not sure
The main drawback seems to be that the battery may not last more than a few years and is expensive to replace.
I would like at least four gigabyes of storage. I would like something I can take to the gym and something I can jog with. I would like something that is easy to use and doesn’t have a complicated user interface.
Should I go with the Ipod or get something else? If you want to bash any Mp3 players go right ahead.
I just ordered a Rio Canon from Amazon. It costs as much as an IPod but it’s smaller and has 5 gigs instead of 4. Like all products, there were mixed reviews, but the positive outweighed the negative, and it was actually on sale for only 199, so I bought it.
Can’t wait until it gets here so I can test it out.
I bought an iPod three weeks ago and it’s been nothing but trouble. The battery won’t charge and Apple has been extremely uncooperative about replacing it. I tried to return it to the store where I bought it and they say that they can’t take it back, that Apple is the worst company to deal with in terms of returning defective merchandise. This is from a store that I’ve bought from for over 20 years and never had any problems at all.
The Nomad Zen Xtra comes in 30gb (the one I have) and 40gb models.
I find that my mp3 player is superior to the iPod in all respects. The iPod will change songs if you brush up against the keys; not so with the Nomad. It is compatible with all file storage programs save iTunes. It’s way less expensive. IMHO, it’s the best hard drive mp3 player on the market today (and I’ve tested out a handful of them, including the iPod). I’ve used it while walking too, and it’s okay for that too despite being heavier than an iPod.
Gosh, I’m kinda surprised at this thread. I love my iPod. No problems with the battery - I’ve had a 15g for a little over a year now, I use it in my car with the iTrip and at the gym, mostly. I think the interface is fabulous and simple and the device itself is just wonderful all around. I’ve got a friend who has one and uses it in the same ways and she feels the same way about it - I can’t believe this thread is all full of haterz.
I love my iPod too. I did manage to break my first one - dropped it once too many times, apparently. But I liked it well enough that I didn’t hesitate to replace it with another iPod. (It was out of warranty, and I wanted a newer, larger capacity model anyway.)
Before the iPod I tried an Archos Jukebox Recorder 20 and it was nothing but trouble - battery didn’t charge properly, got it exchanged and the second one had the exact same problem. The interface was non-intuitive and the buttons felt cheap. The iPod is pure bliss by comparison.
I like my iPod. I take it everywhere. Anytime I leave my car, I make sure to keep it safe, even when I leave expensive textbooks in my car with the doors unlocked. It really has worked out well for me.
What I like:
• Easy to use. this should not be underestimated. I have had other MP3 players in the past and a crappy interface can be a huge turn-off.
• Can find add-ons to make it do whatever I need. Use it as a voice recorder? Can do. Play it over my car stereo? No problem. Nothing like a long road trip with a friend and the iPod.
• Chicks dig it. Not that I am looking anymore.
• One very important chick digs it… my wife. One trip to the gym with it (her & the iPod) was all it took for her to stop giving me grief for buying it and start giving me grief about sharing.
• I have it set up to sync my calendars and contacts. Nice knowing ya Palm III…
• Every time I pass another iPod owner we give each other a knowing look like “Aaah yeah, iPod set up us the bomb”.
• Every person who has followed my recommendation to go iPod has thanked me later.
What other people make a huge deal about but I am pretty neutral on:
• Battery life. I don’t remember ever running out, so it is adequate for my needs.
• Storage space. Again, adequate. It took some doing to fill my lowly 15 gigs.
• Price. Are there cheaper players out there? Yes. Do some have “better specs” than the iPod. Sure, on paper. I have checked out other players and… meh. I feel like I got what I paid for.
Dislikes:
• The brushed metal back cover tends to show finger prints and other marks. A boon for manufacturers of protective cases, I’m sure.
• My kids think it’s the best thing since… something… good… that happened… since they’ve been alive. They ask me to bring it in the car whenever we go somewhere, and then they request the same song over and over…
• I clumsily knocked it off the table today. I dislike that very much.
I like my iPod (20 gb, 4th generation) well enough. The battery life on the new iPods is quite good (12 hours), plus it’s an attractive piece of kit. I particularly like the new buttons on the scroll-wheel, because it means I can operate my iPod when it’s in the pocket of my pants (simply my poking myself in the thigh–or making strange, circular strokes on my leg to change volume (which looks somewhat dodgy)).
However, I abhor having to use iTunes, which is clunky, feature-deficient and ugly. Winamp5 is a superior media player, so I have the ridiculous situation of having to manually synchronise playlists between iTunes and Winamp.
The storage capacity is nice, but nothing else really enchants me. The touch-interface means I usually end up changing the song or turning it off or something when I reach into my backpack to turn down the volume. The battery life sucks. It won’t get me through a long bus ride. The interface isn’t all that intuitive- it froze at one point and I had to call a friend when I was on a long trainride to figure out how to reset it- not very convient. Apparently a hard reset button would be inelegant, so you have to somehow divine that pressing two of the buttons for ten seconds will turn the darn thing off. Did I mention that it freezes sometimes, for no reason at all? It’s a big “hey steal from me!” item if anyone sees it, and it’s absurdly expensive. the iTunes software has it’s faults, and Apple has done some pretty dirty things with the software- like using “software updates” to disable plugins and setting iTunes to automatically erase everything on your iPod if you don’t tell it not to! I’m always afraid I’m going to fry mine and lose all my music or something.
I have to have a large capacity MP3 player because I do not have my own computer. But if I had my way, I’d go back to my old iRiver MP3 CD player. It was hardy, cheap, the wired remote was AWESOME (shows you the song name, allows you to navigate through menus…just awesome), it came with a AA battery attachment that made it’s battery life increadable (I think Apple charges $60.00 for theirs), I didn’t have to worry about losing everything and I didn’t have to worry about software doing strange things to my music collection.
I love my iPod and wouldn’t hesitate for a second to buy another one. It is so cool to have all that music wherever I go. The best part is having the dock port hooked into my Yamaha receiver. Friends come over and hear the music cranking out of the speakers and start looking for a 500 disk CD changer. They are blown away when they realize all that sound is coming from that “tiny little white thing.”
Another iPod lover. Mine rocks (40Gig, 3rd Gen) The common criticisms of it never have affected me at all. I love the interface. The earphones get a bit uncomfortable after an hour or two, but I’ve got a funny lump in my ear to blame for that.
Love my iPod. I never would have bought it, because it was so expensive (3G 30gig, $599), but it was a gift from my husband. When we moved, I put all our CD’s into iTunes and loaded them up in the iPod, and my husband carried it with him. It was a multistage move, and it was all the music and audiobook player he had until three months later when our stuff caught up with him. I have thirty or so audiobooks loaded at all times, and it comes in great on long car trips with the adaptor.
My son loves it so much he bargained me into getting him one of his own instead of a birthday party. He’s an audiobook listener too, so we got it through Audible, $100 dollars off if you subscribe to the Audible Listener program for a year. The subscription is part of his Christmas present.
The OP wanted something with four gigabytes, and something to jog with. I don’t know that an iPod is the right choice there. How about a Creative Muvo 2? 4gb, much smaller than the iPod, and $199. Or, I’d consider a 512MB player, like the Muvo Micro. No moving parts, extremely long battery life, very small. Great for jogging, and with 512mb you can fit a hundred to two hundred songs on it. And, it’s $129.
