Fangoria

iTrader: (1)

Looking to buy an MP3 player as a present for someone

Dont really know anything about them or which are good. The MP3 player needs to be ok for someone thats running. I've seen the Apple Ipod in Piccies and it looks like some taccy bit of white plastic. So I guess anything really except that

I saw soemthing in silver I'm sure in a magazine a few months back - but dont remember the make - think it was Phillips H........

Anyone know any good websites that have reviews of these things and any good websites were you can purchase on line - i.e. cheaper than the shops?

Thanks in advance

PG

have a look at the iPod in the flesh. By no means tacky white plastic.
A quality bit of kit !

farmer1

Amazon is the best place in my honest opinion there are pictures of each player dimensions and cheapest place to buy.

The customer reviews are very helpful in finding the right one for you/somebody.

I currently have a creative rhomba. It is silver, small takes less then an hour to charge and last for about 8 hours. It can hold up to about 6-8 hours of music and was a bargain at the price of £100. it has radio which isnt the best of quality but is listenable and a dictohphone.

angrynorth

I will restrain myself.

But.

The iPod is far from being a piece of tacky white plastic.
I suggest you go and have a play with one.

STi-Frenchie

Just bought an iPod yesterday and am installing loads of songs on it. The product is great - sexy as hell - the problem I've had for the last 2 days is trying to upgrade to Win2K SP4 to get the iPod s/w installed. XP? No problem.

Fangoria

iTrader: (1)

Thanks I'll try Amazon and look at the ipod then - given its so common there must be a fair number of places that heavily discount it?

angrynorth

Erm, afraid not. Apple products and discount don't go together I'm afraid.

Its worth every penny though.

farmer1

Nope you would be lucky to get any discount mate, from what I here there is very little shop mark-up on it anyway. You are better off buying it online but if you do buy from a shop try and get an extended warrenty or something thrown in.

Brendan Hughes

How far are they running? I think I read the Ipod has 25mins anti-jog. Might be good for a 20min jog but crap for half-marathon training. (Dunno, never run with one). You're possibly better with a solid-state player than a hard-drive one; downside is you get a lot less songs on. Still several hours' worth though.

brickboy

Rio Nitrus -- sexy as hell, longer battery life half the price of an iPod. Comes with Sennheiser headphones as standard. www.rioaudio.com

Jiggerypokery

Half the price of an iPod?

The Rio Nitrus is $199 for 1.5GB.
I got my iPod for $299 for 15GB.

farmer1

The Rio Nitrus is $199 for 1.5GB.
I got my iPod for $299 for 15GB.
Or else Creative Zen xtra $300 for 60GB

Fangoria

iTrader: (1)

Thanks again

Have been on the Amazon site for the last hr - indeed an informative site

Seems that the Iriver Device is regarded very highly - more so than the Apple Ipod.

For starters I may buy the 256mb player (and upgrade the speaker component) As this should be one that can be used with exercise...... not sure about the 20/40gb ones for use with exercise

the 256mb one is about £130ish and given that new gadgets come out all the time I dont think It'll be money wasted compared to the Apple - which seems to retail at closer to £250..........

farmer1

The iRiver is made by Apple I belive. Which is good because you can sync with iTunes a very good music programme.

jason4656

i think the creative mx nuvo(sp) is the best myself, small and that, depends what u want it for, 256mb is more than enough for me, and size was more important, dont want a great big jelopy like the ipod or i would have got a netmd ages ago

bonkers

Some important questions:
- Hard Drive or solid state (RAM)? (I would lean towards solid state for use when excercising)
- What formats do you want it to support? (MP3 is an open standard, there's also a newer format that's a bit better compression but belongs to Microsoft [who I don't trust to remain open] but I forget the acronym off the top; I would avoid anything else as it's probably proprietary to the manufacturer)
- Do you want an FM radio built in? (Don't underestimate the appeal of unlimited music and talk radio, unfortunately many manufacturers do so you'll need to actively look for it)
- How much are you prepared to spend? (you said it was a gift)

I actually bought an obscure, high-end solid state MP3 player just over a year ago - was labelled the Odyssey 300 here in the US, Taiwanese original brand was MPIO, model DMB(?). Very happy with it but it was not cheap as solid states go.

I also like epinions for electronics reviews.

Bonkers.

Fangoria

iTrader: (1)

Thanks again

Hardrive/solid state - erm not sure exactly what you mean there

The requirements were:

Get an mp3 player that can be used whilst running/in the gym
Money wise I guess I can go up to £250 realistically

I do like the look of the iriver - but the 256mb is quite low - dont want to be messing about so often downloding cd's into it. Re format would be looking at mp3 as thats what I have on my computer and they are easy to sort out...

Something small, with disc space - say up to 2gb (I looked at the Rio and didnt like the look of them as much as the iriver) - ok so its not for me but I have no dout that I'll be using it as well

At the moment I think it'll be the iriver - but I'll keep looking at/reading the comments

I spend more time looking at the smaller item than spending £4k on a plasma tv!! - but then for the tv there was only one choice - the Pioneer 43 inch

bonkers

Solid state means it uses physical memory (RAM) to store the data rather than a hard drive. Your 256MB iriver sounds like it's solid state (vs the iPod which uses a hard drive).

For 250-quid, you should be able to get a top end solid state player with a memory card to max its capacity. (Mine is 128MB internal + 128MB card, when I checked again recently the top ends were 256 + 256)

256MB is more than you'd think - figure 1MB / minute for MP3s (bit better for WMPs[?]) and that gives you over 4 hours of music - figure on a battery life of about 8 hours of continuous play. Add a built-in FM radio and you're set - really, I'm serious... I wouldn't buy one without a radio. (I had, well still have, a sony walkman - lovelly tape player but the one thing that always bugged me was no radio)

MP3 format is good - I like it because its a common standard and nobody controls it.

*heh* I'm drooling over plasma TVs myself... the low-end 42" ones are down to about 2500 dollars now.

Bonkers.

farmer1

I am abit of a Creative man myself.

The creative MuVo is in your price range and it holds up to 4GB but this is a hardrive model.

Or else the creative rhomba which is only £100 comes with radio (which is very useful) but is only 256mb

carl

Personally I have the mpio FY200. Got it from www.ihavetohave.it. Small enough to hang round your neck/arm/etc. without using up valuable pocket space.

bonkers

Yah, I'd vouch for MPIOs... need a new set of ear buds for mine but the player is still in top shape after a year plus of heavy use.

Bonkers.

Fangoria

iTrader: (1)

Bonkers and everyone

Thanks for the comments

Re the Plasma screens the prices in the States are quite sickening - I go over there pretty regularly..............!!! and they are $ price equivalent - corse you have to add the Sales tax onto the price but stillllllllllllll.

I will order this afternoon - will do a bit more reading......

Rgds and thanks again..............

Markus

Friend of mine just got a nomad thingy, phoned their sales line and asked if they could do them a deal! got the 60GB version for around 220 quid.