Horico

been looking at getting one for me and the mrs....but are they wprth it....or are the competition just as good but cheaper?

carl

Worth it, IMHO. Had a few MP3 players now and the iPod wipes the floor with them for sound quality and ease of use. The click wheel is a revelation, and so natural to use.

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

No get an Iriver, much easier to get music on, has an FM radio and you can put videos on the colour ones (with the firmware upgrade), tried an Ipod, it was a superb product but the Iriver was more flexible which suited me, not that it was particularly any cheaper.

Streebeck

Once you've had an ipod you can't have anything else...

I had a zen 60gig, firmware failed in the first day, two replacements did exactly the same thing. Got my money back and got a 30gig Photo ipod off ebay for £209 delivered. Unbeatable!

RRH

I bought the Sony 20 gig MP3 player, didn't like my daughters ipod mini, and have been very impressed with the Sony. 30hrs battery life did it for me.....

Streebeck

Oh yeah, the Sony is good, great battery life. And who cares about a built in radio? Radio's ****e anyway these days

carl

I had a little MPIO with a radio built in once. I thought it was great, except I never used it. Easier to download a podcast, IMHO, then at least it works on the Tube.

Luan Pra bang

I pods are in my opinion complete ****e and I have 2 of them. Iriver much much better.

fast bloke

would agree with the iriver thing

fatherpierre

I've got a Rio Riot. A bit big, but better sound quality the my GF's IPOD.

Half the price too

ru'

Lots more accessories available for the iPod family; I chose an iPod photo and have now got an Alpine interface for my car - fantastic, as long as you mainly use if for playlists.


Apparently Sony are going to release somethingh similar for their head units and mp3 players, but it won't be for any other head units etc.

Dracoro

There ISN'T a 'one is better than the other full stop'. There's the best for YOU and YOUR requirements. If you want a radio for instance then the iPod is useless.

My requirements was 60GB. Only 2 on the market, the iPod and the Creative rio thingy. The creative wasn't up to it. Prolly got an iRiver if they did a 60gb colour but they don't so I didn't.

If you go the iPod route, replace the headphones, they're crap.

The iPod is the BMW of the mp3 player world. A good product but there's a lot of people who 'wear' their iPods and buy in to the whole image. *****. It's an mp3 player, that's it, get a life, it's not some bullcrap lifestyle 'statement'.

Anyway, it's more important what music you play on it a LOT of people have this bit wrong

camk

Just bought a Rio Carbon 5GB. Had a Creative Jukebox 20GB before but broke the screen last week after 4 years hard use. Had all my stuff on the 20GB but only played certain bits anyway. Wanted something smaller as I travel a lot and was amazed at how small the Rio is, in fact it was a real shock opening the box. Was only 150Euros from Amazon. As said earlier it depends on whats important for you. I just wanted a small player with enough storage for transatlatic slights etc.

Horico

i like the look of the i river H320....as it plays video too...off to thailand on saturday for 3 weeks so will get some milage out of an mp3 there...when i get to the beach that is...

It says it can store snaps from a digital camera....and comes with the cable to xfer them...may just come in handy

Horico

ooooooh, just spotted the iriver pmp range.......bugger

gso

my mp3-geek of a brother swears buy his sony....great battery life and apparently stores a lot more than most? I dont know...i dont like headphones in my ears

Horico

came home today, all pleased with myself with my 20GB iriver thingy....

charged her up...easy...
put 2500 tracks on....easy.....
plugged the wires in to take some pics from my digital camera.....

..
..
..
..
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

NOT A BLOODY PEEP!

damn thing......it's supposed to be easy!

Can anyone tell me what im doing wrong....?

the camera is a sony cybershot p150.....both of them can see each other as if theyre there...just nothing happens when i press the button im meant to......looks like i need to resort to taking it back.....

after looking at the ipod route, i so don't want to buy one.....cos then ure trapped with buying all the damn extras that should come with it!

ScoobyDoo555

You may be almost right with the extras, BUT, you plug the IPod in....................



and it works straight off

Dan

jonc

Got myself a Creative Zen Touch 20GB with sony earbud 'phones, sound quality and 24 hour battery life swung it for me. Take your own decent headphones to the shop and test them out and in most cases, the headphones that come with the players are sh!te.

Horico

the solution has been found....the vaio mp3 player thingy....meant to be about £300 but dixons are knocking them out for £199 - bargain...tried it in the shop and it transferred the pics no problem...

http://www.dixons.co.uk/martprd/stor...1&tm=undefined

thats the link....it looks way more stylish than an ipod...and has a 40 gb memory too....

SiPie

How you getting on with the 'over sensitive' navigation button?..... Not experienced thi smyself, but heard lots of complaints re this, otherwise I reckon it would win hands down

Cheers

Streebeck

I looked at one of those, doesn't have ANY shock/skip protection and will only play mp3's with a firmware upgrade. Battery life does seem great, though, and the screen was a dream.

jonc

The touch pad is quite sensitive on first use, but I since set the sensitivity to its lowest setting and don't have any problems with it. Some people are ok with some aren't, try before you buy. I would still say that the touch wheel on the IPOD is easier to use, but the Zen has more versitile controls and separate volume control. IMO the sound quality is better on the Zen and battery life is nearly 3 times that of the IPOD, and its not a fashion accessory.

Horico

not so sure about the shock thing...just been shaking and knocking it for ages and no skips of any kind....surely it would be daft of sony to leave it off this type of gizmo?

Streebeck

Sony have there own "direct" iPod competitor, that tiny little thing with the square buttons. The vaio thingy is, as far as I can tell, a sort-of multimedia/music player. i.e. not just a dedicated music mp3 player. I'm reliably informed that they do now play mp3's straight out of the box, due to people complaining about having to convert all their mp3's to Sony's ATRAC format before uploading onto the vaio.

And it doesn't have skip protection, but from what you say it obviously doesn't need it

Horico

yeah, that (sony hd5) was the same price at dixons but the vaio does a lot more and has double the capacity....must just be luck that it's discounted at the mo...

I did have to update the firmware tho before it would play mp3's...only a 5 min job tho....i tested it in the shop with my digi cam and it was easy as you'd like....

All the vaio is, is an mp3 player with some file support and can view jpgs. a bit like the ipod photo.....

Dracoro

well, duh all they ALL are is a hard disk(solid state or hdd type) of varying capacity with the ability to amplyfy sounds though and output socket (i.e. headphones). Some display a small pic of images too.

Streebeck

I know what you're saying, I do.

The point I was trying to make was that these...

...are the units that Sony made to directly compete with ipods. Exactly the same features, capacity, etc. but slightly less £.

The vaio thing, which has been around for nearly a year, was never marketed by Sony as a personal music player, more like an external hd which had expanded multimedia capabilities (show pics and play WMA or ATRAC files). As it was never designed as a specific personal music player, it has no shock protection, Sony's music management software is ****e and up until a few months ago couldn't even play mp3's.

The only people who have ever pushed it as a personal music player have been Dixon's, with their stupid bloody adverts.

However saying all that it looks like people are happy enough with their's, so its all good.