What mp3 player to get?

[neonplanet40]

Hey guys. im back from holidays. very cold at home i must say anyway here goes

my parents go to florida on sunday and they have told me they will get me an mp3 player over there. now i jsut need to decide what one to get.

i liek the idea of a remote with it etc and backlight. also gd storage space and looks is gd.
i seen the ipods of course and they look gd. but u's mite think differently. also i seen the rio karma and it looked nice and the newer rio carbon looked excellent. but i would like u guys to tell me which ones are best and why also the price would be gd to knwo too. thanx alot peeps

PyRo

[Allen]

Since they're going to the States anyway, I would suggest an iPod, much better value for money over there.

[Tom]

I'd suggest an iRiver hdd based mp3 player, from what ive heard far better than iPods

[neonplanet40]

lol i have a feelign im going to get alot of different ones mentioned here.

is there any chance KeZ could tell me which one is the best out of them all? ive heard of others that Neuros makes. http://www.neurosaudio.com/

i dont knwo how they perform but they look excellent. dunno if u can get them in usa though :S

[Spud1]

iPod for sure - one of the best purchases i ever made

[directhex]

i just ordered a rio karma.

the ipod is fine if your objective is to show everyone "look, i'm in ipod club". the karma looks ugly, but is one hell of a personal portable media playback device

[neonplanet40]

well i want the best one. even if it has to sacrifice on looks. directhex what about the rio carbon? it looks very nice and would prob be just as gd or better than the karma. anybody own one so they can say how gd it is or is a reveiw coming on ?

PyRo

[myth]

I'd suggest an iRiver hdd based mp3 player, from what ive heard far better than iPods

Quite right! iHP 120, twice the battery life of the Ipod better audio, direct mp3 encoding, built in tunner, mic, optical in/out...

This is all you need to know!

http://reviews.cnet.com/iRiver_H120_...tml?tag=glance

[DaftpuNk]

I-Pods, don't even think of unsheathing a barge-pole to touch one with. They are not only ludicrously priced, but they are merely a fashion accessory. If you value sound quality as number one like me, then avoid them like the plague.

I've used/owned an original Zen, Zen Xtra 60GB, ipod and most recently the 4GB Creative Labs MuVo2.

What are your priorities when it comes to a portable player? For me it's the quality of sound, storage capacity and size in that order. The MuVo2 holds a good amount of music and is so light and small i don't notice it in my pocket at all.

For ease of use, the device acts as a removable mass storage device, so plug it into a USB 2.0 socket and copy folders of music over, job done. It can't be simpler. As a bonus, the MuVo2 can therefore also be used as a large USB key, as long as you carry the cable about of course.

User removable battery so the device doesn't become a paperweight within a year or two, the MuVo can't be beaten in my view. I only look forward to Hitachi GST making larger capacity microdrives to make this device even better.

[pre]

There are now portable dvd/mpeg players coming onto the market (handheld size). Not too familiar with them but if they are in USA you might want to look at them as well. Would have to agree that the Iriver and MuVo outperform the Ipod. Nice not to have to have any software in order to download some mp3s.

[myth]

There is a pocket media player from Iriver... but it costs $500 US....

[directhex]

my gp32 plays xvid & divx, and i paid 100 quid for it

as for the rio carbon, it's only 5gb versus 20gb, and has worse codec support than the karma

[unrealrocks]

Another vote for iRiver, only heard good things.

I used to have a Rio Diamond 800 for about 5 years (untill it finally bit the dust), now I have a 20Gb Frontera Labs one, mainly because it was much cheaper than the iPod and had loads more features (direct line, digital, mic record / outputs) ... Doubt you'd find that in the US though.

[Spud1]

The MuVo2 holds a good amount of music

4gig is NOT a good amount of music. the muvo2 costs what, £150ish and you get 4gig...thats 10% of my music collection. A 4th gen ipod isnt that much bigger [tho its noticeably heavier] and has 5x the storage space for an extra £50

same goes for the i-river and rio ones, all of them beat the muvo2. imho the muvo2 and ipod mini are both pointless players that serve just as fashion accessories - more so than a 'normal' ipod

[Kezzer]

I've just got a MuVo2, it's hot plug and play so no software required and it's tiny and light and it's high quality for a decent price.

btw, i'm selling my zen 60GB

[Pretender]

In the 4 or so comparisons between the iPod and iRiver I have read, I don't think I've ever seen the iPod come out on top. It is, like DaftpuNk said, an overpriced fashion accessory, though it can afford to be so because it's in the public eye a lot more. I think the one thing it has over the iRiver is that it looks better, and that's subjective anyway.

Of course, having never owned either of these players, my view comes solely from these reviews/comparisons, and I think you'd benefit from finding some first-hand reviews of the iRiver like the one myth posted above