The Sansa players are fantastic as long as huge amounts of storage aren't required (I believe their max is 16GB internal + 32GB Micro SD card). They have excellent SQ, battery life, easy to operate etc. They even play back Apple AAC files that aren't DRM wrapped. I highly, highly recommend them.
As for ripping with iTunes, I personally avoid iTunes like the plague and use Easy CD-DA Extractor to rip and convert audio files.
