Creative/IPOD vs Palm/pocket pc's

[STRONGBADF1]

Hi all,

My wife wants an MP3 player for work, vacation and in car use. She has a Palm Tungsten e for general personal and work functions that she has worn out and would like a new PDA. (we have not used mp3 before) My question is do I buy her one or two devices. I am not familer with MP3 and do not know how much storage she will need. I would prefer it that she down loads songs at a quality that I will not cringe at so we both can enjoy. We probably wont use it much on our main system but would like to be able to hook up to my Yamaha rx-v2500.

How many minutes will 2GB hold at a reasonablely good quality level. (From what I've read this morning 198kbs is minimum for good quality???)

Are the ipod/creative mp3 devices easier to use? (enough so to justify two devices)

What are some good sites to download better quality songs?

Whats the easiest way to connect in a car?

HELP,
SBF1

 

[Warpdrv]

Hey StrongBad... BTW I named my Motorcycle Trogdor... The Burninator.


Anyways.. Not too sure whether you should go to 2 devices or stay with 1, as I guess that depends on the support or accessories you can get your hands on with a PDA, but there are tons and tons of add-ons that you can get for an Ipod, now Im not saying Ipod is the way to go or not... I have one, they work great and sound fantastic, with the right set of headphones, or earbuds.
I like the Nano and 2 gigs is a decent amount of storage.. I have 4gig.
How many songs depends.. but its still a cr@pload.. Many hours..
FM transmitters for in the car hookup, docking stations for your home..


If you do decide on an Ipod, don't use that PIA Itunes software.. It sucks...
Mediamonkey or http://www.redchairsoftware.com/anapod/ works good, and there are a couple of others as well...

Downloading music, you can use torrents sites, but make sure you are not sharing what your grabbing...

Good luck...

 

[MDS]

How many minutes will 2GB hold at a reasonablely good quality level. (From what I've read this morning 198kbs is minimum for good quality???)

A 4 minute song at 192 kbps will take roughly 5.5 MB. With a mix of different lengths that average 4 minutes you can plan on about 425 total songs.

I bought a 4 GB Nano for my sister and got about 676 songs on it (although there were quite a few 'long' songs).

The current Nano is 8 GB and I think that is about right. IMO it becomes more difficult to navigate to find specific songs when you have more than about 1,000 songs.

I'd buy a separate PDA and MP3 player, especially if you go with an iPod. The iPod requires iTunes to sync the music to it and is far less convenient for using it as a simple hard drive to store notes, contacts, etc - not to mention that it can't run programs other than the simple apps that are built in.

 

[STRONGBADF1]

BTW I named my Motorcycle Trogdor... The Burninator.

I said consumate V's!!!

Anyways.. Not too sure whether you should go to 2 devices or stay with 1, as I guess that depends on the support or accessories you can get your hands on with a PDA, but there are tons and tons of add-ons that you can get for an Ipod, now Im not saying Ipod is the way to go or not... I have one, they work great and sound fantastic, with the right set of headphones, or earbuds.
I like the Nano and 2 gigs is a decent amount of storage.. I have 4gig.
How many songs depends.. but its still a cr@pload.. Many hours..
FM transmitters for in the car hookup, docking stations for your home..


If you do decide on an Ipod, don't use that PIA Itunes software.. It sucks...
Mediamonkey or http://www.redchairsoftware.com/anapod/ works good, and there are a couple of others as well...

Downloading music, you can use torrents sites, but make sure you are not sharing what your grabbing...

Good luck...

Hi Warpdrv,

Thanks for the reply. I thought there was no way I would be dealing with mp3's but, because of my wife, here I am...(She has a way of doing that to me )

Thanks again,
SBF1

 

[STRONGBADF1]

A 4 minute song at 192 kbps will take roughly 5.5 MB. With a mix of different lengths that average 4 minutes you can plan on about 425 total songs.

I bought a 4 GB Nano for my sister and got about 676 songs on it (although there were quite a few 'long' songs).

The current Nano is 8 GB and I think that is about right. IMO it becomes more difficult to navigate to find specific songs when you have more than about 1,000 songs.

I'd buy a separate PDA and MP3 player, especially if you go with an iPod. The iPod requires iTunes to sync the music to it and is far less convenient for using it as a simple hard drive to store notes, contacts, etc - not to mention that it can't run programs other than the simple apps that are built in.

Hi MDS,

I'm thinking most likely seperate...Thats more toys right! I think it might be easier on my wife.

If 192kbps' sound is acceptable then 2-4GB's should be more than enough for her.

Thank you for your help,
SBF1

 

[corey]

What are some good sites to download better quality songs?

HELP,
SBF1

The best site is your own computer. Rip your own CD's with Exact Audio Copy, then make mp3's with LAME (-preset extreme). That will give you VBR mp3's at about 240 kbps.

 

[pbarach1]

Hi all,

My wife wants an MP3 player for work, vacation and in car use. She has a Palm Tungsten e for general personal and work functions that she has worn out and would like a new PDA.
HELP,
SBF1

I have a Tungsten e2 that I use for an occasional mp3 player via headphones. The sound quality is good if the mp3 files have a high enough bitrate. However, there are some technical issues that you should know about before you go with the Palm as an mp3 player.

Before you buy a memory chip, check the Palm manual. The e2 will use a 1 GB chip at most; it will not recognize a 2 GB memory chip. I made that mistake and had to exchange the 2 gb chip that I bought.

The Palm uses a built-in Real Player for mp3s and it is definitely a low-end piece of software. It has a "playlists" feature, but nowhere can I find an explanation of how to use it. So the software uses the alphabetical file order to sequence through the song's you've chosen. It plays mp3's only, not any other audio format.

Unlike an iPod or other music players, you have to turn on the touch screen in order to make adjustments in volume or change songs. The only interface device is the touch screen; there's no wheel or anything else.

Finally, the Palm's HotSync program does a poor job of transferring music files. It will frequently ignore your selections, or else it will conclude that the memory card is full when it's got lots of empty space. Get Palm File Browser, a freeware download:
http://mytreo.net/downloads/details-220.html?Palm_File_Browser

 

[STRONGBADF1]

The best site is your own computer. Rip your own CD's with Exact Audio Copy, then make mp3's with LAME (-preset extreme). That will give you VBR mp3's at about 240 kbps.

corey,

I'll be making playlists from our cd collection. (mostly) My wife will be down loading all the "one hit wonder" songs.

SBF1

 

[STRONGBADF1]

I have a Tungsten e2 that I use for an occasional mp3 player via headphones. The sound quality is good if the mp3 files have a high enough bitrate. However, there are some technical issues that you should know about before you go with the Palm as an mp3 player.

Before you buy a memory chip, check the Palm manual. The e2 will use a 1 GB chip at most; it will not recognize a 2 GB memory chip. I made that mistake and had to exchange the 2 gb chip that I bought.

The Palm uses a built-in Real Player for mp3s and it is definitely a low-end piece of software. It has a "playlists" feature, but nowhere can I find an explanation of how to use it. So the software uses the alphabetical file order to sequence through the song's you've chosen. It plays mp3's only, not any other audio format.

Unlike an iPod or other music players, you have to turn on the touch screen in order to make adjustments in volume or change songs. The only interface device is the touch screen; there's no wheel or anything else.

Finally, the Palm's HotSync program does a poor job of transferring music files. It will frequently ignore your selections, or else it will conclude that the memory card is full when it's got lots of empty space. Get Palm File Browser, a freeware download:
http://mytreo.net/downloads/details-220.html?Palm_File_Browser

pbarach1,

Thank you very much. Thats good info to know.

Now....ipod or other mp3 player...

Thanks again,
SBF1

 

[skizzerflake]

pbarach1,

Thank you very much. Thats good info to know.

Now....ipod or other mp3 player...

Thanks again,
SBF1

That might be a question that transcends features. I'm so sick of being bombarded by the Mac vs PC ads and that smug cool guy that I can't imagine buying one of their products. I've gone over the the bland guy with the brown suit.

I will put in a testimonial for Creative Zen. The feature that sold me on the unit is that you can record from FM radio broadcasts. When I bought mine, the Ipod wouldn't do that. Sound wise, quality is more dependent on transducers than anything else. The earbuds that come with new players, basically suck. Decent replacements are a requirement before you can make any judgment about bit rates on mp3 files.

 

[Geno]

As a long-time Palm user (currently a Treo 700p) and a frequent flyer, I'd advise you to get a separate MP3 player. One reason is battery life: I use my Treo heavily both for phone and PDA functions. If I were to use it for music too, I'd be out of battery power fairly soon. I've had 3 different MP3 players: an Archos Gmini, a Creative Zen, and finally an iPod 30G. Hands down, the iPod has the best interface, and I personally like the iTunes software. I burn all my own CDs through iTunes at 320VBR, and listen both through my car stereo or a set of Etymotic ER-4 'phones. The sound quality is, IMHO, excellent.

I've always been a contrarian about joining the crowd when it came to the iPod, but believe me, there's a good reason the iPod has over 90% of the market. Other players may have a good feature or two, but nobody I've seen has the ease of use that the iPod has.

Of course, that's just my opinion...I could be wrong

 

[STRONGBADF1]

Easy to use is important. I want the wife to enjoy everything about it.

Has anyone used the Zune?

My gut says buy Ipod...

SBF1

 

[STRONGBADF1]

The wife decided to buy the Creative Zen VPlus 4GB. Seems pretty nice.

Thank you everyone for your opinions.

SBF1

 

[Nick250]

I like separate devices. Palm makes the Z22 PDA. It is small and seems like a toy compared to other PDAS, but if you don't need bells and whistles, it's great little PDA. It fits in your shirt pocket almost unnoticeable. $99.

Nick

 

[abboudc]

Are the ipod/creative mp3 devices easier to use? (enough so to justify two devices)


Whats the easiest way to connect in a car?

HELP,
SBF1

There are devices out there with more features or are cheaper than an iPod, but none are easier to use. Plus, there are tons of accessories for it that you wont find with other mp3 players.

Connecting in the car depends on the car. If you have aux in, you can do it that way. If you don't, an FM transmitter works, but it's not the greatest solution. If your car has a tape deck, the headphone to tape deck adapters are the best bet.