Looking for a new Music Player

November 17, 2006 @ 4:32 pm- from Maui, Hawaii

As I mentioned some time back I’m looking for a new music player as my IPod is just giving up its ghost. I’ve never been real happy with the iPod – the software on the device has always been flaky, battery life abysmal and I really hate the whole lock in with iTunes which is as sucky as music software gets.

I’ve been using Media Player on Vista for a while now and I actually like that interface much better and the overall user experience of the media player is much more pleasant.

One of the big things I want in my next player is not to be locked into some proprietary software – I should just be able to drag files onto the device with Explorer if necessary and have the device see these files and be able to access them as well as use standard playlists that Media Player or various other players use.

So the Zune shipped a few days ago and I saw one a week ago at the Connections conference. It looks Ok, but it’s certainly nothing mind blowing. I was thinking about getting one of those, but after doing a little more research it looks like it too uses proprietary music software to transfer to the device. I can’t confirm this so maybe some body that has one of them can say for sure. It looks like Media Player interaction is not supported and if that’s the case, WTF was Microsoft thinking?

In the meantime several people I know have been raving about the Creative Zen Vision series of players and they look like they have have the same sort of feature set, plus a microphone (that’s handy!) and it just works with plain files dropped on the device.

But while I’m at it I thought I throw this out here and see what others are doing besides the iPod especially when dealing with straight over file management. Any yay’s or nay’s?

Posted in Personal

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re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Steve from Pleasant Hill November 17, 2006 @ 5:18 pm

Don't know anything about it, but this just came out. Maybe worth a look.

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2006/05/22/lg_mfjm53_mp3_player/

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Joel Leach November 17, 2006 @ 7:23 pm

My daughter has a Creative Zen Vision:M, which we use with Yahoo! Music, and it works well. It took Creative a while, but they finally got it right with this series. For $120/year, we can download any of over a million songs to the device. We usually do it in Yahoo! Music Jukebox, because it downloads from the internet to the device in one step, but you can also transfer files using a Creative utility or Windows Explorer. We have to connect the device to Yahoo! Music at least once per month to renew the license, but it's not a big deal. It's Windows DRM, which plays in just about any non-Apple media player and on any non-Apple device. Other services (Napster, Rhapsody, Urge, etc.) use the same thing, so there's plenty of choice.

Apple could have owned the DRM market by licensing their technology, but they chose lock-in instead. Sound familiar? Of course, Microsoft stepped in to fill the void.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Nic Wise November 17, 2006 @ 7:25 pm

Rick, I've had various copy-any-go players (mostly from creative), and a friend of mine has had a neuros (which he LOVED until someone broke into his car....) and now has an i-river device. Both are/were copy and go as far as I know, tho personally, I found the menu's impossible to work (ie, to find stuff to play etc) - but I'm a playlist kinda guy, and I find it hard to find stuff on my wife's ipod (she doesn't use playlists, we both have ipods)

So, I'd recommend looking at either a Neuros (http://www.neurosaudio.com/) or one of the i-river ones. He had one of the Neuros DAC's, but it was only 20GB, not the 80 they have there. He now has a iriver H340 (http://www.iriver.com/html/product/prpa_product.asp?pidx=42)

Personally, I have a 1st Gen iPod Nano (4GB). I LOVE it. If it breaks, I'll get another. It's perfect for me, and I prefer itunes over WMP or WinAmp. If iTunes could share the library (which sits on my server) between 2 laptops (mine and my wife's) I'd be even happier....

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Bob Archer November 17, 2006 @ 7:52 pm

Have you looked at the Sansa players. They are Media Center based with "Plays For Sure" support.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Rich November 17, 2006 @ 7:52 pm

Here's a pretty in depth review

http://www.thetravelinsider.info/mp3/zune.htm

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Nic November 17, 2006 @ 8:09 pm

BTW, Rick, did you consult your co-workers? Some of the players come in Tuna flavour :) Might be best to avoid those ones....

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Rick Strahl November 17, 2006 @ 11:14 pm

The brown one looks more like a Turd! I've got 'em trained not to eat those <s>...

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Jeff Atwood November 17, 2006 @ 11:14 pm

What a coincidence. Just went through the same exact thought process getting a DAP for my wife's birthday.

I found the Zen Vision M to be the best choice.. no software required, as long as you're using XP or Vista. It's not quite a pure hard drive interface, but it's close; it uses the MTP standard, so it shows up in Explorer automagically and you just drag and drop music back and forth to it. And it comes in Pink!

There's also the Cowon X5L, which does work like a pure hard drive device and works on any OS, but the device and UI looks a bit clunky:

http://reviews.cnet.com/Cowon_iAudio_X5L_30GB/4505-6490_7-31383685.html#more

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Alex Feldstein November 18, 2006 @ 7:59 am

I have a Creative ZEN Sleek Photo and am very happy with it. 20Gb and enough for the MP3s I carry around.

When I got it, it had a bad battery. Lost charge and would not recharge in the first 24 hrs. Called them and they replaced it immediately. No problems in the year since.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Noel Nunkovich November 20, 2006 @ 5:17 am

Check out any of the various players by iAudio at www.cowon.com. I have a Cowon A2 and an iAudio G3. Both of them are excellent devices even though the G3 is a little old these days and the firmware on my model has some limitations with regard to file and folder counts.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by AC November 20, 2006 @ 9:11 am

so much hate for the Ipod. Yes the older ones had issues with battery life. However I'm not having those issues with the new ones. (video ipod)

Itunes does suck and the new versions are a hog. You might already know this, but didn't mention it in your blog. You can access all the files on your ipod thru winamp pro and the mlipod plugin. http://www.mlipod.com/ If you tell me that winamp isn't very pretty and might take some time to get used to....I'll say that you are correct.

I'm seeing some people mention creative products..and they are nice. But if you are looking for the zune, you might be able to get one cheap soon. The initial sales of the zune has been sluggish due to the releases of gaming consoles...so you might be able to get one cheap soon? wishful thinking? maybe but you never know with those crazy thanksgiving and after christmas sales.

sorry for the novel, I hope this helps out.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Jeff November 20, 2006 @ 10:49 am

I have Zen Vision M myself, this is very good player. I had Zen Jukebox 3 before, it was very good but it does not cut in any more.
I still have a Rio Carbon player - this brand no longer exists but there are new firmware updates on the web. VERY GOOD.

This Zune is such a shame.
WMP? Incompatible. Vista? Incompatible. Podcasts? Incompatible.
If it had a bottle opener or screw driver at least, there would be some attraction. But so: no-go for me...

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Michael Lyons November 20, 2006 @ 3:04 pm

Winamp also works with the iPod. And I think Sonique does as well.
I also wouldn't be suprised if someone has created an addin for media player as well for the iPod.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by cj November 21, 2006 @ 7:17 am

i'll add another vote for the Creative Zen Vision:M. you don't need any special software for it or licensing on your music, and you can copy music directly from your computer to your player using the good ol' drag-n-drop. after i bought mine and tried it out a while, my fiance bought one for himself. we love them.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Rick Strahl November 21, 2006 @ 11:35 am

Yup after some more research I decided to get a Creative Zen M. It should show up in a few days.

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Dren November 29, 2006 @ 4:23 pm

Well... you can buy an iPod and install this thing: (http://www.rockbox.org/download/rockbox-2.5-install.exe) on the computer and change the iPod-s fimrware so you can drag-and-drop files to the iPod...
Or if you think thats dangerous try this one: http://www.sturm.net.nz/downloads/sharepod/sharepod.zip ... this one you can extract in your iPod and open it wherever you go and use it for copying mp3s and it has many other features and you dont have to install it (so its portable app)

check the sites too:
http://www.rockbox.org/
http://www.sturm.net.nz/website.php?Section=iPod+Programs&Page=SharePod

I hope I've helped you (or some of the others here) :)

re: Looking for a new Music Player
by Milena December 02, 2006 @ 3:08 pm

Dren, does the firmware change imply that there is no annoying id3 tag sorting anymore? I'm a folder tree type of gal so finding songs in the folders exactly as one drags and drops them would be fantastic! Is that what the .exe above does?

Regards,
Milena