iPod Killers For the Holidays 344
An anonymous reader writes, "MP3 Newswire has an excellent rundown of 29 new digital portables for the upcoming season. From the article:
'We have run the iPod Killers for Christmas/Summer series since 2004. In that time we [have] reported on 149 portable players and NOT one iPod killer from the bunch. That said, [this time] we may actually have a couple of genuine challengers to Apple. This holiday season will see Microsoft pump tens-of-millions of dollars to hawk their new Zune portable, and SanDisk's 8GB e280 flash unit is compelling high-end users. Both can realistically grab double-digit market share from the iPod... Whether they do or not waits to be seen.' The article also makes a good case as to why the Sony PSP should be included in market figures for digital media portables."
The Archos 504 (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:The Archos 504 (Score:5, Informative)
You'll fall down the stairs if you carry one of these... while it's a neat gadget, at 11.15 ounces [archos.com], it's not exactly a direct competitor to any iPod. Using a 2.5" hard disk necessarily compromises the size and weight.
(Your claimed battery life for the iPod is also way too short [apple.com].)
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That isn't to say you can't get them (with the normal low backlight simple video simply encoded etc conditions) just that real world times aren't there.
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I think I go almost that long EVERY DAY with the buds in. In fact, if you've seen that Doctor Who episode where everyone in the parallel universe London is walking around with implants, that's kinda like me.
The thing is, I often don't even realize they're in, to the extent that I'll often have left them on when the music/podcast has finished. People will gesture to me as if I won't be able to
Video Ipod battery life (Score:3, Informative)
That is all.
Simon.
What's up with the dildo mp3 player? (Score:3, Funny)
Read the headline (Score:5, Funny)
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Let's make a rule (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Let's make a rule (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/arti
Nothing will be an iPod killer unless they grab the mindshare. Kids aren't asking their parents for MP3 Players for XMas. They're asking for iPods - specifically and by name. An iPod killer can't just be as good as an iPod. It has to be way better and have people know what it is for it to be a success.
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Car Keys.
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Re:Let's make a rule (Score:5, Funny)
Nothing can kill the iPod (Score:5, Insightful)
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MS did it in less than 3 years and created another monopoly!
Apple should be vyer scared
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PS: I hate the 20 second wait for posting comments. I can type fast damnit.
Re:Nothing can kill the iPod (Score:4, Insightful)
What has kept Apple pretty safe is the marketing, both in the media and in terms of "viral" marketing, and they've been a moving target in terms of design and cost. Apple made the iPod cool with nice, sleek aesthetics, good UI and making it generally easy for the less than computer-savvy to use, basically doing something very well, despite its unfortunate lack of certain features that competitors have built-in.
The Zune does seem to be an interesting product, I will grant it that. My own personal skepticism to whether I will like it is that the screen is rotated on its side. I've seen several phones and music players like that, the apparent contrast ratio for each eye is different because the screen in question was not designed to be used on its side like that. I also wonder whether offering the color brown might make people think that it's so hopelessly out of touch. Personally, I think there is a spectrum of other colors to choose, I've never seen brown succeed with any piece of consumer electronics.
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That's one theory. But then, Palm had staked its reputation and built its business on usability over features. They credited their rise to targeting paper and pencil as their main competitor, instead of other PDAs. The iPod is similar in that respect. It is focused and has fewer features than most competitors, such as a radio,
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I showed my Nike+ to my podiatrist, he
They may not be killers, but... (Score:2)
I think if any had a chance of actually competing against the iPod, it would be the Sansa. I've actually seen ads on the side of buildings and on buses/trains around here.
And I've heard people actu
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The Sansas are kind of iffy in my opinion. I had one for a while. It has nice features and capabilities, but I didn't like the UI. I can get used to its UI, but I really didn't see any reason to, if the buttons were thought of as arrow keys, the way some screens scrolled doesn't make any sense at all, I hit the left key after looking at a track's details and the previous screen moves down. The "arrow" keys were way too small for my fingers, in part bec
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I'm using a Zen Nano Plus 512 MB and it's actually a sweet little unit, great for listening to downloaded podcasts. The only downside is it does tend to use a lot of AAA batteries, so it's a good idea to invest in decent rechargeable AAA batteries and charger (I've found NiMH AAA batteries makes the Zen Nano Plus play as long as 17 hours before needing a recharge).
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iPod killer: Mobile phones with MP3 players (Score:3, Insightful)
At this point, the best contestant in the horizon seems to be the mobile phone which can play MP3s. My reasoning is as follows:
- Nowadays most people already have mobile phones.
- The cycle of replacement on mobile phones is about 3 years. Mobile phones that can play MP3s just came out.
- Carrying around just a mobile phone is always lighter than carrying around
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"Technical Details
* 30GB digital media player stores up to 7,500 songs, 25,000 pictures or 100 hours of video" - Amazon.com
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Re:Nothing can kill the iPod (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Nothing can kill the iPod (Score:5, Informative)
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The PSP is a digital media platform, no doubt. (Score:4, Insightful)
The biggest problem with the article is thr's little data on price ranges for some objects. If the Ipod killer is stylish but costs 1000 dollars, what's the use? On the other hand, if it's 100 bucks and looks like crap (those football helmets for most people) who cares what size the ram is?
The Ipod is stylish, "inexpensive" but with a good sized ram. Now however they have made them more expensive then they should be but still easy to use. Competitors go for so many markets but they fail to miss the reason why the ipod is the killer is because it's a status symbol as well as a mp3 player, and it's easy to use (supposidly)
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Hard drive -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_drive [wikipedia.org]
And if memory serves correctly, the PSP uses some form of flash memory, although I could definately be wrong on that one.
Archos 604 WiFi/Touchscreen is Perfect! (Score:4, Interesting)
I do like the iPod's size but my primary use would be in the car or visiting a friends house, or my bedroom for that matter (much lighter than a laptop). I guess if you were walking around a campus or just plain need something that will comfortably fit in your pocket the iPod or similar product is for you.
Easy + Accessories + Everybody's got one + Cool (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure what the 'average' consumer is thinking about when purchasing a digital music player, but to know that there are a gazillion after-market items I can get for an iPod is somewhat comforting. Plus, the ubiquitity of the iPod means millions of websites devoted to tips, info, hacks, etc. for the iPod. And don't forget the 'cool' factor (which is hard to put into words).
Do not get me wrong. I have a couple of issues with the iPod. I used to own a Minidisc player (EXCELLENT hardware, TERRIBLE software). It had swappable, rechargeable, gumstick batteries. Plus, the exterior didn't scratch easily. And the battery life was incredible.
But come on, iPods are INSANELY easy to dump music to. I don't even use iTunes and it's still insanely easy. Drag and drop will always be the best way for us geeks to get our music on these things, but the ease of use, the ubiquitity of accessories and information, and, finally, the cool factor will make it very hard for any other player to make strong inroads into the market.
Itunes still blows... (Score:2)
Why so slow, even a DHTML version of itunes in mozilla would be faster, is apple just that crap at coding
windows apps?
It even skips like its a 66mhz computer, winamp never drops.
Someone should tell apple, just drop all the 1 layers of emu of carbon / osx wrappers, and re-write the damn application
from scratch using some cool high end gui or even 100% in directx so its faster, not 100% GDI windows cpu crapola.
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Killer (Score:5, Funny)
CmdrTaco: Ok, it's Saturday night and anyone with a life is out doing stuff. But we need more material to keep our ad revenue coming in.
*Everyone nods*
CmdrTaco: So what have you got?
kdawson: KILLER!
CmdrTaco: Quiet, kdawson, Zonk is speaking.
Zonk: Well, I could write in as an anonymous reader and we could talk about MP3 players. The kids love those, don't they?
kdawson: KILLER!
CmdrTaco: Kdawson, I don't want to have to warn you again. I love it, Zonk. But what will we title it?
Zonk: How about 'Some More Electronics for You to Buy.'
CmdrTaco: Nah, not enough edge, anyone else? kdawson, do you have something constructive to suggest?
kdawson: Yeah, 'The Killer Devices that Kill iPods in the Killing Fields for the Killing Season
CmdrTaco: You may have something there, kdawson
kdawson: Killer.
Re:Killer (Score:5, Funny)
Killer!
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Zune is double the killer (Score:2)
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Nothing new (Score:2)
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http://www.audiocoding.com/ [audiocoding.com]
Re:Nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
The reasons are many and varied, but the main one is, quite simply, the problem it solves is not a problem many people actually have. Ogg was an attempt to create a compressed audio standard unencumbered by licensing, which could replace MP3. Which is all well and good, except I have never, since the day I first became aware of MP3, been unable to download a piece of free (as in beer) software which would encode MP3s for me. I have never been unable to do something with an MP3 because of the license the format is issued under. In short, MP3 is free enough for me.
If you look at the two other most widely used compressed audio formats, WMA and AAC, they both have (near) monopolies pushing them. The most popular digital audio player and online music store uses AAC. The OS preinstalled on 90+ percent of computers sold in the world ships with a media player that supports playing and ripping WMAs. Who is pushing ogg?
The market for ogg is basically limited to linux users, and most of us are using MP3 anyway. There is no reason for any company to push it, and really very little reason to use it. I know it's supposed to be highter quality, but A, I can't hear the difference, and B, why would I want a high quality compressed audio format? To play on my portable music player, which supports which formats? Oh, yeah.
*NOTE TO PEDANTS - Yes, I am aware of the difference between the ogg container format and the vorbis codec. I just can't be bothered to type ogg vorbis every time.
PSP is NOT an iPod Killer (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless Sony comes out with something similar to iTunes... the PSP is little more than a novelty music player. It's much larger than the iPod, more expensive (when you add a good sized memory card) doesn't hold as much music, doesn't have a music store, doesn't have the market share [must I go on?].
I could buy a nice 2GB iPod mini for $149... or hundreds more for a PSP with similar storage.
In my case, I purchased both... because they both have their areas where they excel. The iPod for portable music, the PSP for portable gaming.
No kidding (Score:2)
Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Slanted review. PSP is overrated (Score:5, Insightful)
The writer (Richard Menta) has a well-known bias for PSP. For example: [mp3newswire.net]
PSP is the most user-hostile portable device out there, complete with awful, proprietary technologies usually found in Sony products. That's the reason why DS/Lite is eating Sony's lunch. The market even rejected PSP on its own turf.
Plugging PSP into the iPod competitor column is disingenuous. My cellphone can play MP3s too, I don't see it on there.
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SanDisk fails immediately (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course you can't have brand product recognition immediately, but you can't build it with just another anonymous product number, swimming in a sea of technology with similar numbers.
No killers here. (Score:2)
There is no iPod Killers there. All I see is a list of Media players. Nothing more.
There only way to kill the iPod is to change they way we think about Media players and make it stylish to boot.
I see the ideal iPod killer as a device that can kill both the need to carry laptop and ipod around. It would have a fairly decent screen size. A screen that's much bigger then PSP's screen but easy to carry. It can browse the web, communicate with friends, coworkers, or clients on the intern
Stop with the "iPod killer" crap! (Score:4, Interesting)
There needs to be some kind of rule that until a new media player has been shown to effect the marketshare of the iPod at least 20% (I know it sounds high but we are using the term "killer" here) it cannot be mentioned in any press release or news story that contains the phrase "iPod killer" unless the sentence is "iPod killer strikes again, slaughtering another competitor!"
When you're right 52% of the time... (Score:4, Interesting)
So, is there any non-emotional reason why I should bother to listen to these guys?
Back in 2004, after extensive research, I finally moved my large MP3 collection off of my linux server and on to my first MP3 player, an iPod, and it was a slam dunk. For me and my music collection it's all about iTunes, and back in 2004 the only alternative was WMP 9, which I'm sure we can all agree is complete junk, so the choice then was obvious. And since then Apple has continually updated and improved both the desktop and client software, while adding new features such as podcasts. As I said, for 2004 it was an absolute slam dunk.
Since then there have been lots of attempts to entice me to upgrade my old iPod; features like Photos, Video, FM Tuners, etc., from either Apple, 3rd parties, and other MP3 manufacturers, all of which have meant nothing to me. I've been quite determined to keep the old iPod until its hard drive dies. With all of the new competition on the market, including Microsoft's Zune, it's ironic that the only new product I've seen that has made me even consider upgrading is iTunes 7, with its gapless playback and additional playlist fields (Skip Count, Last Skipped, etc.) which aren't available on the old 3G iPod.
The other MP3 manufacturers have added lots of technical features to complete against the iPod, but in my opinion Apple still does the best job of addressing the needs of the real music fan.
Not this again. (Score:2)
Something, somewhere will make the iPod obsolete, but it isn't going to be another mp3 player, and it's definitely not the Zune; having said that, I can't wait to see what it's going to be. Til it gets here, I'll just continue adding to my iPod collection. The la
Give me podcasts, baby! (Score:2)
Winamp, it really is a lama! (Score:2)
as itunes, as pretty, and as cool. Add import itunes db options in even if its 3rd party.
And AOL then could partner with who ever and try to out do itunes, hello time warner idiots.
stylish compact cheap(free) music (Score:5, Insightful)
What Apple has done, and is continuing to do, is forcing the "content producers" to stop the chain of forced redundacy. My father replaced discs with 8 tracks with LPs. I replaced tapes with LPs with CDs. Now with music in MP3 form, will I every have to buy an old song again. No. Do I think it was easy for Apple to convince the music label to give up this cash cow. No, even though the labels had little choice because it was the only way to have sales. However, Apple has done us a great favor by insisting on a reasonable price.
Now that the labels have done the hard work, all the other electronic manufacturers are on the band wagon, claiming superior products. The problem is that I buy music in WMP format, I am not any better off than just buying a CD. So I have a choice of buying a player whose songs might have a limited lifetime, or a player that will likely be supported for a long time. Face it, MS has already given up on play for sure, so how long will those songs be useful?
But music isn't really the issue. Apple is moving against the movie studios, and right now video is not even a huge issue. A good quality half hour show is going to be twice as big as a good quality copy of a CD. Other than hugely popular shows, the level of sharing of movies is not as great as music. And despite the fact that the movie studios are not a present threatened, Apple is still forcing them to make deals that will force a new model of making money, even more so than the VCR, which was a huge cash cow, and now the DVD.
And the competition is responding by making MP3 players with radios and 'wireless' sharing, even though we have been sharing "wireless" for years. Maybe if it was a HD radio I might be impressed, but style has always been secondary to content. Look around you. The 12-25 year old demographic is thinking which one of these can I get free music on. It is like the the 12-25 demographic 20 years ago, buying computers based on what had free software. One kid buys a CD, rips it to WMP, ops, can't give load it onto another play for sure player. Another kids rips the CD to ACC. No problem loading it onto many iPods, or burning it onto a CD. As the past 50 years of widely profitable Music has shown, the kids will eventually buy music. And everyone will be rich beyond belief, but the labels ignore history. Just remember how much they hated MTV, and in a large part was responsible for the lack of music on MTV, even though MTV was arguably a major player in the revitalization of music. I see the same thing with iTunes, with people buying music for the first time in years.
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Ipod killers (Score:2)
PSP (Score:3, Funny)
Interesting sale on 20gig Harddrive MP3 player (Score:2)
Not bad.
Amazon affiliate scam (Score:2)
Batteries... (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't want crappy, low capacity, hard to change batteries. I want to swap a few AAAs (or AA) in 10 seconds, and have my DAP working non-stop. No need to be plugged-in to a cord for hours every day. Not to mention that battery capacity is continually increasing, and CD players that had a 10 hour battery life some 10 years ago, now have about 30 hours thanks to newer rechargable batteries.
Just add that simple feature to a couple DAPs, and you'll have something that might actually appeal to people like me who wouldn't ever consider an iPod. Meanwhile, I'm sticking with my MP3 CD player that gets 50+ hours on a pair of rechargable AAs.
My other criteria are large (40GB+) hard drive and FLAC/Musepack/Vorbis playback, and any rockbox-supported players will handle those easily.
Re:Under a "killers" moon. (Score:4, Funny)
Unless the batteries dont work (Score:2)
They should make some fcc rule that says you cannot sell devices without ability to change batteries
in the event of explosion or fires. That'll screw em. Imagine if mobile phones came with none changeable
batteries.
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This is what you do. (Score:4, Informative)
Install Rockbox.
Load up with (FLAC, SHN, MPC, WAVPACK, OGG, MP3, M4A) and enjoy lossless playback with pure-integer decoders and a really nice DAC to boot
Oh, and the iHP-140 has an optical output which is _very_ useful if you have digital inputs on a custom DAC or amp.
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But in general, portables aren't really designed to be audiophile gear. They certainly could be, but the market really isn't large e
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Enter the Chu Moy
http://www.dansdata.com/cmoy.htm [dansdata.com]
DIY or Cheap from E-Bay
It will make headphones sound better.
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The iPod's headphone amp has a nearly flat frequency response - which is what audiophiles want. It doesn't get much better than what the iPod offers.
The iPod also has a 100db s/n ratio, higher than its competitors, and it supports lossless. What more do you want?
Yeah, I own an iPod so you could call me something of a fanboy. But a lot of people seem to be looking for alternatives when what they want is r
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portables that support FLAC [sourceforge.net]
although I doubt you can hear the difference between lossless and any LAME preset on any portable, it is convenient to sync FLAC over without having to transcode.
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The fact that people still don't get this is evidenced by the frequent "but I just want to drag files to it" comments here. That works for about 20-30 songs or videos, but fails when you are managing thousands of music tracks from multiple albums, audiobooks, and syndicated podcasts and vid
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It works when the player can hold your entire music collection, you can just drag&drop everything at once. It breaks down when you want to fill a 20GB player from a 32GB music collection. Building an iTunes playlist for all tracks rated 3 stars or more and syncing it to a
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Plus I paid a lot less for the ability to do so.
BFD.
Re:Why exactly is the Ipod cool???? (Score:5, Informative)
iTunes is a simple, easy to use interface. That said- there are third party interfaces including ones that run under Linux.
What conversion are you talking about? The iPod groks mp3 natively- it doesn't do any conversions. AAC is the format Apples sells songs from iTunes in- but that's only songs you buy from iTunes. Perhaps you are thinking of the cracked conversions Sony did with their moronic ATRAC format.
Your dragging question is the same as the iTunes question. Either use iTunes or use a third party app. I use iTunes even without an iPod. I used winamp 3 (IIRC) and never seriosuly considered winamp after that. Is iTunes perfect? Hardly- but it does the job and gives me no grief.
Looks are purely subject and up to you. That said- ever held an iPod? They feel solid. Everything about them feels right. The interface is simple, the buttons and scroll wheel are perfect, and the screen on the newest models is gorgeous. It isn't just about looking cool- they are beautifully designed, inside and out.
-sirket
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Yeah, dude, my cell phone is freakin huge. I so wish they would have made the battery non-removable so it would f
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Re:Why exactly is the Ipod cool???? (Score:5, Informative)
- The click wheel and the UI are well-designed
- The output quality and bundled earphones are good
- The design is classic, and it feels solid and well-made
You can't just drag files onto the ipod because it maintains a database of the songs in your collection. If you don't like iTunes, you can use a number of programs to maintain the collection, like Winamp.
A database is better than using the filesystem for your music collection because it allows you to find your songs with multiple indexes - artist, album, genre, etc. Using the filesystem, you have to pick a sorting system and stick with it - say, one folder per album. Every music player app made this decade uses a music collection database. If you haven't organized your music this way, it's your loss.
The iPod isn't cool any more than a cellphone is cool. It's just another device you carry around with you. It happens to be both a very popular device and a best of breed device. If that doesn't sit well with you, I guess that's sour grapes.
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... the same way as the iPod uses iTunes to manage songs. I was hoping for an old-fashion drag and drop. I haven't tried on a non-MS OS yet and I am not sure yet if Plays for Sure manages the library like iTunes does (partly meaning that it's "hooked" to one computer.)
You don't have to use your iPod this way if you don't want to. Uncheck the automatic sync option and you can drag and drop to your heart's content (from within iTunes, but you still have full control and can update from any machine you want)
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You can get the files back onto the desktop and into a sensible naming structure quite easily using itu
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Archos website [archos.com]
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That's what kills me about the ipod. Your choices are "too small" or "way too large". Just as the prices look like they might drop, Apple increases the size by 20 gigs and drops the lowend model completely.
Walmart sells a 20GB Creative Zen for $160. That's amazing. Apple doesn't even sell a model for the "medium sized" $150-$200 market.
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that has come out in the last 3 years. (Seriously):
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1 &item=280036927578&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=018 [ebay.com]
Try to get a refurbed ihp series. H320/H340 is also decent.
Driving factors are:
* USB Mass storage support
* Excellent battery life
* Best sound quality of any portable reviewed, ihp series also have an optical line out
* Install rockbox, get even more features
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How can one of these Janus(DRM) players kill an IPod when I can use an IPod with nearly every OS compared to these Janus players that require WinXP w/ WMP10.
Because an Ipod killer wouldn't lose much by not selling to those 23 people who do not run
windows on any of thier PCs.
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for audio recording i bought an m-audio microtrack [m-audio.com]. a lot of musicians use it on the road and i've found the audio quality to be pretty amazing. it supports mp3 and also aiff (i believe, i don't have it with me at the moment). it has audio inputs and comes with a small stereo mic that actually has amazing noise cancellation and quality.
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the first step to letting them is embracing apple and iTunes so then the game is who has the best DRM infested music distribution system rather than who has the best music distribution system.
magnatune and eMusic both sell unencumbered music and seem to be doing quite well without fucking us in the ass.
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1. Does not require Itunes or any other proprietary software; should show up as a drive letter in Windows XP and you can move songs that way.
2. Menu scrolls FAST, allows for browsing other songs while current one is playing..
3. Supports all song formats and allows for flash upgrade to support more.. ie.. Ogg Vorbis
4. It should be at least as tough as a cell phone.
5. Wait.. why the fvck isn't my mp3 player built in to my cell phone? How about we just do it that way. Cell phones