5 Reasons Not to Buy an iPod

TommyH1000 writes "CNet has posted an article with five reasons not to buy an iPod. " The article really just shows the major shortcomings with the iPod (Battery, Cost, Moving Parts etc) and gives several alternatives. A great summary of the major things going on in the portable MP3 player market.

Comments

Here's my low tech solution.

[i_want_you_to_throw_]

Rip all my CDs and then burn them back onto CDRs. You can fit like 12 CDs on one CDR in MP3 format. I have a wallet case when I travel and I manage to pack the music of 144 CDs with me that way. Best Buy has portable CD players that they sell for 30.00 that read MP3s and there you go, the cheap solution. When I get my cut of this money that the Nigerians are transferring to me though an iPod is the first thing on my list!

Re:Here's my low tech solution.

[akedia]

And your MP3 player won't skip, either. Because it will be cushioned by about $380 in cash.

Re:Here's my low tech solution.

[2nd Post!]

All will be fine until, of course, you find out you really like iTunes.

Re:Here's my low tech solution.

[zwaffle]

I was using the same solution at work (I'm a coder) for almost a year.
Disadvantages: no playlists, so you end up swapping CDRs quite often. It's also a major pain to organize your CDRs: if you've ripped 12 CDs in one CDR it's already hard to list them all on the disk, but if you have to burn hundreds of individual songs (from the ol'napster days) on one CDR, you gotta keep some sort of separate catalog to be able to find what you want to listen.
I eventually got an 40gig IPod and I'm saving at least 30 min a day from not having to manipulate CDRs and I now enjoy my library much more (takes only a few seconds to switch album or playlist and therefore keep me in the zone more easily by selecting the right music to match my mood).

let me spoil the article for you....

[wanderers_id]

"Don't buy it"

"We love it, but it doesn't blah blah blah blah...."

"But it's still the best"

Thanks for nothing....

Re:let me spoil the article for you....

[Daniel_Staal]

That wasn't the point. This is not a review. It is a state-of-the-market analysis, using the iPod as a comparison point.

The iPod is the best all-round mp3 player today. Many would say it is perfect. CNET doesn't agree: they point out the areas where it could be improved (and list alternatives if that specific feature is important to you). The point is to show what mp3 players in general need to work on. The iPod is just an example.

Re:let me spoil the article for you....

[dasmegabyte]

Yeah. I liked this article...it reminded me of one of those Kung Fu movies, where each of the five members of a gang has a speciality area in which they can beat the protagonist. Maybe one is an axe wielder, one is tough as nails, one is very fast, etc. Each one of them has an area of expertise in which they are the master.

Of course, in those films, all the protagonist has to do is step outside of that area of expertise and he easily kicks their asses. Which I think is exactly what the iPod does overall, kicks ass.

• Yes, it could have more battery life but then it would be larger (like the model they show). Since its small size and weight are what make it perfect for sitting in pockets or running with without getting sore hands, that wouldn't be that useful to me.
  
• Yes, it could be solid state -- i did have mine skip at the gym yesterday and have decided from now on I shall have to run a mile in under 6:39 and I'll just run along to Metallica's Blackened -- but then it would also have a TINY capacity, the biggest player they listed was 512 meg and there's no way i could deal with that after overflowing 27.4 gig.
  
• Sure, it could be cheaper...and a total piece of shit like those CDR units they showed (can't run with it, no interface, no battery life, have to carry a supply of discs with you, unwieldy). I traded in a stack of similar devices when I bought my iPod, which was the easiest $538.92 I have ever spent.
  
• Sure, voice recording would be nice, and it's coming...that was the point of adding the dock connector.
  
• And as for "choice in music services"...well, I choose iTunes because AAC ounds so damn good and I have both Macs and PCs. WMA is not an option for me, so I don't have a choice.
  

Aw, brave iPod. How easily you have destroyed the warriors of the C-net. The spirit of the Wu-tang Clan flows within you -- in fact, the complete DISCOGRAPHY of the Wu-tang Clan flows within you.

Re:let me spoil the article for you....

[zurab]

Here is a better portable audio player that does the stuff the article talks about (and some more) and has a very reasonable price - Neuros.

- First off, it comes with a small memory card and optional 20GB HD attachment, so you can go light when you are jogging and attach HD for long road trips;

- Speaking of road trips, it has an FM transmitter that lets it play any audio on any FM radio without extra connections;

- It has FM radio, and is able to record directly from FM radio to MP3 format;

- It has a microphone and a voice recorder;

- It has full Linux support;

- It has Vorbis support;

- The whole package - the unit itself, software, USB cable, earphones, 20GB HD attachment, regular charger, car charger = $230.

That would be less than half the price of iPod. I would like to see some reviews of this baby.

Re:let me spoil the article for you....

[dasmegabyte]

Oh, more stuff for you. This is just looking at the specification BEHIND the dumb features that have you floored (proprietary transfers over FM...only a true geek would get impressed by that)

128 meg Neuros: $230
2.5" x 4.3" x 1.3" x 5.9 oz
Res: 128x128
Input: USB 1.1 max 12 Mb/s
Time to full charge: 8 hours

The backpack adds a further 7.6 oz to a pleasant 13.5 oz, or 3/4 of a pound en total. And the unit size becomes 3.1"x5.3x1.3"

20 GB iPod: $399
2.4" x 4.1" x.62" x 5.1 oz
Res: 160x128
Input: USB 2.0 / Firewire, max 400+ Mb/s
Time to full charge: 3 hours (at 80% after an hour and 20 minutes on the charger is usually enough for my hour and a half workout)

So what you have here is a unit which is, i admit, check full of neat ideas and features for $170 less. But it also takes twice as long to charge, up to 40 times as long to copy files (USB 1.1 is absolutely unacceptable for a hard drive and you KNOW this), is nearly three times heavier, twice as thick, an inch taller, has 20% fewer pixels, the headphone jack is on the bottom (which is just wierd)...the buttons aren't inlaid, the hand interface just looks unwieldy (with buttons on either side of the face, how do you GRAB it without pushing them in all the time? Even with a lock they'll jam up pretty quick).

All in all, it looks like an iPod knock off that tried really hard and nearly succeeded in being a better unit. You're right, integrated FM and microphone are neato...and these are two features Belkin and others are trying their damnedest to shove into the iPod...but they're also features most people will never use.

There's a design rule I like to follow, one that I think always makes devices easier to use: make common things simple, and complex things possible. I think Apple has done that -- common things, like selecting songs, copying songs, and walking around with the thing -- are easier. I think the Neuros has taken the opposite approach...laden the device with features, tried to keep it smallish (and yeah, 13 oz is still pretty small, smaller than those 2 lb Archos machines) and succeeded in making a device that I would probably buy if the iPod hadn't been invented.

They complain it's hard drive based

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet, that's the only way to get huge capacities at a somewhat affordable price. If they had gigs of flash media, they'd be too expensive for most people. It's a trade-off, not a defect.

Re:They complain it's hard drive based

[tgibbs]

Yet, that's the only way to get huge capacities at a somewhat affordable price. If they had gigs of flash media, they'd be too expensive for most people. It's a trade-off, not a defect.

Which is essentially what the article says--far from being about iPod "defects," it merely points out there are certain people and uses for which these trade-offs favor another type of player, despite the acknowledged virtues of the iPod.

Re:They complain it's hard drive based

[Graff]

My favorite thing about the whole article is they give 5 reasons that the iPod isn't the best and then each reason shows different music players that could replace the iPod. Notice however that there is no player that will fill all 5 roles by itself, in order to get all these "features" you would need to buy 5 different players.

The fact is that the iPod does a pretty good job at filling all these roles, but it can be beat by a specialized player in a particular function. If you want an overall good player then the iPod is a great choice.

All of the reasons are pretty flimsy or can be overcome easily, such as the battery life/airplane flight reason. 6 hours is plenty for most flights that people take and if you are going on a longer one then you can get a power adapter that works on planes. As for jogging, the iPod has an extremely long buffer so it has little chance of getting hurt by vibration. Price, yeah it's on the expensive side but you have to pay for quality and solid features.

High-quality digital recordings on a MP3 player? You have to be kidding, you will probably use a feature like that maybe once or twice in your life unless you are a professional and then you will probably have dedicated equipment that is way better than any MP3 player.

Choice in online stores? Well given that the iTunes music store has about the same prices as everyone else, and the choice is similar to everyone else, and that it has had 80% of online sales of music, don't you think that just having the iTunes Music Store is enough? I mean what is the point of being able to purchase the same music for the same price at 4 or 5 different stores? Aren't you only going to purchase from 1 anyways?

I also love how they bracket the entire article with "it's still hands down the best-designed MP3 player in the world." Ok so you think it's the best and yet you decided to write an article about how all these other players are better. Talk about hedging your bets, I'm guessing that they got paid for every mention of a MP3 player or music service in the article. They probably just needed a reason to mention as many as possible in order to make the maximum amount of cash.

Re:They complain it's hard drive based

[Golias]

He's talking about the completely stupid and unfounded claim that you could damage it by jogging with it, not the battery issue.

Also, if you want longer battery life, Belkin offers a cheap add-on pack that extends it considerably.

Re:They complain it's hard drive based

[Digital11]

Really? I'd say the Neuros pretty much satisfies all of those complaints: Battery life is VERY good in my experience. You can't beat the price right now: Something like $220 for the 128mb flash/20gb hdd combo. You can use the flash backpack for jogging if you're worried about damaging the hard drive. You can record 44khz 16-bit WAV through either the built-in MIC or the 1/8" mic-in (there's also options from 160kb/s to 64kb/s MP3 recording, as well as a couple lower WAV qualities). DI (the developers of Neuros) don't believe in DRM, so buy your music from wherever youw ant. Oh, did I mention it has a built in FM tuner and FM transmitter? In my opinion the Neuros beats the iPod hands-down in features. Granted, it may not look as cool, and it's a little bit on the big side, but they're working on that for future versions. I LOVE my Neuros.

Re:They complain it's hard drive based

[Dominic_Mazzoni]

High-quality digital recordings on a MP3 player? You have to be kidding, you will probably use a feature like that maybe once or twice in your life unless you are a professional and then you will probably have dedicated equipment that is way better than any MP3 player.

But what about the millions of amateur musicians out there? I would LOVE to have a device that I can take to an informal gig or jam session and make a decent-sounding recording, and then transfer it to my computer later. Right now I use a Sony Minidisc recorder, but you're limited to just a couple hours per disc if you want any sort of quality, and then you have to do an analog transfer of the audio to your computer later! Almost defeats the purpose of recording it digitally in the first place.

I was really hoping that the new iPods would record 44 KHz 16-bit audio from any line in, but alas, it looks like it's just voice quality. Quite a bummer. I'm definitely looking into some of those other devices.

I disagree with the article

[squarefish]

it seems odd that for each point, they suggest different mp3 players- which all have some of the same faults the ipod was critiziced for previously. I also don't think that the lack of support for windows media files means it won't work at all with other services, I think the services need to give you an oportunity to convert the music to mp3 or some other less controled standard.

the end of the article says it all: Of course, if you don't care about low battery life, aren't fond of jogging, have ample disposable income, don't need to record/encode music portably, and want to purchase music downloads only from the iTunes Music Store, then the iPod is the best the way to go. While not ideal for some niche activities, it's still hands down the best-designed MP3 player in the world.

Re:I disagree with the article

[DrEldarion]

it seems odd that for each point, they suggest different mp3 players

I don't really find that odd. It's more of a "If you want to go jogging with it, don't get an iPod, get one of these instead." - "If you need over 15 hours of battery life, don't get an iPod, get one of these instead."

They're not claiming that any one thing is better than the iPod, just that some are more suitable for certain niches.

Most of these objections are invalid

[Anonymous Coward]

... such as the ones about excessive weight for jogging (what kind of wimp can't carry 6 extra ounces?) and hard-drive vulnerability. The author clearly fails to understand how rugged those microdrives actually are. I doubt you could wreck one on purpose with anything short of an attack with a blunt instrument.

However, I'm concerned about the non-replaceable battery point he raises. I've already had to buy a $300 replacement lithium-ion battery for my two-year-old Vaio. Is it actually true that the IPod's battery can't be replaced, even by sending it back to Apple? If so, that's the mother of all deal-breakers for me. Modern technology is great and all that, but batteries still suck hard, and I certainly wouldn't want to give up the ability to replace them as needed.

Re:Most of these objections are invalid

[JayPee]

You can replace them. You don't even have to send them to Apple.

Go here: http://www.ipodbattery.com/

Re:Most of these objections are invalid

[devnull17]

There are third-party battery replacements available, and they're under $100.

Re:Most of these objections are invalid

[br0ck]

Dot.Com.CEO?????? What the hell is this, the 90s?

More like 3 Reasons.

[El Neepo]

1. 6 hours is not enough battery, ok fine.
2. Jogging with an iPod could be bad, ok fine.
3. iPod is expensive, duh.

4. Voice recording is an add-on. Find a better one.
5. Since when is the online store a part of having a portable mp3 player? Alsoi, "Microsoft's secure WMA files" made me laugh.

All-in-all, seems like weak reasoning. Yes, its expensive, but I think its high quality.

Re:More like 3 Reasons.

[ekephart]

You forget numbers 1 and 2 do not apply. Who leaves their computer for more than 6 hours at a time? And come on! No one here actually goes outside and runs.

and buy what?

[herrvinny]

It's not like there's anything better. What, should we buy a Nomad or one of those Napster branded ones? Forget it. The iPod might not be perfect, but it's a damn sight better than anything else on the market. I'd get an iPod, if only I had any money......

Confused

[BWJones]

Of course, if you don't care about low battery life, aren't fond of jogging, have ample disposable income, don't need to record/encode music portably, and want to purchase music downloads only from the iTunes Music Store, then the iPod is the best the way to go.

Well, I routinely get 5 to 6 hours on my iPod and that is plenty for me. I have never had to have more battery life even on cross country plane flights or drives. I jog routinely with the iPod and have never had a problem and I tried the other music outlets for downloadable music. The iTMS is simply the best there is so.....What is his point?

And then at the bottom of this rant, the author saysWhile not ideal for some niche activities, it's still hands down the best-designed MP3 player in the world.

What gives? Is this guy totally out to lunch?

Re:Confused

[afidel]

I have a series one iPod and I get around 10 hours battery life if I leave it on repeat album and random play. This mode loads an album at a time into cache (if it will fit) so that HDD access is minimized. Not only that but for the adventurous geek there is an aftermarket battery pack with an ~15% higher rating than the stock unit available here, it appears they have even added one for the series 3 ipod's.

Re:Confused

[Chibi]

And then at the bottom of this rant, the author saysWhile not ideal for some niche activities, it's still hands down the best-designed MP3 player in the world.

What gives? Is this guy totally out to lunch?

I get the impression it's an article simply meant to point out some of the flaws of a very good product, especially since the iPod and iTunes have been the centers of some major love-fests, especially in the press. I don't think it hurts to acknowledge that a good product may have some negatives. It's something that future versions of the product could try to improve upon.

If something only has positive attributes, then that make my BS detector go off. Once in a while, you'll find that rare gem which really is all positive. But I think being able to consider a product's drawbacks gives a more accurate impression of it, and can in the long run give a better perception of the product.

Anyway, would you rather see another "me too" article about how great iTunes and iPod are, or a slightly different take on all of the buzz around them (although I'm sure C|NET probably has plenty of "me too" articles, as well)?

Re:Confused

[tuckerclerico]

Some of us travel internationally. My shortest flight in my 150k butt-in-seat miles this year is 11 hours. I guess I'm in the niche.

Then spend a couple bucks and get the damn Belkin battery add-in. You'll get 6 hours plus another 18 hours.

The Belkin add-on is great because (a) it's cheap, (b) it adds *INSANE* amounts of time to the iPod, and (c) is there only when you need it. When you don't want the added weight, you simply unsuck from the back of the iPod and stash it away. Then the iPod is sleek and lovely and thin (because if it wasn't sleek and lovely and thin, these insane "Why I Don't Like the iPod" articles from (airquote) Professional (airquote) reviewers would complain about it being not sleek and not lovely and not thin.

Re:Flamebait?

[Carbonite]

Did you RTFA? It's stated right at the beginning:

Don't get me wrong; it's still our favorite overall MP3 player. Although everyone can think of reasons why they want an iPod, I've decided to use this column to list a few reasons why not to buy one.

Before you send me rants for putting down the iPod, please read the list, realize that we still love the iPod, and take a deep breath.

If CNET ran an article with the title "5 Reasons Not to Buy a Windows XP PC", would that also be flamebait or would you consider it an alternative view? Follow the advice of the article: take a deep breath.

Don't buy a Ferrari or a Mercedes.....

[rixster]

not that I'm comparing and iPod to the above, but I'm sure you could somehow mangle those reasons to argue against anything that costs more than dree-fiddy.

Way to state the obvious

[rritterson]

Okay, except for maybe the battery life point, the other four points are:

2,3,4,5)Because it doesn't do something it's not designed to do.

Btw: If you won't buy an iPod because it's expensive, you obvious aren't in the target market for the device. It's actually reasonably priced in it's segment.

It's like saying 5 reasons not to buy a house:
1)It's expensive
2)You can't take it to the grocery store... etc.

5 reasons to agree with this story...

[contrabassoon]

1 - the things in the list have nothing to do with technological flaws with the unit itself.
2- the author's expectations for battery life versus product size exceed that of most major military technologies.
3- I, like the author, need a bigger paycheck so I don't have to buy cheap, lower quality music devices all the time.
4- Making high quality digital recordings is something I should be able to do from a $500 device that fits in my pocket.
5- The picture of the author inspires me to buy a new pair of headphones.

The iPod Is Not Perfect

[Pave Low]

or even close. I bought 15 gig 3rd gen iPod almost on the first day it came out, after hearing all the raves it got before. While I do enjoy it very much, this article does make some good points.

The battery life really is not great, and it continues to suck power even when you don't have it on so you have to recharge the thing constantly. The other issues like weight, and expense are valid too, I also dislike the the touch-sensitive buttons, no manual EQ settings, no line-in.

Apple zealots don't do Apple any favors as they set themselves up so high on the pedestal, that they're bound to get knocked down a peg. The iPod really isn't THAT much better overall nowadays.

Don't get me wrong, I still like the iPod, but it's not so clear-cut nowadays with all the new competitors. Hopefully, Apple will address these issues in the next revision to stay ahead of the pack.

Re:there are no moving parts

[Phrogz]

Well, FWIW, if you're not constantly fast forwarding or skipping songs, the hard drive buffers 20 minutes of music and then spins down.

Jogging

[Da Penguin]

Jogging can damage it? Then I should be more careful, as not only do I run with it (though mostly to classes), I regularly play squash or work out while jammin' to "War and Peace" from audible.com. Not to mention the many times I've dropped it (note: get a carrying case!).

It should not be difficult, however, to refute their claim. Considering the accelerations present when jogging with it, compared to the internal velocities of the hard drive, it really seems inconsequential. Though don't take my word for it.

Lack of radio

[Midnight Thunder]

Lack of radio is a small but important one for me. Considering that it costs less than 50 cents for an integrated radio chip, and that the iPods UI is ideal for radio tuning, it is certainly something I would like to see. Sometimes I want to hear the news and other live events.

Apple could open up a bit more in terms of media formats, but then again, so could the online stores. AAC is far more open that WMA is at the moment. Heck AAC, is even part of the MPEG4 standard.

Re:Lack of radio

[Phrogz]

Lack of radio is a small but important one for me.

It isn't an issue for me, and only 1 out of 5 iPod owners I know wanted radio. For that 1 person, it was simple to buy a tiny inline receiver that works with the iPod.

5 real reasons

[banky]

1. Apple hasn't partnered with Cnet to sell their device via click-through, resulting in less revenue for CNet from the apparent #1 player.
2. Were Apple to increase in marketshare as a result of 1)the #1 portable music device and 2)the #1 online music store, we'd have to have people cover it more, potentially resulting in less coverage of Microsoft-based products.
3. Anyone can find something wrong with anything, and I have, and since I work at CNet and you don't, you have to listen to me.
4. Microsoft creates standards, not Apple. If Apple creates standards, or supports ones not approved by billg, we'll be back in the chaos of the 80's and early 90's. I can't go back to installing WinSock! I can't!! Buy WMA devices, please!
5. Ha ha, sucker, thanks for the ad impressions. Coming up next: 5 reasons why you shouldn't use Linux, Mac OS X, and/or Mozilla!

Solution to Battery Life

[clarencek]

I personally get about 8 hours from my iPod. And when I need more juice I use this:

http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process ?Merchant_Id=&Section_Id=201526&pcount=&Product_Id =148969

If you need to listen to music for more than 10 hours having an optional battery pack is a must, and it uses AA's so I just swap those for more power.

I don't see one offered for the Dell or Samsung player.

Re:Ogg Vorbis sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

And your music collection is only ever on your "digital jukebox"? You don't understand bitrate peeling. It lets you encode things at a super high quality to stay on your hard drive (say with 5.1 sound), but then strip it down on the fly as you transfer it to your "digital jukebox" or email it to a friend or stream it on the internet to a lower bitrate and fewer channels. And, not everyone plugs their "digital jukebox" into headphones. You could plug it into a real speaker set, or a sound system.

Re:6. No Ogg Vorbis!

[iJed]

As much as it pains me to say it I think WMA would be more useful to the masses that Ogg.

What would also be nice is support for some sort of compressed lossless codec rather than using huge AIFF or WAV files.

Re:6. No Ogg Vorbis!

[wankledot]

The fact that this is mod'd +1 Funny is really sort of telling.

Screaming "Ogg! Ogg!" is almost seen as a joke now. I know I'm laughing at you.

Re:Flamebait?

[jared_hanson]

Don't get me wrong; you are still my favorite overall insightful poster. Although everyone can think of reasons why your posts are good, I've decided to use this comment to list a few reasons why they are not.

1. You are an idiot.

Just because I put the disclaimer up, does not mean that this isn't flamebait. Likewise with the CNet article. They are trying to provoke a reaction, and probably a negative one given how popular the iPod is.

It is one thing to post a review of one of the best products and still point out its flaws. It is another to post an article that is structured in an entirely negative way, despite the fact that they admit it is great. This is simply a case of beating up on the popular guy, just to provoke a reaction (and draw hits to their site so they can sell ads).

Looks like they really had to stretch

[nocomment]

It looks like they really had to stretch to find 5 reasons. "choice in music stores", look, it doesn't matter, the fact is that they still cost $.99.

The skipping while playing is pretty iffy, because they are suggesting that the flash buffer is completely empty before the HD spins up to refill it, which is completely untrue. It spins up long before it's empty to fill up the buffer. A lot like the way burning a cd works (only different ;-). Still, it's nice to see someone being objective about it.

Re:Looks like they really had to stretch

[thparker]

Of course they're stretching. Skipping? Come on, geeks don't jog, silly.

also bitrate peeling and EQs are not the same

[Ayanami Rei]

bitrate peeling = multiple streams at different quality from one source file. You could implement a power-saving mode in a portable with that.
Or fit a lower-bitrate playlist (longer play) onto space-constrained solid state players from a high quality archive without re-encoding.

Heh.

Klutz Proof--IdJit Proof

[malia8888]

The article didn't address fully the durability issues with iPods

I have one of the first generation iPods. One of the first things I did with my new player was slam it in the car door. HARD!! It didn't seem to mind a bit.

I read a few months ago about a fellow who slammed his iPod in the hood of the car--kept opening and shutting the hood on the sturdy little iPod with no damage at least to the iPod.

As long as Mom and Dad keep makin' IdJits glad that Apple is makin' iPods ;)

"Experts say...but I'm a frigging moron, so I'm.."

[rthille]

Some experts say that it's impossible to damage the drive in this way, but I'm not buying that
Yeah, because he knows way more than any expert. He even figured out that you have to wait until the buffer is completely empty before you refill it.
And I'm sure he pored over the specs for the hard drive and saw that the G's he would put on the iPod while jogging would exceed the specs for the drive.
Basically, despite the line at the end calling the iPod the best designed player (added by an editor perhaps?), it's just an anti-iPod rant.

6. You don't want to use 3rd party software...

[Aetrix]

6. You don't want to use 3rd party software to manage files.

Although it has major other faults, the Archos jukebox has one selling point - No third-party software is necessary to upload and download files. It's just a hard drive that plays mp3s (and other stuff in later models). You can load and unload mp3s from it using Explorer, or mount it in Linux. Copy your mp3s just like any other files and play them. There is no necessary uploading software and no download controls. It's fully linux-compatible.

When I was researching MP3 players last May, this was a big selling point of the Archos.

Boy, Bill's getting desperate

[kelzer]

Pull up the article, and check out the picture of the author, "Eliot Van Buskirk". Yeah, look real close. Look familiar? Tried the old Superman/Clark Kent trick of taking off his glasses. Threw on some headphones just to be extra careful.

Well nice try Bill, but we're on to you. Your FUD isn't going to work this time!

Archos Multimedia Jukebox

[Mr. White]

I have a 20gig Archos Jukebox. It's a souped up mp3 player. In additition to storing and playing mp3s, the thing has a little LCD screen, and it plays MOVIES! Or it can output the signal to a TV.

Additionally, it has compact flash and SD adaptors, so you can download the pictures from your camera to the device. This is handy when travelling: you can empty your CF cards and browse photos on the Archos whenever you feel like.

Best of all, it's easy hackable so you can stick a 60gig drive in there.

Revolutionary? Hardly. I've had mine more than 1 year. Currently, there's bigger and better Archos players out there, and doing more for less. Compared to Ipod hype and price, Archos stuff is a steal.

Witold
www.witold.org

Re:Quality loss

[zenyu]

Er, considering that you're most likely going to be listening to it through a car stereo or headphones, I don't think there's really a need for monstrous, extremely high-quality files.

1/ I know a few people with iPods that do plug them into their stereo, where you can hear that those things are not hi-fi.

2/ It's nice to not have to convert your music to lo-fi to put it on your portable music player.

That said, I wrote a script that converts my hi-fi MP3s (that I'm too lazy to re-encode) and OGGs to lo-fi MP3s as it transfers them to my flash MP3 player... But I paid $35 for it, which is a bit less than my SO paid for her iPod... I expect more from the iPod.

Sedan vs Truck

[QEDog]

As you say, they don't tell you an mp3 player better than the iPod overall. An iPod is like an expesinve european sedan, and the reviewer is comparing it to trucks, motorcycles, SUV's and rollerblades and saying how those are better for some things than the sedan. Of course the truck can carry more weight. Of course the SUV is better in rough terrain. Of course the motorcycle is easier to park. Of course the rollerblades are cheaper. So what? It is totally a meaningless comparison.

iPod is a great product. Period. My friend had one, and he just loved it. I couldn't figure out what was about it, and, having my own MP3 plays, I used to think 'it's about the same, i guess'. Then, I borrow my friends iPod for a few hours. I was convinced, sold my mp3 player, and bought an iPod. Then, a second friend saw me with the iPod, and asked me about it. He borrowed it for 3 hours, and that weekend, he was buying one. Have you ever heard of anything like this with any other consumer electronics? It is a quality product, I haven't been so satisfied with a consumer electronic products in a looong time.

I was thinking the opposit, actually...

[joggle]

Out of the possible solutions, he doesn't mention MiniDisc (which uses Sony's proprietary format). It's great for doing portable recordings (so long as you get a model with a mic jack) and has extroardinary battery life, with the extra bonus of only neading 1 cheap AA battery.

Why people buy an iPod

[Mr_Silver]

Because it looks good. Seriously. Most of the people I know has bought one because it looks good and it feels good. It's got nothing to do with the "Apple" name - at the most they know they make computers, at the least they know they make MP3 players.

The reason other manufacturers of HD based players don't get it is because they think they can compete and win on price and features. Which is true, they can do pretty well - but in their desire to push the price down lower than an iPod they end up using cheaper materials which means that what they end up with:

1. Looks cheap and nasty
2. Feels cheap and nasty

When a HD based MP3 player hits the market which looks and feels good (and i'm sorry to say it but this is butt ugly and this looks only marginally better but still feels cheap and nasty) then they'll be onto a winner. Even if it has the same or less features.

For many people, if you're going to pony up several hunded quid for a HD based MP3 player - it better not look like something made by Fischer Price.

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel, Toshiba might come up with the goods (and also Panasonic, but I can't find the product I was thinking of) ...

Re:The Non-replacable battery is a showstopper

[squarefish]

just look here

actually, I didn't even know about this till I saw it in someone's earlier post in this story.

Re:Five Rebuttals (You'll hafta RTFA)

[tshak]

4. What percentage of the owners of portable MP3 players are DJs that want to record their sets? DAT is lossless and is an industry standard, which makes it considerably better for recording your live sets.


You're ignoring his other points. There's probably a large percentage of users who have vinyl and cassets who would want to make backups of their media. Also, as consumer become more empowered with technology, they generally start do do more things with them. Go beyond the average consumer and you have audio engineers, producers, and DJ's as well. There's multiple markets to target with such a feature - why do you think even low end portable cassette players have audio inputs?

Replacement batteries for iPod higher capacity too

[gricholson75]

Clicky Clicky

I get his intent, but he's stretching a bit

[HarveyBirdman]

The main problem with the article is that it's the iPod versus the world, and not one particular other device.

Note that each of the 5 has a separate list of alternative players that the iPod beats head to head.

For example, in one point he crows that one alternative has no moving parts and weighs less than the iPod, but in another point, he presents a solution involving an MP3 CD player (moving parts) that is also saddled with a case of CDs (total is far heavier and more unweildy than the iPod).

So it seems if I follow the advice of this article, I need to buy about 3 to 5 different players to beat the functionality of my iPod.

Obligatory car analogy: It's like saying, if you want a sports car, you should not buy Corvette because it's more expensive than a Mustang, might break more easily than a Lexus GS300, hauls less than a Chevy full size pickup, has a smaller fuel tank than a Hummer and is not as "cool" as an Aston Martin.

Re:6. No Ogg Vorbis!

[fenix down]

Ogg make electronic death ray with power of alternating current! Ogg create industrial paridise and end warfare by bringing world closer together! Ogg hate fucking Edison!

Re:The Non-replacable battery is a showstopper

[Golias]

As the article points out, these batteries will lose their ability to store a charge in a few years (all rechargable batteries do so), and buying a replacement battery (as one does for one's camcorder or discman every few years) isn't an option.

Instead one has to throw away the ipod and buy a new one...

Holy crap, I thought this was Slashdot! You're afraid that you might someday need to open an old out-of-warranty MP3 player to replace a battery!? What the hell kind of hacker are you, anyway?

Slashdot's stated purpose is "news for nerds." Go read CNN.com or Drudge Report or something if that doesn't apply to you.

Re:Great troll

[pHDNgell]

*None* of the MP3 players he's hawking resolves all 5 points

This is what I was looking for someone to point out. After each point, a player was shown that was better at that point. I didn't see two pictures of the same player. Does this suggest that no player is even good at two of them?

My list

[genka]

I own a "docking" IPod. This is my 3rd mp3 player and the best one.However, there are some things I don't like about it:
1 "Touchpad-like" controls- you touch it in a pocket, and it skips a song or does something else
2 Sometimes those buttons don't respond- have to touch up to ten times (not sure if I got a bad unit, or this is typical)
3 Can't "drug and drop" mp3 files on iPod- must use a software
4 Doesn't understand file names or directories- identifies fiels only by ID3 tags
5 Battery life- have to charge it as often as analog cell phone. Forget about overnight trips without a charger
6 Forgets the last played track after being connected to a PC, sometimes does it for no reason at all. Very annoying to audiobook listeners.
7 Clip on the remote is designed in such a way that the controls face outside only when clipped to a shirt with buttons on the left- ladies style.Does it confirm a popular Slashdot opinion that Apple is for gays?

Re:6. No Ogg Vorbis!

[pyros]

I recall one of the biggest holdups to ogg support in portables was in the hardware. I think it was that none of the portables shipped with an FPU, and ogg required one. So perhaps you bought a player before there was technical ability for portables to support ogg. I'm sure someone will post a link or two and take any potential informative mod points i might have received were i more motivated to research futher.

Re:6. No Ogg Vorbis!

[Mr. Sparkleru]

There is an integer only version of ogg available.

Hope that helps.

iPod "shortcomings"? Demystifying crack smokers

[greygent]

Major shortcomings??

1. The battery is a major shortcoming? The thing plays for hours and hours. It's not a shortcoming, just because the newly released Dell player does 20 hours.

2. The moving parts (hard drive) are a major shortcoming? I've jogged with my iPod hundreds of times. You set a playlist for the duration of your jog, press play the iPod fills up the memory cache with tunes, you jog. I maybe get one or two skips. Hard drive still not dead in my unit.

Indeed, not only "some experts", but even Apple says jogging with the iPod is okay, according to their official iPod FAQ:

Question 9: Can I use iPod while running, or doing other activities? Will my music skip?
Answer: iPod was designed for people with an active lifestyle. It is compact and lightweight enough to take with you wherever you go. It was designed to fit comfortably in the palm of your hand or to be slipped into a pocket or purse for easy transport. iPod offers up to 20 minutes of skip protection - twice that of other hard drive-based MP3 players on the market - so you can enjoy outdoor athletic activities without missing a beat.

3. The iPod is expensive. It is pretty expensive, but it's also very high quality. I've dropped the thing on hard ground a few times now, and it still works like a champ. It is well-designed, and it integrates with iTunes seamlessly.

The author suggests MP3 CD players as an alternative, but doesn't this violate his point #2? Yes. It does, you think jogging with an iPod is bad, but jogging with a cheaply manufactured MP3 CD player is better? These units probably have some skip protection, and probably almost no shock absorbtion (walking, driving).

4. You want to make high quality recordings. This is true, rumors are Apple is working on this, who knows.

5. You want a choice in online music stores. Well, I do have a choice in online music stores. I download AACs from iTunes Music Store, and I download MP3s from emusic.com and import them into iTunes.

I heard people bitch for years about how horrible and flakey MusicMatch and others were. Why would I want to go use them? iTunes Music Store is superb, and far exceeds the other choices out there.

Sure the iPod doesn't support "secure" (read: DRM-laden) WMA files, but I don't want to buy those, because they strip me of choice. I want unladen MP3s and perhaps minimally-DRM'd AAC files that are flexible, not draconian "secured" WMA files (which I HAVE experienced, thank you).

This article is just full of bullshit, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was shadow authored by John Dvorak or some MS PR drone*, with the stereotypical bone to pick with Apple.

* Note: I am not a Linux zealot.

Zealotry, Ogg, and WMA

[Llywelyn]

The reason why WMA would be more useful is because more people use WMA.

It doesn't matter if, on some ideological (or even technical) level Ogg is "better" (why do I get the image of that guy from SG1? Kom-chy-a!) most people do not use it. Full stop, end of story.

If I produce a word processor and I had a limited number of file formats I could support it would behoove me to select Word over OpenOffice. Why? Because more people use Word than OpenOffice and if I want to appeal to more people that is the way to go.

There is also the point that no one is selling DRM-wrapped Ogg files (not that this is not possible). They /are/, however, selling DRM-wrapped WMA files. Appealing to more customers again.

>Because ogg is patent and royalty free, there's no reason
>for it not to be adopted by everyone and be everywhere.

There /is/ a reason not to support it on an iPod: they already are paying for support of AAC and MP3s and can only fit a limited number of formats in its memory.

AAC is a given, the Apple Music Store distributes in it and its what's used in mpeg4 files.

MP3 is a given.

AIFF/WAV are givens.

I want to see support for (smaller) lossless formats before I see Ogg support.

For me as an end user, I never (directly) see the license fees paid by Apple for mp3 or AAC support (if they even have to pay the latter). iTunes is distributed to me for free and it does not support ripping to ogg and my iPod won't play ogg, why should I bother with it?

-1 wrong.

[morgue-ann]

emusic.com

If it was buy one song at a time, I might go for it, but I pay enough monthly subscriptions between dish, cell, dsl and netflix.

Their webpage hawks the free trial at you like crazy and hides the real price but it starts at $9.99/month for 40 downloads per month.

I'm trying to be satisfied with stuff I found through Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads and avoid supporting the dinosaurs completely. GarageBand looks promising- I can listen to RealAudio songs & "radio" at work, add the ones I like to my playlist & download 'em to my iPod at home.

Re:Yup.

[Kevinv]

I probably would go with the belkin battery extender if i needed more battery life.

http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.proce ss ?Merchant_Id=&Section_Id=201526&pcount=&Product_Id =148969

But the time I get now is more than enough for me.

5 Reasons to not read CNET

[mach_5]

1. Amount of content is not sufficient
Compared a sample web page from CNET to Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment and found the Dostoevsky's single book to provide far more content that CNET single web page.

2. Switching screens while viewing CNET is not cool
Compared switching between CNET web site screens and found it was no where near the fun of pushing buttons to switch screens on our new 42" Pioneer Plasma TV.

3. CNET is slow
Compared the load times of cnet.com and found the page load times to be significantly slower than localhost.com. What gives CNET? can we have a little optimization?

4. CNET does not allow to make high quality margaritas
Once again CNET faltered when compared to our new KitchenAid blender when it came to making margaritas. We were not even able to find any third party accessories to add this functionality to our CNET homepage.

5. You want a choice in online advertising
You would think that with an article on the Ipod you would atleast be able to check prices on it as they provide for most of the other players.

Stereophile Review

[nuxx]

I think you might want to take a look at the Stereophile Review of the iPod. If you read the article, what is actually (between the lines) reviewed is the DAC of the iPod, which is incredible. I'll attest to this*. Sure, MP3 generally sounds like ass, as to lower bitrate AAC files, but that's a product of lossy compression, not the player itself. iPods themselves sound absolutely wonderful, especially if you use the line out (often from the dock) into your stereo.

*At home I have my iPod dock in the living room hooked to a mid-range NAD receiver and some Gekko speakers. It just sounds amazing.

iHP-120

[Querty]

I just got my iRiver iHP-120 last week, and I'm extremely impressed.

I'm very happy with Ogg Vorbis, and I wanted to buy the first good quality player that supported it. Well, iRiver, I must say you have outdone yourself. The iHP-120 is simply amazing:

• Great sound quality. This player is one of the best sounding out there; very low distortion, flat frequency response, high signal-to-noise ratio and a good amplifier for enough output volume to drive more demanding (large) headphones.
• Ogg Vorbis support
• Optical, and line in and outputs. External Mic in. Built in microphone
• Comes standard with clip-on microphone and Sennheiser earbuds.
• Did I mention Ogg Vorbis support? ;-)
• Great battery life, about 15hrs
• Upgradable firmware
• A standard external USB2.0 20Gb drive, no special software required
• OpenSource (3rd party) Linux version available of the software to create the indexed DB (not required)
• FM radio
• Remote control with backlit LCD display

I could go on and on, but I think you get the picture. Sorry, but the iPod doesn't even come close...