Slashdot Mirror
World's Smallest MP3 Player
Chris_Yates writes "mobiBlu is claiming to produce the world's smallest mp3 player, the DAH-1500 cube. The player is 24x24x24 millimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger or various small items), weighs 18 grams, uses OLED technology, and comes in a variety of colors. The 1GB version is currently selling for $130 at Wal-Mart. Buy one today, so you can lose it within a week!" Update: 07/25 22:56 GMT by T : An anonymous reader points out this review of the device.
Is it really that small?
Alright, that thing is just plain fucking cute.
My MPIO already fits in my change pocket and performs all the functions I need it to, I'd be more interested in a player that was this size and packed a lot more meory. A matchbook sized player with 6gb of memory would hold all of my songs and I wouldn't be so prone to lose it. ;)
Marky Mark Killed Jason Bourne!
I found this wee thumbnail sized MP3 player... plugged in my own earphones... hit play and heard weird static with the sound of flies buzzing played. Then my cell rang and a weird, detached voice said "Seven days..." and hung up. Any ideas?
Trolling is a art,
How much play time can you get from something so small?
You'll get it stuck in your iSophagus.
Can you say iSophagus?
I can't believe this, it's wonderful! It's gonna become my precious! It's GOT to become my precious...
Global warming is a cube.
The famed OLED display that this device has is deafeningly absent from the pictures. Maybe its so small that I can't see it?
The device uses USB 1.1 which is painfully slow to manage songs IMHO.
I take TWO things into consideration with my mp3 player choices.. FM Radio Capabilities, and power management.. This has an FM radio tuner (ipod cost $250 and doesnt?? wtf??) and also, the rechargeable Lithium Ion Battery that charges from the USB port is freakin awesome.. this thing couldn't get any better.. but, i'm still scared to spend over $100 on an mp3 player.. i rather use my $60 ILO with FM tuner and recording capabilities.. real nice design though.. i'll get one once they drop in price.. 1gb is a good amount of space too.. anyone who needs more than that, is crazy..
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
... cluster of these things, as a NAS *RAR* lol. I dont know why you'd want a mp3 player that small, interface would be a bitch compared to the slightly larger say, ipod mini.
Shadus
That's almost too damn small. Where could you keep it while listening? On your neck it would feel ridiculous and you'd lose it in your pocket. You'd need a weighted case to make it reasonable and that'd defeat the whole purpose. Cool, nevertheless.
powering their web server?
There was a whole story and shirt about swallowing an MP3 player, and now you can!
When life gives you crap, Make Crapade.
Sluggy Freelance.
I get yelled at for loosing my frigg'n massive universal remote, now I have to worry about my music collection falling into the recesses of my couch?! Arg!
> The player is 24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of
> your finger
Anyone with one inch square fingertips is scary. Seriously. I doubt seeing a 1" cube I could relate it to *ANY* body part.
Having a device that small is nice, but my MP3 player is already mostly size limited by UI concerns why would I want anything smaller than a Credit card.
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
Call me a geek but one of the first things I thought of when I saw this was being able to roll a 20 sided wireless die w/ speaker and have it say 'HIT!'. It could be hooked up to my character sheet and the DM computer. Throw in that overhead LCD map projector and we're good to go.
but blocky. I wonder if to cut down on height they widened it's base. It seems like in your pocket you'd always sort of feel the pressure of it. It looks nice but I'd still rather have a shuffle.
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
With a player that small, maybe they could just make one the shape of a hear piece and we could just change the musics with a bluetooth remote.
I think that this may so small as to be impractical... I had a cell phone that was too small in that the buttons were impossible for me to press with my (sausage like) fingers without messing up. I had to get a bigger one.
I don't mind something that is small enough to be hidden by a sock, but not a match book...
It does seem like this could create some interesting possibilities for integrated earphones. Perhaps an ear phone that hooks over your ear>
Anyhow, Like my wife says, anyone who says that size doesn't matter has a small , er, MP3 player
And All I Ask is a Tall Ship And a Star to Steer Her By
Where Dilbert is buying a new computer, and the salesman shows him the desktop, the laptop, and the fingertop (which is glued to your fingernails).
"Dave, about last night..."
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
Apparently their server is hosted on one of these as well.
http://slashdot.org/~gmhowell/journal/112533
Lasers Controlled Games!
How is this news? How can this possibly matter? It's not like someone just invented the mp3 player. Someone made a tiny one. Whoah, stop the presses! Tune in tomorrow when someone makes one .1mm smaller!
Why do my serious comments get modded "funny"?
OK, I'm sure one of you fellow geeks has a great solution as to how to connect this type of thing to a low-power FM transmitter for car listening. So, for those of you who have spent some time trying this out, what was the best solution you found?
And hey, since Wal-mart is selling this, I think it might just give the iPod a run for its money.
ShortFormBlog: Writing a little. Saying a lot.
...here's a link to Wal-Mart's website. They appear to be nearly sold out of the 1 gig ones, though.
immediatly start thinking about the iFlea??
Mirror
/. in 6 minutes...it must be a new record or something
Not small enough! We need mp3-playing dust. Now that would be a P2P they would have trouble sorting out!
Coral cache of the site.
Google cache
Mirrordot
Not that anybody round here would be reading the article though.
The player is 24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger...
Sounds like it should be really easy to push the buttons to control the thing...
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
The battery life of this seems impressive.
From the specs:
BATTERY LIFE
Approximately 17 hours
PLAY TIME
16 hours with WMA (64Kbps) or 8 hours with MP3 (128Kbps) per 256MB
How difficult is it to hit F7? Or run a spell check?
Sigh. OOPS, I meant, dificult.
Cheers, Nostrada
17 Hours, visit the product's website.
while thire building small mp3 players, wouldn't it be better to just build it into a pair of headphones? no cables geting in the way and not as easy to lose.
Solid Splash design
The player is 24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger or various small items)
I don't know about the rest of the non-gigantism population, but the tips of my fingers are rather smaller than one cubic inch.
For scale: early in the movie 'Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban', Harry causes his b*tchy aunt to inflate and blow away like a balloon. Her finger was the first part to inflate; when she holds it up, the tip of the finger appears to be about 1" in diameter.
To sum up: normal finger tips are not 1" in diameter.
/ pulled a muscle reaching for that comparison
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
can we mod the posts? this gives me a chuckle before I even get to the comments.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
There's always got to be a "Yeah that's neat, but..." post. Here's mine:
Yeah, that's neat, but when's the firmware update coming that supports Ogg. MP3s are so 2002.
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. -- William James
That is cool. But isn't it too small and too light that you'll lose it!
Slashdot needs Geekcode | Can anyone recommend any good SCIFI? My tastes: Foundation, Startide Rising, CITY, Ringworld,
No Wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Oh wait, wrong site. :)
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
If you're going for small form factor, why on earth would you want a cube? Surely the ideal is more of a thin credit-card shape, so that it'll fit conveniently in pockets. Not to mention offering more surface area for sensibly-sized controls.
I suppose this is marginally more convenient than the "caltrop", "shuriken" and "mousetrap" form factors, but it's a close thing.
I'd rather eat glass.
24mm is just shy of 1". How many people out there have 1"x1"x1" fingertips out there? Besides the frog-people...
1"x1"x1" = 1 cubic inch.
0.98" x 3.3" x 0.33" = 1.06 cubic inch.
And the shuffle is easier to fit in your pocket.
Check out Wal-Mart Watch.
People are the problem, stop procreation now!
Anyone out there have a ruler and an iPod shuffle to verify this?
#include "cunning_plan.h"
You may have to squint at the jpg:
This thing is almost exactly the same volume as the ipod shuffle (though a cube is arguably an inferior form factor), and requires a cable to connect it to a computer instead of having a built-in USB plug.
That means it's not as useful as a self-contained portable storage device.
"Leave the strategizing to those of us with planet-sized brains." -Tycho
...when you can get an Apple iPod and be cool.
;-)
Remember: Apple gives you that added layer security with DRM. You know you're safe with Apple !!!
Other companies? Who knows if they'll be around?
just buy a Mac
The article seems to be down, but is it smaller than this?
http://gprime.net/video.php/ipodflea
Philosophy.
Of course the new Digital Millenium Toilet Act will let the RIAA hang around your house for a day or so until the evidence reappears.
Realistically, how big is the market for this? How many people want to play the world's smallest MP3? Does it play normal size MP3s?
CmdrTaco's Brain (due mostly to the Duplicate Article Cortex).
It'd better be washable, since something that small is going to be getting lost in my pockets for sure.
Drag n' Drop DVD Recommendations
So that's how it happened... I've spent many nights lying awake wondering what would happen if these two ever met.
Laziness, check. Impatience, check. Hubris, double check!
Ooh, look! An actual review.
How did they go about making the screw stand up?
The mp3-player is also known as JNC SSF-8100: http://www.jnc-digital.com.au/products_details.php ?id=66#
So, as the mobiblu site's down, who _actually_ created this?
Yup, the shuffle is easier to pocket, but a display screen, nested folders, WMA playback and an FM tuner kick in features Apple is to elitist to include. (PS, I'm writing this missive on my Powerbook...but I do think Apple is elitist.)
16 hours (wma) or 8 hours (mp3) just seems too amazing from something that small. Assuming that half of the device is battery (the other half is controls, memory, processor), this leaves half a cubic inch for a battery.
It would be interesting if true though. At that size, you could just integrate it into the headphones.
Do not eat this micro iPod.
Do not eat this microsized music player.
Do not eat it.
You have been warned!
If the average geek really has fingers 1 inch square, then that would explain a lot of typo's on Sloshdat...
Oh well, what the hell...
So the headline reads that this is the worlds smallest mp3 player... yet if I take the usb cap off my ipod shuffle, it's volume is measurably less than that of the DAH-1500. Does that mean I've had the world's smallest mp3 player since february, and nobody's come out with anything smaller?
"Leave the strategizing to those of us with planet-sized brains." -Tycho
Leela: What's the matter Amy? Did you swallow your MP3 player again?
I can see the spam subject lines now..
"DECREASE YOUR CUBE SIZE **NOW!** WITH M0B1BLU!!!11!"
What I really want is a player that:
/. visitors
1. Plays ogg
2. Uses aa/aaa
3. Takes flash cards (SD, miniSD, etc)
Also nice:
A large commercial website that can handle the load of
Building a healthy future; Connecting communities
15 silver points to anybody who builds this into another device, or casemods it into something interesting, like an article of clothing.
The player is 24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger or various small items)
I bet you're already thinking "how big of a katamari do I need to roll up one of those?" but please keep the Katamari Damacy fanboyism to the Games section.
24 mm / 25.4 mm/inch = 0.945 inches
0.945" ^3 = 0.844 cubic inches, or something near that.
1.06 is bigger than 0.844
And it's a cube.
It's cool.
Just because Apple doesn't sell it, it doens't mean it can't seem cool to some people.
Of course, the shuffle is still easier to fit in your pocket, still.
And maybe it's not for your pocket, it's something to hang with your keys. Or hanging from your neck.
Or sitting on your desk.
AUDIO FORMATS
MP3 (MPEG 2/3-Layer 2/3, 4-320Kbps), WMA (Microsoft Windows Media Audio, 2-320Kbps), and new formats by Software upgrade
BUILT-IN MEMORY
256MB / 512MB / 1GB
PLAY TIME
36 hours with WMA (64Kbps) or 18 hours with MP3 (128Kbps) per 256MB
HEADPHONE OUTPUT POWER
4 ? / 150mW
AUDIO OUTPUT FREQUENCY
0.2Hz ~ 200KHz
AUDIO SIGNAL TO NOISE RATIO
340dB
FM FREQUENCY
87.50MHz - 101.00MHz
FM SIGNAL TO NOISE RATIO
60dB
PC INTERFACE
USB 2.0
DOWNLOAD SPEED
Max. 678Mbps
AVAILABLE COLOR
Orange, Green, and Pink
for all storage sizes
POWER SUPPLY
Built-in NiCAD Battery
BATTERY LIFE
Approximately 57 hours
DIMENSIONS
0.94" x 0.94" x 0.94"
24mm x 24mm x 24mm
WEIGHT
0.23 Ounces (8 Grams)
The volume is a bit smaller. 1 inch is 25.4 mm. .84/1.06=0.79 times the volume of an ipod shuffle.
(24/25.4)^3=.84 cubic inches
Looks nicer in this review than in TFA. I really like the fact that you just copy files to it to play... the Magic Star "Grey Whale" player (which I still think is the spiritual ancestor of the Shuffle) worked the same way, and it was very convenient.
The Magic Star player is in some ways a better design: it doesn't need a USB sync cable because it had a USB jack like the shuffle's. I don't see why they couldn't build the USB jack into the headphone dongle, though.
Having a display in a box that small and cheap is pretty good. I still wish it was flatter and longer so it was more pocketable.
It looks like it has the same problem that the Magic Star player did. Low speed USB 1.1 interface. Make it USB 2.0 and eliminate the sync cable and you've got a winner.
that those greedy portable music manufacturers don't include an expandable memory slot, then one could seriously consider buying a flash-based player.
i'm not going to buy a player that is locked in the amount of storage it has. that's as silly as someone buying a digital camera that ONLY has internal memory.
anyone know if there are any good players with expandable flash storage?
Science : Proprietary , Knowledge : Open Source
The one sold at walmart is usb 2.0
Or with an extention set so you can use the controls.
BTW: I think I will paint one dot on side on, 6 on the opposite, 2 on another, 5 on that opposite, and 3 and 4 dots on the two remaining sites. Then I can use it for monopoly.
My wife's sketchblog Blob[p]: Gastrono-me
It seems perfectly reasonable to me...The main problem these days is fitting a functionally sized UI onto the smallest possible player, but if you made a UI-less player, built into some headphones, say, with a bluetooth UI hooked into a watch or something, that would kick ass.
Mods on crack I tell ya.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
They should fit the whole contraption in a hearing aid size form factor. Then have a wireless control either on a ring or wristwatch form factor.
are we talking about here?
They've got nothing on iPod Flea!
A religious war is an adult version of a fight over who has the best imaginary friend
Highspeed (400+Mbit) or Fullspeed (11Mbit). I gather the last, which is practically completely compatible to USB 1.1 - same slow speed.
Slashdot: stuff for news, nerds that matter, matter for news, stuff that nerd
1. Does this play the podcasts? 2. Does it have the internet in it?
What about the iPod Flea?
Since when size matters.... oops *ducks*
High-speed is optional in the USB 2.0 specs.
WMA playback is not a feature, it's more like a DRM virus...
People are the problem, stop procreation now!
Yup, the shuffle is easier to pocket, but a display screen, nested folders, WMA playback and an FM tuner kick in features Apple is to elitist to include.
Oh, I do think it's a nice little unit, though I'd rather have it do MP4 than WMA since WMA is kind of tied in to Windows. The functionality and price are all good, but I'd rather they have made it a less clumsy shape even if it was in a slightly larger box.
Incidentally, the thing that I miss the most about my shuffle is the clock. Since it doesn't have a clock, it can't update the "last play" time in iTunes when it syncs, so my clever set of chained smart playlists for Party Shuffle can't account for and avoid dups for the music that I listen to on my shuffle.
I suppose I could write a script that I could run before and after syncing the shuffle to put the songs whose play counts have changed into a "recent shuffled" playlist, but I think I've already spent way too much time on fine-tuning my iTunes settings.
Fuck that. I don't want a shit-ass FM receiver, nor do I give any number of shits for WMA. Anyone who doesn't realize that mp3 is THE standard for portable music is on crack. I'm don't hear much whining that other players don't put AAC playback on *their* players.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
"Spin is a polite way of saying, 'lying'". I forget who said that, but I think it was during a Charlie Rose interview. The guy said that after decades of "spin", we accept, both as consumers and voters, the most outlandish concepts.
"I know how to run a business, that means I'd make a great governor" was one Mitt Romney used, except that his hard-hitting my-way-or-the-highway style pissed off the entire statehouse, and he hasn't accomplished a single thing he promised he would. That style works great in business when you're the head of a mega-powerful takeover/investment firm like Bain. Works great on a personal level too when you're rich, white, and a powerful businessman (and before anyone gets too uppity, I had a close friend who worked at Bain for several years. Romney's a dick.) It does not work on a political level where you are one of three branches of a government (you're not "the boss", by any stretch of the imagination), surrounded by "the enemy" in a "liberal" state with a lot of other entrenched egos who see you as nothing but a johnny-come-lately looking to get into the white house.
Marketers have for decades hinted at crap like "If you don't use our toothpaste, she won't fuck you". Why are you surprised they claim a 1" cube is "fingertip"? It's shown in photos with a male hand, which from the proportions is itself enormous. They're trying their damnedest...
It's tiny, and impressively so; it makes the Shuffle kind of look like the 2001 Monolith. Why can't they just say "it's really really small"? If I had been in their shoes, I would have just shown it next to the quarter and said "about the size of a quarter". Credibility in marketing is a powerful thing, at least to me.
Please help metamoderate.
She loses everything - cell phone, tin whistles, sisters...even herself.
Caroline Corr: "She's dizzy. She gets lost and stuff...You know, in airports, you're looking for Andrea. And she's lost her passport...she's lost her boarding pass."
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
but that's probably because they don't track your location with MP3 players, plus tunes are more useful.
...
Reminds me of those SNL skits - but instead of teeny cell phones, it's teeny MP3 players
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Then what is the difference between what this player has and USB 1?
I have to say that is a dumb form factor.
Who wants a 1" cube bulging in their pocket? I would hate to sit down with that thing in my pocket.
Or under their shirt at the end of a lanyard? It wouldn't hang well, stick out noticeably and don't get it between you and a surface.
Also good luck trying to hold that thing in a way the allows you to use the controls.
Which other national chain has these in stock? Or shall we compile a list of "mom & pop" retailers and link to that list by region, then completely ignore that the world's largest retailer is selling this new startup product? That seems like part of the news to me.
After all, it is the world's largest retailer, and when they carry a new tech product it tends to (1) sell well and (2) be reasonably priced.
Wally world isn't my favorite store for anything, but you anti-Walmart zealots make me want to shop there more just to piss you off.
everything in moderation
Pointer to those useful sounding scripts?
Thanks.
Interesting. Did you happen to make your post on a computer? Any piece of electronics? Where do you think that was built? Take of your watch, don't drive your car, the commies could have sabatoged those too. The cold war is over Tex.
The players supports .mp3 and .wma; not only .wma. I personally don't care about .wma too much, but I'm always happy when I'm given more choices.
The iPod flea is even smaller.
Also here
ShoutingMan.com
See it here.
P.S Might not play well on Firefox but see anyway!
Actually, Walmart is selling an enchanced version with usb 2.0 added and the ability to play walmart's drm files (wma). I am fairly certain this means high speed transfers. http://www.i4u.com/section-viewarticle-101.html lists the max download speed at 6 Mbps.
You probably never heard of the iPod Flea ?
So you get all those features in a wonderful form factor... one with the controls on one face of the cube and the screen on another face (forcing an handedness among other usability issues). Of course you have to hold this thing some how while attempting to use the screen and controls yet all dimensions are the same and small (average thumb pad is about the same size as one of the faces).
Also great to put in you pocket... *rolls eyes*
Nice features bad bad form factor.
Actually as stated on the website
DIMENSIONS
0.94" x 0.94" x 0.94"
24mm x 24mm x 24mm
Which would be 0.83 cubic inch.
But still, the shuffle fits much better.
I've got something else 24mm in size that I'd like to give her!
This player is intrguing, and has some nice features: Small, light, portable, and has OLED and an actual display (which devices like the iPod Shuffle do not).
However, I do not see the one thing that makes it a blocker for me: How long does the battery life last... in lifetime? 10 hours per-charge if you drain it fully, but does it only last 100 charges? 1000? More? Less?
I don't like buying $130.00 "disposable" products, but it seems that is what our society is breeding now. "Its only $300.00, just throw it away and buy a new one!" (speaking of a certain printer that had some issues, and was cheaper to buy a new one than than keep fixing the existing one. The same can be said for quite a few products these days; PDAs, mp3 players, DVD players, headphones, etc.)
It seems like these vendors are continuing to churn out "degrading" products in the hopes that we will keep replacing them with new ones, hopefully from the same vendor. We are not CONSUMERS, we do not "consume" technology like our cars "consume" gas. We are customers, and we expect quality products for our hard-earned dollars, not trash that "expires" in 6 months and gets tossed in a drawer.
So does this thing last 3+ years while charging every day? Does it have a decent LiIon battery to take that number of recharge cycles?
Forget violins. Now you can go to your whiny teenager and say, "this is the world's smallest MP3 player, playing just for you" and not be lying.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Small, portable, blah, blah, but it's not much good if it gets only 10-15 minutes of runtime from its' dinky little battery.
...Which is probably why such a design would never fly. There's far too much of a push towards disposablility.
While I'm spouting off for no good reason, might I mention the rarely (if ever) seen features that I'd personally LOVE to see in a small mp3 player:
* Small. Like another poster implied earlier, a fit-in-your-pocket form factor is much better than a trip-to-the-ER-cause-you-sat-on-it-cube.
* USB 2.0 connector. No one wants to wait for stuff to upload.
* Internal storage is removable flash media (preferably popular and therefore cheap rather than the rare and expensive -- like in my damn cel phone). Makes it ungradable, and you can swap media for different compilations. I also prefer flash over tiny hard drives because of the lack of moving parts.
* Make the damn thing water-proof or at least water-resistant. Not too hard with solid state. Also, there's a big difference between "my player got wet and the batteries shorted and died" and "my player got wet and died."
* Takes 2 AA batteries (fairly inexpensive and readily available). Heck you can use rechargables if you want.
* Decent run time on new batteries. Granted mp3 decoding takes a little muscle, even with a dedicated chip, which equals additional juice usage, but keeping the die small should help.
Bottom line: interchangable components, commodity parts, etc, etc.
Oh well.
But you don't put this thing in your pants pocket you'd need a really long headset cord and it'd get caught on things. Either you put it in your shirt pocket (where flat is also better), or you just leave it hanging from the cord, in which case flat is usually better as well.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
let alone the fact that the Shuffle doesn't have a stupid custom usb cable to lose or have carry around to charge the thing.
Make it so that the two halves can sense how far apart they are, and have it turn off or pause when they are either very close together, or farther apart than the width of your head. That would be a nice simple interface: put the headphones in and it starts, take them out and it stops.
If you could put a motion sensor in one, you could use a gesture-based interface. Pull it out and shake it to do shuffle play. Move it in a circle to change volume. Flick it up/down to skip forward, flick it left/right to skip backward.
I need to correct myself... aspect of the controls live on two opposite faces (menu/hold on one face and play, volume, arrows on the other).
Also the screen is square obviously... not the best for showing song names.
"...about the size of the tip of your finger or various small items..."
She said it was how you use it that counts.
Not scripts, just smart folders. Unfortunately I can't just dump the XML because the important stuff is binary gibberish.
Basically, what I did was set up a series of smart folders:
2star - Rating is 2 stars and last played is not in the last 2 months
0star - Rating is 0 stars and last played is not in the last 6 weeks
3star - Rating is 3 stars and last played is not in the last 3 weeks
4star - Rating is 4 stars and last played is not in the last 4 days
5star - rating is 5 stars and last played is not in the last 25 hours
Weighted - playlist is 0star or 2star or 3star or 4star or 5star
Ambient - Genre is not Hip-Hop and playlist is not Unambient and genre is not Opera and playlist is not Flakey and kind does not contain quicktime
This works a lot better than just "play higher rated songs more often", because I know how often "more often" is. And I can tune things around, cut 5star down to 3 days or raise 3 stars up to 1 week when I'm feeling like more variety... that's how I ended up giving 0 star a frequency that's between 2 and 3 stars.
Unambient is just a regular playlist where I put stuff that I don't want to listen to while I'm working. Flakey is another set of chained playlists. I don't play quicktime in ambient because the volume equalizing algorithm iTunes uses doesn't work for quicktime.
Ogg Vorbis is technically superior to MP3, so if I have a choice (and I often do), I'll take a Vorbis. I therefore am not interested in any player that doesn't play it.
Or the 3.21 cubic inch ipod mini.
24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger
If the tip of your finger is about 1"x1"x1", you either have elephantitis or are about 12' tall. Are your other appendages of such unusual size as well? If so, poor you.
You must really have enjoyed Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat to respond to this post. Tell me, when MKII came out ( Mortal Tuesday, wasn't it? ) did you use the letter K where a C should have been in all your written work that day?
Back in the day when the fighter-genre was all the rage and video games were for nerds only, damnit!!
24x24x24 mm = 0.945" cubed.
nice try... but you are rounding up. i understand, a lot of guys do this. 0.94"x0.94"x0.94" = 0.83 cubic inch it doesn't have the usb port built in, but adds an oled screen, fm, eq, and voice/fm recording.
Still, in practical terms it's less convenient than even significantly larger devices, like the Magic Star MP3 player I had before the shuffle.
And it's a cube.
It's cool.
Just because Apple doesn't sell it, it doens't mean it can't seem cool to some people.
What does cool have to do with it? The Magic Star player is uncool as anything, but like the Shuffle it just worked, it didn't need a display, and I liked it a lot.
here's a review and some pictures
m-i-l-i-m-e-t-e-r
Ah yes, yet another pretender to the iPod Flea throne. :-)
(Note: embedded WMV. For stills, go here or Google 'ipod flea'.)
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I used to use a similar scheme for a few playlists on my full-sized iPod. Imagine my surprise when songs I had played in my Shuffle weren't showing up in my "Recently Played" playlist. I guess it's great they it still bumps the playcount, but date-stamping is something I really do miss from my full iPod. Even if it just stamped all played songs with the time you updated the Shuffle.
Now I'm stuck using only star ratings and play counts to create the smart playlist(s) that I use to fill my shuffle. Oh well.
Hey Apple, you listening?
I can't wait for my 2GB, MP3 playing, insertable, voice activated, hearing aid (patent pending, (c) 2005 GBN, lol).
I'd prefer a 12cm x 12cm x 1cm device (with 5% more volume). I'd really prefer if this OLED/Flash device were flexible, so I could roll it up into a stylus for my smartphone, and unroll it for a QVGA display.
--
make install -not war
The player is 24x24x24 milimeters (about the size of the tip of your finger or various small items)
Most posters seemed to find the "size of the tip of your finger" part of this quote funny, but I personally find "or various small items" even funnier.
Q: How big is 24x24x24 millimeters?
A: About the size of various small items.
Yeah, that's some real useful information.
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SERENITY NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
necklace? Think about it, it's a music amulet. The form factor is quite intelligent that way. hell, where's the gold leaf/chain combo. Booyaka Trendy!
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog_name =CTLG&product_id=42-8071/
Its small and does not require sdpecial drivers.
This thing has been out about a year ago. It's just some nitwit at slickdeals/fatwallet finally saw it cheap at walmart.com and thought it was new. This is so lame.
All the features that you list as missing are included in the Creative Zen Nano Plus player, which is also about the same size and volume. I just got one and its great! It also runs off of common AAA batteries, alkaline or NiMH, so no issues of propriety batteries that need to be replaced by Apple CS.
Yup, the shuffle is easier to pocket, but a display screen, nested folders, WMA playback and an FM tuner kick in features Apple is to elitist to include. (PS, I'm writing this missive on my Powerbook...but I do think Apple is elitist.)
Nested folders (or just seperate playlists) is the only thing I really think the Shuffle needs. I actually kinda like not having a display...less distraction from just listening to music. WMA playback? If you're talking about WMAs with DRM, I try to avoid DRM as much as possible (thank you, Hmyn project!)...if you're talking about getting music from friends who use WMA to rip their stuff...I look at such people as naughty puppies who just need a smack on the nose and pointed in the direction of a better codec. And FM tuner? Good god no...that's a feature that would not even be worth 5 extra dollars tacked onto the price for me. Too many people (myself included) live in areas where the radio selection sucks...those that are fortunate enough to have good radio in their area just need to pony up the 10 bucks to get themselves a portable FM radio.
Multiple playlists though...god, that would make a 1GB Shuffle so much more useful. 240 songs is great, but being able to seperate them into two playlists of 120 would be so much better. Wouldn't necessarily require extra buttons...just use some combination of what's there (holding the skip button for 3 seconds while paused, for example, to bump forward to the next playlist).
Hey Apple...once again, are you listening?
I was in Bangkok about two weeks ago and they were selling the Xenn XM-5, which bears a striking resemblance to the mobiBLUE DAH-1500.
...one of the few complaints I have about the iPod Shuffle is that it's too small. I actually paid for a little protective skin for it, not because I was worried about it getting scratched, but to make it a little larger and thus fit in my hand better. Go figure.
And these guys are shooting to be smaller than a Shuffle? No thanks...especially with a shape that awkward.
i'd love to see that oh-so-not-essential info mentionned in at least SOME MP players reviews ;-)
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
no ogg support => Trashcan
http://www.nytimes.com/video/html/2005/06/29/techn ology/highbandwidth/windowsmedia/20050629_GUEST_VI DEO.html
The external battery is a bit much though...
:q! Oh crap, not again...
I don't care about FM. I don't know why some people call it a feature on an MP3 player. If a person thought that FM was worthwhile, why buy an MP3 player? It's just not on any list of features I care about. I have a couple home theater recievers, I think they get their name because an AM/FM reciever is built in, but I never use them. Same goes for cars. I'd use the FM tuner on a car only because most radio makers don't bother to put a proper line-in on their radios.
.8" diagonal screen is going to be worthwhile on this cube player.
A screen is important though, but I doubt a
iFlea[http://www.layersmagazine.com/features/featu re_cs2/flea.htm%5D
And does it have as many nifty accessories?
I'd expected more from you... (now there is a chance that the joke was made but not modded up to the point where it can easily be seen) but there were no instances of "d6" or "dice" on the two pages of comments thus far. You guys at slashdot.org have really slipped...
lots of people are getting pissed at each other because of the fact they have different uses for different mp3 players.. i personally like having a radio in mine because it gives me the ability to listen to NPR and my albums during my commute.. different purposes for different people.. respect their opinions for what they choose and why.. personally, the ipod is very unpractical for me.. $250 for something that doesn't even have the simple technology of an FM receiver..
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
http://www.aztech.com/press/2005/PressMP3.pdf
Does no one care that with a S/N ratio of 50dB that this thing is only a couple of orders of magnitude worse sounding than an 8-track?
There are many annoying things about it. The dongle has been mentioned. It is USB 1.1, which makes little sense, with maximum speed of 6 Mb/s. By far the most annoying thing is that it is only rated for 8 hours playing MP3 content. I assume that it will work on non-windows devices, but it is not specified as such.
The nice thing is that it seems one can use the device to transfer and play music, none of that annoying iPod type hiding and mangling of the files. I wonder if they are going to tie this to the walmart music service and market it like the ipod. Doing so would make a lot of sense.
In the end, a 1 gb memory stick it cheaper than this toy, and the form factor of the iPod. Even the sony, though twice as big and more expensive, seem to have some advantages. And I am hesitant to buy a product from a company that cannot produce a corporate web site that does not look a it is promoted a cheap toy or art exhibit.
Anyway, dongles are so 20th century. if they were going with slow transfer, they should have gone bluetooth.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I suppose I could write a script that I could run before and after syncing the shuffle to put the songs whose play counts have changed into a "recent shuffled" playlist, but I think I've already spent way too much time on fine-tuning my iTunes settings.
:)
s p=updateshufflelastplayed
Or you could let somebody do it for you!
http://www.dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/ss.php?
Haven't used it yet, but something you might want to check out. Looks like it does exactly what you're talking about doing.
Assuming this script works, thanks Google!
Well, I like audio entertainment. So I consider radio and pre-recorded playback two sides of a coin just as a CD player in a car comes with an AM/FM radio. I don't think many people would opt for a CD only player in their car nor do I really want a portable player that doesn't have a radio. It is a personal preference, though, and I just wish Apple would give us the option--after all, the chip set in the shuffle has built in FM radio support (and screen support, and WMA support)!
PS, I'm not a big fan for WMA, but more options are better than fewer.
m-i-l-l-i-m-e-t-e-r
Proud owner of BOT2K3 [ bot2k3.net ]
ummm... it was made small so it's "Good to Go"?
Get your Unix fortune now!
I just copied it from your comment.
"And hey, since Wal-mart is selling this, I think it might just give the iPod a run for its money."
That's modded funny? That's pretty insightful to me. I think if the price comes down a bit, it'll sure give the iPod Shuffle a run for its money. On price, if Walmart wants to be it, it will.
Besides, with a built in FM tuner, even the technologically inept can use it until they figure out what an MP3 is. That's a definate Walmart winner. That feature alone makes is a definate Rio killer. It also has 5 hours more play time than the iPod Shuffle, weighs less than iPS, and actually comes in color (white is so 2004, unless you like being mugged).
The jury is out on iPod killer status, but I have to say one thing. It is pretty sexy, and a definate conversation starter (for geeks at least). If it goes hits $110 or less, I'd probably get it.
I8-D
It's still nowhere near as tiny as the iPod Flea!
The firmware (which you can download from MobiBlu's website) has "StationZ" and "MP3PZ" scattered all through it. So I'm guessing the hardware is pretty closely related to the StationZ "pendant" MP3 players. Unfortunately I'm not leet enough to recognize what cpu it's using from a hex dump, so I can't guess anything more from the firmware file. (FYI, 'strings' only gets about half of the text in the file, since the rest is in UTF16 or some other 2-byte character set.)
Myself, I go to the FM side of the dial for pretty much one thing only -- the FM-stereo simulcast of my local PBS station. When I can't sit in front of the TeeVee for the News Hour (w. Jim Lehrer), this handy broadcast lets me get my nesw and info nonetheless.
Granted, my use (and admittedly the availability of FM stereo simulcasts of your local PBS station) may not be terribly common, but if there's one slice of FM that I use every day, that'd be the one.
.. pa-ra-bo-la, pa-ra-bo-la, 2 pi R, 2 pi R, where's your latus rectum, where's your latus rectum, 2 pi R
I'm using a list called "good weighted" that's 3-star-or-better songs from Weighted, then for the shuffle I'm extracting the least-played several hundred of those. That way I get a lot of stuff from "Unambient" on the shuffle, and there's enough of that most of my shuffle stuff has had 5 plays or fewer, and it's still got some weighted ratings.
:)
Now I'm wishing the shuffle had a "skip this but mark it as played" button.
Apple, you listening?
While Ogg is technically superior, it requires more cycles to decode and thus drains batteries faster compared to playing mp3s.
Actually, I think its important to ask where your product is made. The cold war is over? The economic war is just beginning, we are in a global economy now. If you want to keep your job, shop in your best interest.
Supposedly, the firmware on this thing can be upgraded to support more music formats. Maybe the manufacturer will release a patch, or perhaps the hacking community will take care of it once they get their eager little hands on a firmware binary.
I hate to point this out, but the article did say that it was an MP3 player. :-) My turntable won't play compact discs, either.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Considering how small it is, it will soon become The World's Most Lost MP3 player.
Somehow, I am thinking of the type of hat which has the little strap under the chin that keeps it from blowing off, and along part of the strap is the piece which is for the ear. Maybe incorporate some of the noise canceling technology used by those noise cancelling headsets while you are at it.
This idea is now posted on Slashdot...! Its now Prior Technology posted in a Public Forum... with time stamp.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
Unless you're a music expert or sound engineer, you're not going to hear the difference between a reasonably high quality mp3 and ogg or any other high quality format. shush* No, i dont care what you say - you're not. Lots of people claim they can, but when it's put to the test they cant.
just search worlds smallest mp3 player on google and look at the second result ...lol
was debating getting this a year ago, but went with the newer yepps cause of 42 hours of battery on 1 AA and ogg support. not to mention fm recording, line in, and a onboard mic.
this looks ok but for size, the yepp yp-mt6z kills it on features, also kills the shuffle too.
and there is no ipod killer, no company is stupid enough to waste as much money on marketing as apple has
I was reading the review and in the cons section it says: "No DRM Support". I don't see that as a con, but more like a pro. Who need DRM
No, Ogg Vorbis not technically superior.
Ogg Vorbis stores data in floating-point format, which is fine for computer CPUs that are equipped with a floating-point co-processor. However, supporting an extra processor sucks up more energy and reduces battery life. Otherwise, without the co-processor, the floating point calculations would have to be performed in software, which would impact performance.
MP3 uses only integers, and so is ideal for portable, battery-saving systems.
This matter was solved on engadget a few weeks ago. DAH-1500 24mm x 24mm x 24mm = 13824mm^3 BenQ Joybee 102r 41mm x 41mm x 8mm = 13448mm^3
Two of the four 'Cons' in the review are:
It's Tiny
No DRM Support
Surely in the wrong column?
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
Sure, it has a screen, but it doesn't seem like you can actually see more than 3 characters at a time... The only thing that works for is scrolling through FM stations... Useful, but not practical. The Nomad MuVo line is just as small as the Shuffle, with all the above features.
Decent price for a GB audio player, cool form factor, evidently very portable... ^_^ However, I have serious doubts about the sound quality of the device. Obviously the internal amp isn't going to drive a big pair of cans like those available from AKG or Grado, but has anybody tried listening to it with a decent pair of in-ears, eg. Etymotics or some such? I'd be interested to read what you think...
DAH-1500 dimensions: 24mm h x 24mm w x 24mm d = 13,284mm^3
Joybee 102R approx dimensions: 41mm diameter x 8mm depth = 10,562mm^3
Of course the Joybee 102R lacks a screen and radio, and they haven't upgraded to larger capacities.. but it's clearly smaller.
Looks amazingly similar to a JNC product here http://www.jnc-digital.com/Eng/, check the SSF-8002/8005/8100 model out.
Built-in battery. Remember the fallout after Apple released their first gen iPods with built-in batteries? This is essentially a disposable device.
I like how their manual for it warns you that leaving it plugged in longer than its recomemded charging time may result it in it bursting into flames.
And with 1 gig and USB 1.1 i would worry about it bursting into flames before the damn song transfer finishes!
photos of shuffle and dah-1500
http://www.i4u.com/article3863.html
New MobiBlu DAH-1500 review on I4U
http://www.i4u.com/section-viewarticle-101.html
The square design seems a tad... inconvienient. How about the same idea and functionality in the form of one of those wafer-thin calculators. They have a power source and a display.
It looks like a great idea, just an odd form factor.
actually, I can... unless they are encoded at a high bitrate. What's nice about Vorbis is that it you can get get equal or better quality at a lower bitrate.
Free electronics!
Good news for all world's smallest MP3 player owners. We understand your trouble in operating the device. But troubled no more, as we have provided an external control for it. With it's 10cm x 10cm x 2cm dimension, we guarantee you will be able to distinguish between play and stop button.
Available now at ebay.
~So much for the smallest mp3 player
Why is it every time I read about some new techno gidgit that going to revolutionize our lives, I think about the Japanese? Once you run out of coolness in your toys, you get things like Karaoke.
Ogg Vorbis was never designed to work on small devices. Both AAC and WMA, on the other hand, is, and sounds at least as good (moreso the former) if not better at the same bitrate. So go ahead and keep your "it's OSS/Underdog/Nerdy so I have to have a completely impractical product requirement" attidue, the rest of us will get a life, and a decent digital audio player. Sorry for the rant, narrow minded geeks annoy the hell outta me.
You will be assimilated!
Because it is a Borg cube obviously. A tiny one, but it will grow bigger and bigger every time it assimiltes a new user and finally conquer the universe. Very evil plan, so beware!
My buddy bought one right when we got here for the summer. It's surprisingly easy to use, has phenomonal sound quality, an amazing 1-cable interface for power, data, and audio, and comes with a little rubber condom-type thing that only surrounds the edges and corners. The condom lets you drop it with no fear of damage and eliminates any discomfort it might cause in your pocket. Also, for the person who complained of pain in the leg, in Korea everyone wears mp3 players around their necks. It's sort of a techno-necklace. My buddy managed to bargain his 512mb one down to $210...so $130 in the states is shocking to me. Now I'm not so sure I'm going to blow a bunch of cash on one that plays 8 hours of video as well as mp3 in a package only marginally larger.
Looking at the volume of this compared with the iPod shuffle, I assume the headphones are slightly larger to compensate? .... ?
Darwin Hawking Blackmore
And help China make the necessary upgrades for its military. When are we going to see that Walmart is really a Chinese company? While all of you are dilly-dallying around the Middle East, The Chinese will march right into your back door. Just like the terrorists were able to strike while the great defender of our frontier(Customs) is harassing people for not using credit cards and not staying at fancy hotels while out of the country. You all are toast.
You're quite right. I can't hear the difference, and I really don't care. I'm not a sound engineer, but I am an engineer. I care about quality and good design, which Vorbis represents.
So go ahead and keep your "it's OSS/Underdog/Nerdy so I have to have a completely impractical product requirement" attidue, the rest of us will get a life, and a decent digital audio player.
Care to explain what's 'impractical' about the Ogg Vorbis requirement? Plenty of players can handle Vorbis; it's only crappy ones that can't. Apparently, it's not only practical, but it makes economic sense to include it.
Meanwhile, I've spent a comparatively small amount of money on a player with more features and capacity than I'd ever need.