Hey thanks for reading,

I used to own a 20gb Archos hdd player like 7 years ago (left it in my car on a cold day and the hd died)... anyway i never needed a MP3 player (i have a computer) until now.

I have no use for video and most are too bulky and if they arent its like a 2" screen so its pretty worthless.. (for me anyway)

One thing i really liked about archos is i had direct file system access i can just drag and drop or sync via windows/3rd party app. Plus it makes for a great backup of my music collection which is rather bulky i think its over 60gb now but windows media player likes to download cover art so who knows exactly...

I've been looking at Creative Zen Vision: M 60gb tho its a littler smaller then i want, and the iPod 5.5 (80 GB)

I must say from the cons of both i don't like either, the zen sounds good at first but no gapless playback, u have to used M$'s MTP (totally lame) and i don't think it supports VBR which is a total loss for me, most of my mp3s are vbr.

I saw someone mention rockbox and i must say im pretty impressed with it, but i can't seem to find a decent mp3 player in the 80gb range i could prolly ruff a 60gb if i had to, or if i could replace the hdd with a bigger one that would be awsome.

Was hoping on this technical forum other people ran into the same issues, i must say i've never liked mac, but that doesn't mean i hate ipod's, i hate itunes. I would like to setup folder sync in windows and be able to just connect the usb cable and let it sync, keeping a backup of my music and keeping my player with my recent tunes, without the hassle..

I've only looked at the ipod80gb and creative zen, feel free to make other suggestions... im lost

Thanks for reading

I'm pretty much an iPod/Rockbox guy, so my main suggestion is to keep an eye on this thread: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=7738.0

You also may want to look into other programs that handle iPod transfer without iTunes (ephpod, anapod, etc.)

I recommend that you get a Gigabeat or an iAudio and install Rockbox. You're going to have trouble finding an 80GB non-iPod player, though.

Rockboxable Gigabeats are getting kind of hard to find, but there are a few F60s still available on eBay. [e.g., here]

Alternately, get the 60gb X5:
http://www.amazon.com/iAudio-X5-Multimedia...k/dp/B000BKPK90

You can't go wrong with Rockbox, IMHO.

If you want a really good audio player, the X5 is a very good choice IMHO. If you are interested also in video playback (you can connect most PMPs to a TV, so it works like a VCR) the iAudio A2/A3 are the best players. The A3 should be released within a month (only 30 GB) and during the summer a 60GB version should be available too.

Sorry for jumping in, but what's the big difference between the Gigabeat X & F series?

They are both supported by Rockbox and look very physically similar. I'm having problems finding info on them from the Toshiba sites though. They only have info on the new S series players. The Australian Toshiba site has something on the X series though Toshiba X Series
JXL

wow everyone has been very helpfull, a lot more then i expected, still not sure what to do but you guys gave me a lot to sort through, ill keep researching and post back later on when i figured out what im gonna buy...

Thanks again all

i picked up a h320 from ebay for $110 and rockboxed it.

couldn't be happier


later

iPod Video 80 GByte is the one for you (you don't have to put video in it. Just use it for sound.) You are going to love it! I have a 30 G.

Pretty much since 1999 every portable on earth has supported VBR.

X series has a slightly larger LCD (2.4" instead of 2.2", IIRC), at the expense of some battery life. Otherwise they're identical, I think.

AFAIK, it is not yet possible to "rockbox" the 80 Gig iPod-Video. With the 30 Gig it works fine though,
i would definitley recommend it, great improvement in audio playback caps, for the price of the
loss of the video...

I have no experience with the 80GB iPod, but Rockbox works fine on the 60GB version (5G).

i've heard of people swapping out the hard drives on the h100 and h300 series with larger units, too.

http://www.misticriver.net/showpost.php?p=...mp;postcount=55


later

Works fine on my 60GB 5G. I really had no interest in iPods until finally someone gave me one as a gift. Now all my other players are collecting dust.

hey i wrote back like i said i would

I honestly got stuck on what to buy, i narrowed it down to

TOSHIBA Piano Black 60GB 1.8" hard drive USB 2.0 Portable Media Player: Model MES60VK
JetAudio iAudio X5 Black 60GB USB 2.0 Portable MPEG4 Player Model X5-60BL
Apple new iPod video Black 80GB Model MA450LL/A
Creative Zen Vision: M Black & White 60GB USB Multimedia Player, Voice Recorder with FM Radio Model 70PF204000000

I still haven't ordered anything, but i think after reading a lot of reviews on all of them that I am gonna get a Zen 60gb, my mp3 collection is over 60gb but i really don't need it on me at all times and theres a lot of junk that i just don't listen too aswell... The rest of them looked good but price/benefits were the two major factors for me iPod 80gb was way more expensive came with no fm tuner or recorder with a hair more disk space...

Hopefully rockbox will support zen in the future, that would make it much better if you could use it as a mass storage device, there was a really good review on the pcmag site with this video http://zdpub.vo.llnwd.net/o2/pcmag/Creative.Zen-Vision.html its on the 30gb, but they are pretty identical.. i especially like the sound quality and volume plus's of it...

play it loud, play it clear

thanks for the help/links it was a killer choice to make
-baw

Rockbox if ever will take a long time to be ported to the Zen.

Creative has that thing locked tight.

I think you would do better with a iPod. Even without Rockbox apple now supports Gapless playback.

You can do video. And you get decent battery life on the standard iPod.

Then there's Warrantee and customer service.

FM tuner is ok but you can get one of those inline tuners for like $20 and put it between your earphones and your player.

There are many 3rd party apps that you can use with your iPod rather than iTunes.

Last but not least there is Rockbox. Even if you get the 80Gig Rockbox will be available for it soon, its not that different from the other iPods.

I only owned flash players until Rockbox was ported to iPod then I bought a used (New) but still in box barely a smuge 30Gig Black iPod for $230 in Feb 06. and it has been fantastic

The Zens really aren't locked that tight. The retail firmware isn't even encrypted. Its just that no one with any real hacking skill has stepped forward to work on it, so nothing has been done.

(If anyone with embedded programming experience is interested, feel free to PM me and I can fill you in on whats been done and what needs to be done).

AFAIK the Zen doesn't support mass storage. I would never buy such player. I think I would go with the X5, here is a good review.

hurray i got my ipod 5.5 80gb (black) today, so heres my mini review

I will note that this was a hard choice to make specifically cuz if u are busy u might not have the time to select or dj yourself tunes and may want to just flip the radio on, lots of people also make use of the mic/recorder on other mp3 players. They do have radio adapters for ipod so i could always get one if i really wanted.

The iPod itself was WAY smaller then i ever imagined it, i figured it would be more bulkier, when they said 2" i didn't take it so literally but it is very small (which rocks). I use winamp a lot and it found my iPod right away and i could just toss music to it from winamp which is awsome, i will note that the xfer is extremely slow even on USB2 (i have lots and lots of music) i suggest putting all the stuff u got on there that way u dont have to add and remove cuz it does take awhile.

A big point for me was the AC adapter not included, a lot of people told me you can't charge it without the AC adapter, but you can charge it via USB (i havn't tryed to yet but it says boldly that you can).

The audio quality wasn't as good as i expected (i paid $350 for a mp3 player i wanted it to sound like my SB Audigy on my pc) but it does have tons of preset EQ's that you can choose from that make the sound much much better, the headphones they give you are not to shabby i didn't like them at first because i have some big earmuph headphones and they sound amazing, but for the size of the earbuds they give you they kick butt and play very very loud, iPod pushs some loud sound out too defantly can hurt your ears if you wanted.

Some other info for potential buyers, the touch pad on this thing is insane i could look at it and it might change tracks haha its SOOOO sensitive, but as others have said you do get used to it, and i guess it is pretty convient to just touch your finger down and have total nav control. The lock button on the top takes care of accidental tapping.

a lot of people have told me these break, scratch, and get fingerprints easily. As i just got mine i can only say that it does get finger prints easy, but its an ipod were not showcasing it lol its pitch black so unless u look clear u dont notice it. The black is very very sleak.

I wasn't a big iPod fan, and i can't say that i am, but MP3 player wise its defantly rockin, but it is very very expensive and thing to note to users that aren't to computer savy on HD sizes 80gb turns out to be 74gb when u plug it in. I still haven't gotten my album covers to display i assume it only accepts id3 covers i have mine as .jpg covers atm.

Ill try to writeback if anyone has questions but thats my mini overview if anyone cares

thanks for all the help everyone

Who told you this? All iPod models can charge just fine via USB2.0 or the AC adapter. Most people prefer that their iPods charge through the AC adapter simply because they don't want their hard drives to spin up. Still, no big deal.



You will come to find that those EQ's mainly distort sound quality instead of helping it.



This is true but that is what a good case is for, just like the iSkin eVo3.



Blame it on the computer hardware manufacturers in that they use the standard of 1000MB = 1GB when 1024MB = 1GB in binary. As for the album art, you can add them into the ID3 file of your mp3's and they should be fine.

i use nano 2g 8G
and i fill with winamp+ml_ipod , works better then itunes!



by the way could i mount a rockbox on nano 2g?

No. Not yet. The firmware of nano 2g is encrypted

yeah i ended up using winamp to xfer mine instead of iTunes. After installing iTunes it seems the only good thing its used for is to update ipod firmware. Took me around 12 hours to sync 72gb of mp3s via winamp. I have CoverART for them all but it didn't show up cuz its not via the ID3 tag but who cares would just bloat size's more.

/edit/

after winamp finished transfering my 72gb of music over it crashed after it finished the last song. the iPod said it had no music at all on it and when i pluged it in my pc it said 72gb/74gb free.... yeah this is much better then copy and paste in windows, silly apple

Just a last word on whats happening in the DAP hacking world.

Rockbox has been ported to the 80GB iPod.