What is the most storage for an MP3 player WITHOUT a hard drive?

Where the hell did I say ANYTHING about iPods?? I was just saying WMA is garbage. I'd switch to high-bitrate MP3 or (ye-gods, NOW I'm bringing up Apple) AAC. Most stuff can play AAC and MP3. Not everything plays WMA.

 

Explain to me why WMA is garbage vs MP3 or AAC, please. You got any metrics to back up that statement?

I already gave you a number of examples where WMA is supported, so obviously I don't agree with you on compatibility. MP3 is certainly more ubiquitous, but there's a trade-off on file size for comparable sound quality. As for AAC, it hasn't made much more inroads than WMA - it really depends on what devices you happen to own. And with older Sansa devices like the Clip/Clip+ (which has been suggested as a device to consider in this thread), AAC support is spotty at best or flat out not supported. But WMA plays back just fine.

Btw, the AAC format isn't owned by Apple. Common misconception.

I used to use MP3 but after a while I didn't want the file size trade-off for better compatibility, as the devices I cared about all support AAC. So I moved to AAC last year. So I'm not defending WMA because I use it - I'm just defending it because I don't agree with your reasoning.

 

Somewhat OT, but I wonder why folks buy these things? I have a micro sd chip in my phone. Why carry an extra gadget around? Heck my phone is better than most players, because I can, if the mood strikes me, put it on the counter and listen to it without an ear bud.

 

Sound quality. Just because it's portable doesn't mean I want to sacrifice that.

Plus, in my case, I have a Crackberry (work) so that stays separate from anything personal.

My main DAP is my Cowon D3. It has several flaws but SQ is not one of them. It's the best sounding portable device I've ever bought. I add a headphone amp + a pair of Yuin PK1's to complete the package.

 

This, however, is not a flash device. I've owned a few, loved them all, and if you can get one for $150 from e-bay, you should. I would also recommend the Zune HD-fabulous user interface, flash based, and excellent SQ.

 

Even solid state drives fail
Sound Devices, makers of pro portable recorders, have slight problems with both mechanical and non mechanical drives.

 

The Sansa players have a limit to the number of songs/files that the current Sansa software can access with it’s database (IIRC, around 8,000). 32GB + internal memory pushes that limit. I have an 8GB Clip+ w/ a 32GB card and the software wouldn’t read all the files, in particular, it ran out on playlists. I had to move to Rockbox and have not had that problem.

Not sure about Sansa + Rockbox and a 64GB card, but the price premium has likely kept folks from giving it a try.

 

I never thought my Zune 120 would die on me. I really thought I would be using this 10-20 years down the road.

 

I'm giving this serious thought. One thing though: I always use regular stereo headphones when listening to a device, NOT earbuds or the chintzy headphones. Will this drain the battery of this small unit too much?

 

Oh, there's a player with a great future ahead...

Actually, I would agree with the person criticizing WMA. To me, it has all the disadvantages of any proprietary format without any of the advantages of Apple (350,000,000 players). I do agree with your point that AAC is the best way to go -- provided you can live with the Apple ecosphere, which not everybody can.

 

Doh... don't say that! I just spend $7K on a new SD 788t!

Wonderful machine... so far. Its only limitation as a recorder: tops out at 48.048. (No 96kHz or 192kHz recording.) But I bought it mainly because it can do 10-track recording in a small space. Great preamps, very reliable. There are several other recorders at this price range that are less reliable, and none better, IMHO.

 

Thanks, good to know!

Just got a Clip Zip-WONDERFUL!! It was just $40! Up and running in literally minutes! Plugged into an iMac, dragged some files, out mowing the lawn.

Capacity: well, maybe limiting out at 32GB, BUT you can always carry more than one card and swap, eh?
Formats: I can play stuff that happens to be in WMA or FLAC, which is very convenient. (I also agree WMA is least desirable due to compatibility, but sometimes stuff is already in WMA due to ripped on a PC or whatever).

Baba, the screen IS small. But...why do you care? Are you watching videos? Not capable. Otherwise, you can see artist etc info just fine.

 

Well I used to own a Zune 30 (the "brick") - great sounding device. And I did own the ZuneHD for two weeks before returning it (after MS announced no App Store I knew they were killing it off right then and there). The Zune has no future, but it's one advantage right now is price. If you need a decent sounding DAP at a bargain price, its certainly something to consider.

As for WMA, although you are a little more clear in your reasons there's still nothing compelling there, to be honest. Assuming the OP is only using it as an "on-the-go" codec like how I use AAC, then WMA isn't necessarily a bad option - but again it depends on what the OP uses it for. Cowon and Sansa suppport WMA and there's no reason to believe that will end anytime soon. It was also very common on a lot of "ChiPads" and "ChiPods" (I have no idea why). WMA is of course proprietary, but then again so is AAC.

I actually used Vorbis for several years -- great codec as well, but that has far more compatability issues than WMA has. I finally gave up on it last year because it was too much of a pain to deal with once I left the Cowon / Sansa / Android ecosystem.

Here's actually a reason to use AAC over WMA -- Amazon Cloud Services. They support two codecs without any transcoding -- MP3 and AAC. No WMA support, no FLAC, no Vorbis.

 

Here is a very thorough review of the Clip+ comparing it to the iPod.

http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/02/sansa-clip-measured.html

The maximum output is 15 mW which is higher than average. As long as the headphones impedance is less than 64 ohms there should be no problem driving them to adequate levels. Some complain that there is short battery life. At max volume with FLAC files I got 6 hours. Others report 10 hours with MP3s. This is with Sansa software. Rockbox will increase this. For a player thats smaller than a matchbox its pretty good. I carry an auxiliary battery when I know I want longer usage. The FM radio comes in handy too. For the money its one of the best bargains in audio.

 

I honestly don't know how long the battery life is using them with a set of headphones for an extended period. Most of my use is in the car using the aux plug, or on walks or runs for 30 or 40 minutes at a time. When reading the Sansa forums I have not seen anyone complain about battery life.

 

I would disagree with you here. If he already has his music stored as WMA there is no reason to change it to anything else. The fact that Apple has sold a billion players doesn't have anything to do with someone who doesn't own one of them. No reason to use AAC if you don't own an iPod.

 

AAC is no more proprietary than MP3 is. Both codecs patents are owned by Fraunhofer Institute in Germany. FLAC, now that one is real open source. FYI.

 

I understand that AAC is not proprietary, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. By the same token, there is no reason to use it if you operate outside of the iPod universe. For my Sansa players I use MP3 at 320kbps. I can drag and drop, and on my Clip Zip and Fuze players the Artwork is displayed painlessly. For me (and I think for the OP), using AAC would just be throwing in an extra step for no reason. If you download a lot of music from iTunes that obviously changes things, but I don't do that.

 

There is a good reason to use AAC outside iPod/iTunes. It is better sounding at 320 Kbps than MP3 does, artifacts less. It is the best compressed file format, many aftermarket car players support it and some portables will play it.

 

The best? I wouldn't go that far (remember, I use AAC now as my lossy format so I'm not diagreeing with just to disagree with you).

MP3 is the most ubiquitous, but also requires a larger file size to match the file quality of a WMA/AAC/Vorbis file. The other three are pretty much the same, SQ wise. (prove me wrong, please - I've actually done my homework on those three at length). The only thing to ask yourself with WMA/AAC/Vorbis is which one fits best in your environment, as not all devices support all codecs. The PS3, for example, doesn't support AAC but it supports WMA. My mini-van's optical player doesn't support AAC but it supports WMA. But Amazon Cloud Services supports AAC and not WMA. And Vorbis support gets very spotty once you leave the Sansa/Cowon/Android world. Etc etc etc.

 

If you hear a difference in sound quality between the two, then I understand why you would prefer to use it. I do not hear any difference in my limited amount of testing, and I don't use either one for serious listening so that is not an issue for me.

 

Wait a minute here. Let's stay focused on the real problem. The problem is NOT with WMA - the problem is that iPod does not SUPPORT WMA. This, and many other problems lie with Apple. I will NEVER buy an iPod. Never!!

WMA 192 kpbs sounds much better than MP3 320.

 

:eyeroll:

 

I'm in agreement as a general philosophy. But again, Apple owns about 90% of the portable player market. That makes it very hard to ignore 300,000,000 elephants in the room.

I see no real advantages of WMA over anything; the only real factor is that the player and OS you have supports it. At least there's a dozen third-party software makers that will play AAC with no problem, like Winamp and Foobar2000, plus it'll work on Mac OS, virtually all flavors of Windows, and also Linux. To me, WMA has all of the disadvantages of AAC with none of the advantages.

Real-world, high-res MP3 probably makes better sense for most people, since that will play on 100% of the portable devices out there. My only reason for going with AAC was that, back in 2004 (when I started setting up my servers), I compared MP3 to AAC at a variety of bitrates, and decided that AAC always sounded better. But in truth, I think once you get at 256kbps or above, the differences are practically undetectable.

I'm still not sold on the Cloud, either Apple's or anybody else's. We're edging towards a time when Cloud storage will work, but we have to have a) cheap high-speed internet everywhere, b) no data caps, and c) vastly faster speeds than we have today. Give me wireless FiOS coverage in 100% of North America, and I'm there.

 

David Ranada did a very in-depth test of MP3 vs. WMA for Stereo Review back in the 1990s, and was adamant that WMA sounded worse -- audibly and via measurement tests. My own ears told me the same thing in 2004.

But me personally, I went with 320K AAC for my personal stuff, and 320K MP3 for anything I make for other people. I'm also extremely adamant that mono files make more sense for mono music (at 160kbps). Storage is cheap, players are vastly more capacious than they were 10 years ago, and larger file sizes are not an issue for me.

Perhaps in another thread we could hit some bullet points on what would be an ideal MP3 player for audiophile use. If we had readily-available 256K compact flash or SD card, I'd love to see a player built around that, with removable storage. There are many things I think are almost perfect about the iPod, but I do chafe at the non-replaceable battery and non-removable storage. Don't assume that I'm a big Apple fan; some of Apple's worst critics are Apple owners.