Anyone know of any decent 256 meg mp3 players w/ FM and USB 2.0 would be nice…?
I see all these chinese brands at the store, but can’t find any reviews on them, only on premium brands like IPOD, iRIVER, Samsung Yepp etc.
I have my eye on this player, but not sure…if any good:
shopping.pchome.com.tw/256mp3/de … d=QAC00117
That seems a good price for 256MB.
I got my little super-slim (smaller than a matchbox) ‘Armani’ at 3C (and I’ve seen it elsewhere. I’m very happy with it. It has English OSD. It’s small and light. 256MB. FM. Decent enough voice recorder. I haven’t had any experience with other models to compare it with though. So if you see this ‘Armani’ you could consider that too.
Brian
Avoid “Music Bank” ones. I bought a 128M Music Bank MP3/FM/DVR back in about March, and it completely died a couple of weeks ago. I mean totally. Won’t turn on, can’t upload or download files to it by computer any more, nothing.
Also avoid MPMan players - lousy build quality. I’m very happy with my new iRiver.
I bought a Ergotech 245mb the other day. It cost me $2800 or so from T-Zone. Seems OK so far, except file transfers seem a little buggy… It seems that I can transfer files to the player no problems. But when I try to copy them back to hard disk, it doesnt like it. I’m thinking they’ve done something to block this on purpose, as ZIP files are fine, just MP3 files dont like to copy… :raspberry:
I bought Acer 256MB, radio, voice recorder, A-B and a few other features for NT$3500 (at Zhongxiao Xinsheng). If the design is not a priority for you I
I’ve not owned an MP3 player before and I’m thinking of getting one. Roughly how many songs can you fit on a 256MB player?
Brian, your armani player sounds great. Suitable for a beginner like me? And how much would it set me back? How about battery life?
Well…my songs are about 4 megs on average, so 256/4= 64 songs, but you may have different experience depending on encoding and such.
I have seem some good looking players on www.pchome.com.tw but cannot figure which one is worth the dough… I am trying to get a 512mb one now (128 songs 
) but the ones supporting usb 2.0 seem to cost a fortune, but at that level, I can also use it as an alternative storage device
An average would be 1 minute equal to 1 MB in case of MP3. Microsoft WMA has a little better compression, but some people say it has a worse quality, but if you are not an audiophile should be all right.
Most of players support WMA.
[quote]I’ve not owned an MP3 player before and I’m thinking of getting one. Roughly how many songs can you fit on a 256MB player?
Brian, your armani player sounds great. Suitable for a beginner like me? And how much would it set me back? How about battery life?
[/quote]
My CDs seem to be about 50 Meg each with the standard compression I chose when I ripped them. So I get about 5CDs worth of songs at a time. Yes, my ‘Armani’ (it says IBM MP3 on the box) MP3 is easy to use for a beginner. I like it. I can’t remember how much it cost. Maybe 4000NT. It was competitive considering that it was about the smallest of the lot. The battery lasts about 4 hours. It is internal (you charge it - not disposable AAs), so not suitable for going camping/travelling, but great for at the gym, or bike rides etc.
Brian
Thanks for the info Brian.
What’s all this about HP having an iPod clone? It doesn’t make sense to me. Why buy an ipod made by HP when you could just get the original ipod for the same price?
By the way, is there any reason I shouldn’t get an ipod? Everyone raves about them but there must be some downsides.
[quote=“Spack”]Thanks for the info Brian.
What’s all this about HP having an iPod clone? It doesn’t make sense to me. Why buy an ipod made by HP when you could just get the original ipod for the same price?
By the way, is there any reason I shouldn’t get an ipod? Everyone raves about them but there must be some downsides.[/quote]
Several reasons. Here are two:
Larger revenues off 3rd party licensing, and thus larger revenues and market share, not only in the device area, but also in the all-important online music battlefield. Microsoft recently went back on its word and said it WILL now introduce its own music service.
Branding. People who trust the “HP” brand will now get a chance to buy the “iPod” from them. I haven’t seen the device. Is it a different color? Does it look “HP”? If so, this is called “product differentiation” in order to capture more of the market.
Just think of why the Toyota Landcrusier was rebranded also under the Lexus name. Same car. OK, maybe the put in leather seats and some other 3rd party goodies, but still basically the same car. They wanted to sell more cars by selling to different market segments that wouldn’t necessarily be caught dead driving a “Toyota” around.
I got the Acer 256MB too. According to the box battery life is 16 hours and it does seem to be about that. (An internal battery charges while the drive is plugged into USB port.) Voice recorder, FM radio. I’m happy with mine so far (1 month).
[quote=“Spack”]
By the way, is there any reason I shouldn’t get an ipod? Everyone raves about them but there must be some downsides.[/quote]
This has been posted before on this board but here you go:
http://www.ipodsdirtysecret.com/
Since then they have introduced a service for replacing the battery, I think it’s $100.
Edit: Haha… or you can make your own battery pack like this guy.
What is a MP4???
pchome seems to have a sale on the Solomon mp3 player, its 256 megs and only $1500NT, its a limited 3 day sale though.
I am gonna try buying it, will post later how good the quality really is.
shopping.pchome.com.tw/256mp3/de … d=QAC00064
For $60 cdn, I can’t see how i can go wrong, 
I believe maybe mpeg4 is avi and mp3 standard, not sure, about this MP4 though…is it a audio codec compression standard, product, company name, file type? plz be more specific in your question, thanx!
Anyone like this?
Rio Carbon
5GB will give you enough space for all those renditions of Stairway to Heaven.
Is it true that all of these players can act as memory too? Such as I can download and store photographs there too for later download elsewhere?
US$249=NT$8,439
Oh, I discovered yesterday, that my MP3 player is not an ‘Armani’, but a ‘Piere Cardin’. 
There you go. :s
Wolf, yes, you can use most MP3 players (mine anyway) to carry files, documents, photos etc around, and upload through the USB port. Most also have FM radio, and voice recorder functions.
Brian
I finally took the plunge and bought an mp3/wma/fm player, it was about $2900NT at the Gongua Computer Market and comes with 256MB of storage.
Shop around, some of the stores there were selling it for $3600 and others for anywhere in between 2900-3600.
This player is a bit more pricey than the others, but its extremely light and thin, albeit a bit long. Its also more pricey because the battery is internal and rechareable, charges off the USB port (USB port built into the mp3 player so no cable required). I highly recommend getting a player with built in USB so you can use it as a portable USB storage device should you ever need to take something last minute from the office back home.
After 12 hours of use, my only gripe is the menu keeps changing back from english to chinese and player seems to scratch easily, may get a case for it.
This is a no-name player, but there are similar players by U-Best thats a little shorter and thicker as well. I chose this one because the earphone jack is at the top of the player and its so thin it easily fits in a shirt or pant pocket without any visible bulges.
I will take some pics and attempt to post links here…
Nvrmnd, I found an ebay auction of my player, so can just go there for pics
cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi … 00030&rd=1
These sound awesome (from today’s Taipei Times):
How can they be that cheap?
Brian
[quote=“Bu Lai En”]These sound awesome (from today’s Taipei Times):
How can they be that cheap?
Brian[/quote]
I think it’s natural that they’ll gradually come down in price as the competition heats up and the market expands. That happens with most electronic goodies, though there is obviously a “bottom” where it just can’t get any cheaper.
But as for this Hsuan Mao Enterprise Co being hyped by the Taipei Times - realize that here in Taiwan, “news” is often “pay for play”. If you read in the Typo Times that Fly-By-Night Technologies, LTD, is now offering a perpetual motion machine for NT$1500, some healthy skepticism is in order.
regards,
Robert