Which mp3 player?

using the effing search gave me no exisiting threads ,however, please feel free to merge this with any other threads related to consumer goods queries

I am after an mp3 player as hate using my phone, the UI is gash (Desire) as it doesn't allow you to go back to the previous view...oh loads of annoyances and my phone headphone socket is becoming wobbly and cutting out, which is pretty shit on a year old handset. And I prefer having something that just does what it does so I don't have to worry about treating it ok - I just want an 8Gb player - have had Creative before and like drag and drop, so rather not Apple

So there you go....any reccos?

no didn't think so

sansa clip+

iphone :)

sansa clip+

+1. You can pick them up for pennies and they work well, but cheap enough not to be too precious.

why not an ipod? I'm yet to see anything that's even remotely close when it comes to size and interface, allright price too

i bought the latest nano a while ago and I'm still amazed that such a small thing can do so much

'cos you can't mount it as a drive and just drag stuff onto it. I don't like iTunes

Right, I'm in the market as I lost my Cowon J3 and my dad has offered to buy me something given I can't afford one.

I'm looking for:
1) Supports FLAC files and has silly high quality audio processor
2) Insane battery life, at least 40+ hours music playback for FLAC files
3) Relatively small size, with nice aesthetics
4) Mass storage support as I use Linux and MTP devices won't work
5) 32GB basic, ideally with micro SD slot expandability

In the past, this has always meant "buy a Cowon", but it seems that they've gone all video player and the things are much larger now.

FLAC means no Apple. The Cowon Android ones have crap battery life. The non-Android Cowon are too large. The Sansa are too small, too poor battery, lack decent aesthetics.

Any other suggestions?

have a look at colorfly, either c3 or c4

Right, I'm in the market as I lost my Cowon J3 and my dad has offered to buy me something given I can't afford one.

I'm looking for:
1) Supports FLAC files and has silly high quality audio processor
2) Insane battery life, at least 40+ hours music playback for FLAC files
3) Relatively small size, with nice aesthetics
4) Mass storage support as I use Linux and MTP devices won't work
5) 32GB basic, ideally with micro SD slot expandability

In the past, this has always meant "buy a Cowon", but it seems that they've gone all video player and the things are much larger now.

FLAC means no Apple. The Cowon Android ones have crap battery life. The non-Android Cowon are too large. The Sansa are too small, too poor battery, lack decent aesthetics.

Any other suggestions?

WTF! Why do you want FLAC on a portable device? Unless you want to carry a 1TB hard drive around...

I'd recommend a 8GB Sansa Clip+ when they go cheap and a 32GB SDHC card. Convert your FLAC files to Ogg Vorbis for the portable media and be a happy bunny.

You can Rockbox it too but I didn't like the interface so went back to the original firmware.

WTF! Why do you want FLAC on a portable device? Unless you want to carry a 1TB hard drive around...

My entire music collection is FLAC. All of it. 6,238 albums with 83,655 songs by 1,488 artists. All FLAC.

Why would I want to transcode a compressed lossless format into a more lossy one? I've no desire to take my whole music collection with me, this hasn't been possible (for me) for more than a decade (even the HDD iPods couldn't have done it - only the iRiver H340 could've done it at the time, as it was possible to replace the drive with a larger one).

My listening isn't 'while on the tube', it tends to be connected to mid-range speakers and a stereo, and then occasionally in the car (long journeys) or relaxing in the evening without disturbing my girl. 2 out of 3 use-cases benefit from a good file format, and a good player.

The aesthetic thing is about scenario 1. When playing it at someone's house then it should be pretty enough and the software intuitive enough that someone else enjoys finding something new to listen to.

So yeah, FLAC. Player has to support it.

I've got a Sansa Clip+, it's adequate for use down the gym and on the tube, and other people's definition of everyday use. But for me it fails on storage, aesthetics (of the player itself and the software) and battery life. Audio quality isn't superlative either, it's 'good enough'.

What I had was a Cowon J3:
http://www.cowonglobal.com/product_wide/COWONJ3/product_page_4.php

http://www.cowonglobal.com/product_wide/COWONJ3/images/design_9.jpg

Served me wonderfully, but it's 3 years old and suddenly very hard to find... hence me wondering, is there something newer kinda like that.

Looked at the Colorflys. The big one is too pricey and far too large, and the small one has a really horrible interface.

from all the reasearch i've done the cowons seem to be the most highly recommended

i looked at 2 in particular the J3 or X7 j3 slimmer smaller less capacity x7 bigger chunkier more capacity ... i believe they have the same gubbins inside except for hard drive / storage capacity

both were very highly rated for sound quality which is all i'm really looking for in a MP3 player navigation around the gui isn't so important

Velocio, all my music is FLAC too. It sits at home on my server so I can tap into it from anywhere that has a computer with a decent internet connection.

I guess I'm just happy with the Sansa as a device to use 'out and about' and Ogg Vorbis is a good enough format for me.

I guess that storage is getting cheap enough and big enough to use lossless on portable stuff nowadays.

Sans a clip+ with a micro sd. Jobs a good 'un.

Having torn the house apart I haven't found my Cowon J3.

What I have found though, is my Cowon D2.

A 16GB player that supports FLAC, can take SD cards up to 128GB and has a DAB tuner built-in.

Awesome stuff.

Off to see if I can talk my dad into buying me a 128GB SD card instead of an MP3 player now.

are you using a portable dac/headphone amp too?

The Cowon players are famed for their DAC chip and that they are able to drive some of the larger headphones out there. So for general use a portable headphone amp truly is not required.

That said, I own a Fiio E7 amp/DAC that I used in the office to ensure the Mac would deliver good sound and to up the power for the poor input on the car stereo.

So, I have one... but on Cowon players I've never needed one.

DACs aren't really worth worrying about and headphone amps are only needed for really high impedance cans.
IPods and from what I gather cowons have a healthy amount of output power to drive most. My sansa clip is noticeably quieter that my iPod touch with the senn HD25s but it still doesn't require an amp.

Seriously though, forget DACs - they've been good enough in nearly all devices for long enough that any perceived differences are quite subjective. Having said that, some devices have audible noise caused by other parts of the circuitry.

So my dad agreed to order a SD card for me yesterday, and it arrived today.

Just put some music on it and it works.

My really old MP3 player just went from 16GB to 144GB.

That's insane.

Boom! [all about Steve Jobs.com] - YouTube

Yeah, it's a bit boom!

A MP3 player from 2005 that can play 24bit FLACs and has a DAB radio.

Yet it can be upgraded using a 128GB SDXC card that was only released September 2012.

That's pretty freaking impressive.

And it still gets over 55 hours of battery life whilst playing FLACs.

I'm pretty chuffed.

Radio is the only thing i miss from my old ipod, perfect for travel. no boom.

Velocio, that's amazing. iPods are a fucking joke when it comes to storage...
Is it a cowon?

Yeah, a Cowon D2 from 2005.

It's not even the D2+ that came out in 2009.

And it is possible to get a 256GB SDXC card, but the price per gigabyte for that is kinda insane.

At 128GB you're paying about 86p per 1GB (£110).
At 256GB you're paying about £2.60 per 1GB (£670).

Oh, and my headphones are 42 ohms, and the Cowon D2 has no problem driving them.