iPods and generic MP3 players

[Steve Maskery]

BTW
My wife's is an iPod VIdeo. She has transferred some of her DVDs and Vids to MP4s, but when she syncs her machine, it wipes all the vids off as it loads her music on. She then has to load the vids back on manually. It's a pain. I've not really looked into it for her, but it doesn't seem to me that she is doing anything wrong. I think it's just that her vid material is not in the same directory as her music. Anyone else had this sort of thing? I'm sure it can't be right.

 

[Oryxdesign]

Not experienced that.

 

[TrimTheKing]

Mark
what do you mean by "jailbreaked"?

I've been looking at some of the offerings on the advancedMP3players.com site. Quite like the look of the iRiver L. I don't suppose anyone actually has one, do they?

S

Hi Steve

It is basically loading on a 'cracked' version of the code onto the iPod. Various cracks do various things such as allow you to use 'homebrew' (3rd party) apps, and free up certain 'hidden' funtionality on the iPods and iPhone's.

If you google (or YouTube) iPod Jailbreak it shows you what you can, and need to do. This is really for the iPod Touch, but there are similar code cracks for other iterations of the Pod.

I don't want to come across that I am trying to persuade you to get one. All I know is, I like the way it looks and works and it serves the purposes for which I use it (music and video for the 5 hours a day I spend on the train).

Cheers

Mark

 

[tnimble]

With my previous MP3 players I used a modified firmware project. It's an open source project with good intentions. I now see that they are covering iPods. Those that can't stand iTunes might want to take a look.

http://www.rockbox.org

I do admit that I 'jailbreak'ed my touch the day I got it, and this has freed up a lot of the file playing issues you mention,

There should not exist any reason that must be done. And doing so is illegal, or at least Apple and other would very much like that to be highly.

but I have to disagree with that iTunes is a bloated and ill behaved app. I have never once experienced any of the issues you mention, but then again I have built my own PC's for the last 10 years and I know what I'm doing, so maybe that's why....

For the iPod purely the device, for the package of iTunes iPod combo Apple, for iTunes and most of Apple's semi 'cross platform' software also Apple. Apple deliberately write their software in a closed and inconformity way (adobe does exactly the same. Both companies have been sued multiple times, but all cases get bought off so far) For instance enable high contrast colours or large fonts in Windows. All Appla and Adobe software refuse to use these settings. When writing software under Windows a programmer must display texts, buttons, menu's and pictues following some rules. Appla and adobe refuse to do this rending for instance speach or braile in operable or unusable. Its not because its impossible to comply with these rules they put huge effoort into avoiding complience.

To take another thing when going to the iStore website (which may be just a link, a referrer or an picture of an album on any site or blog of which the author choose iTunes as their source), Apple has put up a piece of script which launches the iTunes software and either forces the back button of the browser or closes the browser (which depends on the type and version of browser and OS). What if I did not want to have iTunes launched and loose where I was surfing?

Not bloated? Only the compressed files alone are 64MB. When started is slurps up about 98Mb of RAM of which about 10MB is permanently in use by iTunes even when iTunes is not open. PLaying a file using iTunes consumes about 19% more system resources than with WMPC, VLC or most other players.

Or for instance a while bck Apple released a new version of iTunes. After downloading the installer people with Windows 2000 could not install it. The installer refuses to install. But the installer does leave some msi files in the temp directory. Just running the loose msi files installed this new version of iTunes without any problem. A few days later the same version of iTunes after downloading it did not leave any msi files behind. But with this version while the 'iTunes can't be installed' was displayed the same msi files where still present in the temp directory and installed just fine. But again a while later theseseperate msi files all refuse to install. Apple clearly does not want any users with Windows 2000 to use this version of iTunes, whilst this version of iTunes runs without any problems on windows 2000. This is thick! Like this there are things like iTunes disallowing the useage of the iPod and or iPhone on certain software combinations, refuse some hardware to be 'detected' etc.

 

[misterfish]

I was given a Creative Zen for a birthday present and I'm really impressed with it. It plays MP3s without a problem and also video files and image files. I connect it to my PC and can transfer files to and from it without any problems. Also, apart from its built in memory (8GB in my case though you can get larger) it also has an SD card slot (I also have an 8GB HC SD card that I can also use in my camera). Also has an FM radio that uses the headphone cable as an aerial.

Even more important is the quality of sound and screen image. I would have no reservations about recommending this neat bit of kit.

http://uk.europe.creative.com/products/ ... duct=16999

Misterfish

 

[gidon]

Steve
Amazon have a sale on MP3 stuff:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/feature.html ... 1000216023
Cheers
Gidon

 

[newt]

Just a small point, I assume mp3 is a format, what does the mp stand for surely not music player. If so are we saying music player 3 player.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Taken from a gentleman called Alatea:

MP3 stands for MPEG Audio Layer III and it is a standard for audio compression that makes any music file smaller with little or no loss of sound quality. MP3 is part of MPEG, an acronym for Motion Pictures Expert Group, a family of standards for displaying video and audio using lossy compression. Standards set by the Industry Standards Organization or ISO, beginning in 1992 with the MPEG-1 standard. MPEG-1 is a video compression standard with low bandwidth. The high bandwidth audio and video compression standard of MPEG-2 followed and was good enough to use with DVD technology. MPEG Layer III or MP3 involves only audio compression.

Cheers
Steve

 

[tnimble]

MP3 stands for MPEG Audio Layer III and it is a standard for audio compression...

Not enterely, it's one of the legacies of the daft PC file naming schema where files must have a name between 1 and 7 characters followed by a 1 to 3 character extension. Where this upto 3 character extension to the file name denoted which program to open the file with. (other OSes predating the daft PC operating system where not so limiting and had and have no means for any file name extensions at all)

Layer III is an audio compression algorithm part of the MPEG-1 format. There are other autio codecs defined within the MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-3, MPEG-4 with different features, compressions ratio's and targetter platform (narrow band streaming, network broadcasting, HDTV). An music song file should have a name ending in mpeg or mpega if you want the format to be human recognizable. (computers reorganize files by their location and their header (unless your called Gates))

 

[Vormulac]

Mark
what do you mean by "jailbreaked"?

I've been looking at some of the offerings on the advancedMP3players.com site. Quite like the look of the iRiver L. I don't suppose anyone actually has one, do they?

S

Steve,

I don't know about the iRiver L, but I have an iRiver HP-140, they don't make them any more as far as I'm aware, but it's a staggering piece of kit. It's a really well built thing and for sound quality and functionality it outperforms every other hdd-based mp3 player I've experienced to date, even though it's now at least 4 years old! If iRiver's other products are half as good as the HP-140 then they are worth every penny.

 

[wizer]

I have an iRiver HP-140,

Thats the one I had. Fantastic bit of kit, wish i still had it

 

[Steve Maskery]

Well thank you all for your input.

I've just bought the iRiver Lplayer and an FM transmitter. I've no idea whether or not it comes with any earphones, but I guess that will be another avenue to explore. I've never liked any in-ear ones I've tried (not that that is many - I just don't like the idea or feel of things poked in my ear, and I was always told never to put anything in my ear smaller than my elbow...) but I do have some cheap clip-on ones which are comfortable. I've no idea how the sound quality compares, though.

Anyway, I've just got to curb my impatience - I want it NOW!

Cheers
Steve

 

[TrimTheKing]

I've no idea whether or not it comes with any earphones, but I guess that will be another avenue to explore. I've never liked any in-ear ones I've tried

Ahhhh, B&O a8's, try these babies. Ear buds, with a wrap around bit for those of us who have 'roomy' ear cavities that normal buds won't stay in. They sound awesome too for buds.

Mark

 

[Raggy]

These are what I use, they are well comfy.

 

[Vormulac]

Nice one Steve - should be a great piece of kit!
The earphones that came with my iRiver were pretty good, but as I commute on the tube I needed something to keep the noise out. I used those Sony in ear ones like Raggy, but although soudning pretty good I found they were extremely uncomfortable after a while, made my ears really hot and sweaty (nice). The best solution I found was buying a pair of Sennheiser noise cancelling headphones (PXC-250 I *think*) - they sound amazing and cut out the background noise.

 

[wizer]

I use the Sony ones too and find them very comfortable.

 

[Vormulac]

Maybe I just have especially hot and sweaty ears? :lol:

 

[wizer]

Maybe. I have very small ear holes, I found the larger inserts uncomfortable, but the small ones fit a treat.

 

[Steve Maskery]

oooh, I LIKE!

 

[wizer]

No need to SHOUT Steve