Portable music players: cheap is sometimes easy

BY DEBORAH GILJUM

First, we had the marching band—sounds good, but rather hard to carry. Then we had “boom boxes”—portable, but not very light-weight. Next came the personal tape player—nice. Then came the personal CD player—could life get any better?

Yes, it could (and undoubtedly, will again). The current incarnation of portable music is found in MP3 players (and the like, in the case of iPod). With an MP3 player, you can carry around hours of music, thousands of songs, all in one small device that fits easily in a pocket or purse. MP3 players can be almost as small as your thumb, with tiny headphones called ear “buds” that far outstrip the big, clunky headphones we used to wear.

Of course, with all electronics, there is a multitude of types, brands, and features to choose from. The main types are music only, music and radio, and music/video. Portable music players can range in price from a few dollars for a cheap knock-off to hundreds of dollars for the more expensive brands. If you don’t need much in the way of features, you might want to give serious thought to one of the cheap, generic players. It’s worth the low price to give a newcomer experience with portable music players and downloading, while you can always upgrade to something better later if you outgrow the cheaper player.

Brands range A to Z, from the most popular Apple iPod models to the slightly lesser-known Zune players. One thing to bear in mind when thinking of brands, is how proprietary their music is. For example, iPods usually go hand-in-hand with iTunes, the Apple downloading software used most often to put music on iPods. While an iPod can play MP3s, generally only an iPod can play an iTune file without conversion. Before you think that it’s best to get the iPod then, consider this: iTunes tend to charge far more per song than most MP3 downloading sites. Still, Apple iPods are the most popular portable music players, and range anywhere from 512MB to 160GB, depending on the unit. They can also cost significantly more than an MP3 player, often with no appreciable difference in the music quality.

There are many other brand names to consider. Archos carries a good line of MP3/video players, at reasonable prices. Creative Technology, whose Zen players are quite popular, also carries a good line of MP3/video players. The new iRiver players are much like iPods, except that they have the added feature of radio. Zune players come from Microsoft, something to consider, and they are growing in popularity as time goes by. Rio has several models, including sports versions that take rough handling better. Samsung has a model that includes satellite radio. SanDisk, which started out with models that were nearly identical to iPod, has lately branched out and is designing players in shapes that are truly unique. And it’s just impossible to think of music technology without including Sony, though its players are not as popular.

Of more importance to your portable music player selection, however, are the features you want. Do you only want to play MP3s, or do you want radio, too? Radio is harder to find in an MP3 player, but some players have the feature. Maybe you want video, too. Some models can not only play music, but also music videos and even full-length feature films. In fact, there are players that will not only play music, radio, music videos, and movies, but also will allow you to read PDFs, and display photos, among other features, like Archos’ fourth and fifth generation of multimedia devices.

As with most electronic devices these days, memory plays a key role. MP3 players can range from a few megabytes in size, to many gigabytes. The difference is how much they will hold. You can buy MP3 players that will only hold a very limited number of songs, such as any MP3 player with less than a gigabyte of memory – they generally hold anywhere from 30-120 songs. Then you get into gigabytes. Although results may vary from player to player, you get approximately 250 songs to a gigabyte. You’ll need to figure out how much music you’re going to want on your MP3 player. It is entirely possible, for example, for you to convert your entire CD collection to MP3s, and carry it in your pocket on your MP3 player. If you want to play video and movies on your player, get one of the higher gigabyte players – at least 30 gigabytes.

Another feature to take into consideration is durability. What will you be using your player for? Will you be jogging? Will you be in wet conditions? Most brands have special models intended for sports use, or all-weather conditions, but you may pay more for such a device, so consider exactly when you believe you’ll be listening to your player, and what you’ll be doing at the time. Hand in hand with durability goes size and appearance of the device. MP3 players range from extremely tiny (just slightly bigger than a postage-stamp) to nearly the size of your hand, but typically, an MP3 player is somewhere in between. The iPod has the most recognizable look (rectangular, white, with very simple screens, normally). Archos on the other hand, while featuring a variety of styles, generally tends to look more like a cool hand-held video player (and usually does play both MP3s and videos/movies), with a larger screen than many devices.

Creative Zen has a wide variety of styles as well, but like Archos’ selection, Zen’s tend to be a bit more stylish than the plain iPod models, and they have models with larger screens for video/movies as well. The iRiver models look like futuristic versions of iPods, and feature both color screens and FM radio, in addition to MP3 functionality. If you don’t like the squareness of many MP3 devices, you might want to check out the curvier Rio models, which include a sports version designed for jogging. Sony has a very large variety in models, with devices that look like flash drives and others that look like a cross between an MP3 player and a camera (they do not take pictures, however). Their Psyc model is completely round, and their more expensive video/MP3 VAIO units look like short remotes, frankly.

When looking over models, check out their display screens. Most MP3 players have monochrome displays, but the color used can vary, so check out how readable the screen is. Some MP3 players, however, and all MP3/video players, come with color screens. These can vary from quite small to three or four inches wide (particularly for those that play films). The displays can vary, though, regardless of the color. Some screens are text/menu-driven, while others are icon-driven. Apple (of course) has an iPod that touts a touch screen. Which device you choose will depend on which display you are most comfortable with. If you can’t read the screen, if you can’t use the system easily, it’s not worth the hassle.

Finally, don’t knock the knock-offs. Bells and whistles aren’t necessary for everybody. If you don’t plan on carrying around thousands of songs, a cheapie may be just the ticket. You don’t need to buy these at electronics stores; you can get them practically everywhere for $30 to $50, and for that price, they give you valuable experience in learning how to handle MP3 players in general. You can always move up to the big guys when your expertise, and comfort level, increases.

You can e-mail Deborah Giljum at crtl_alt_divas@hotmail.com.