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Good mp3 player?

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My cheapo £35 4GB mp3 player off ebay is starting to fall to bits after only 5 or 6 months of use (why is it always the headphone socket that gets damaged the easiest :banghead:). I do plan on fixing it, but I just wanna get a decent one with better sound quality etc:

Can you guys recommend me a good mp3 player with the following:

  • Good sound quality
  • Video playback not a must, because it will just drain the battery
  • High capacity (4GB minimum)
  • A good brand
  • Good build quality
  • NOT an ipod :p
  • No more than £150

Cheers for the help guys! :)
 
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I was thinking maybe a zune, but I think they have an integrated battery, which means when you're out and about and you run out of battery you're buggered.

Any1 own a Zune, does the battery last long?
 

Snake05

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My brother has a Zune and the battery lasts upwards of 22 hours or so. But I love my iPod touch, although wifi drains battery life like nothing else!
 
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Zune most likely. The ipod classic is the best thing since sliced bread though. I don't know your UK prices, but $300USD for 80gb of music (or videos if you please), good playback, and a very long battery life. Not to mention ways of beating the drm w/ the ipod are quite easy (easier than the zune, which is really crap if you ask me). Sorry I know you say you don't want the ipod, but it is the best, I could recommend others, but they aren't as good.
 
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I'm considering an 80Gb zune :p, been reading about them and they have some nice specs, also been looking at creative zens, but they're a bit more expensive for less capacity.
 

Snake05

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I'd say go for the 80Gb Zune. It is the same that my brother has. Has huge capacity, and large screen, easy to use interface, and the battery life is excellent. If I were looking for a large capacity mp3 player, I'd stick with Zune or iPod (Zune for the better price).
 
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Thanks for the input guys, it's a hard decision but I think the Zune wins as it has more features and is slightly cheaper. And it's got a bigger screen. Quite hard to find here in the UK though
 
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Thats odd, I would think any microsoft product could be found anywhere.:laugh:
The zune does have some things going for it, namely the price and the fact that it can do wmas and such (I'm pretty sure anyway), which has better sound quality than mp3 (takes up more space also). It also lets you download unlimited music for $15 bucks a month, which is pretty nice.

The big problem I have w/ the zune, is that all that music you get you are basically renting it. Once you stop paying for the subscription, you can no longer listen to the music. You also can't move the music around nearly as easy as w/ ipods sharepod. There might be ways around their drm management, but I don't know.
 
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I just bought a 2Gb Creative Sen Stone plus for using around the house while working. $25.99 with a promo code from the egg. Cheap and long battery life plus it plays WMA MP3 and voice recording and FM, plus some hacked firmware makes FM recording possible.
 
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Most worthless post EVAR!!!
 

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I've got a Creative Zen 8GB player, very happy with it so far. Was well under £150, though I can't remember exactly how much I paid, lol. It'll play WMA, MP3 and video, don't know about DRM issues as I just rip CDs to it, or download unprotected albums (cough)! Battery lasts a full working day and a bit, so its good enough for me, and it charges from the USB port or a usb charger which some phones use these days. Even my Satnav charger works!

Its a shame it doesn't show up as a drive in My Computer, you need to load the drivers and sync though WMP or Mediasource, or similar.

Sound quality is fantastic to my ears (though I'm getting on a bit, never been bothered by the Mosquito hooligan/teenager deterent....), especially if you get some decent headphones. The supplied buds aren't bad but when you hear the difference compared to my Seinheisser PX100 its like night and day. Hope that helps.
 

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I've had an 80GB Zune for about 6 months now, and I'm glad I got it. I use it every day, and only have to charge it up every 3-4 days or so (or whenever I transfer music over to it).

Had a couples of glitches and restarts, but nothing that couldn't be fixed by a reset, and certainly nothing that damaged any of the contents. So yeah, get a Zune, I'd highly recommend it :)

www.zunethings.co.uk
 

webarchitect

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Zune is good...But I usually store all my music on my iPhone
 
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if you do get an ipod or creative, etc, you can use winamp for putting the music on, at least you dont have to install itunes lol
 
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If you want a really tough mp3 player get a zune 30, I have dropped mine from about 11 feet onto solid concrete and all it got was a dent you can't even notice, that gel plastic on them is very hard to scratch without using something like a knife also.
 
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