Abstract said:
The purpose of going camping, hiking, backpacking, etc. is to get away from civilization and technology. Try listening to the sounds of nature, it has a very long battery life.
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Am I The Only Person Who Doesn't Like The iPod?
- Thread starter Abstract
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The purpose of going camping, hiking, backpacking, etc. is to get away from civilization and technology. Try listening to the sounds of nature, it has a very long battery life.
I'm open to replacing my iPod for some of the reasons you've mentioned. But I haven't found a replacement worthy yet. And, I don't play 6-8hrs consecutively so dropping it in the dock hasn't been a big problem, just a minor inconvenience. It is a potential big problem though.
The iRiver products are probably technically superior but are a little cluttered for my tastes. Also, with no integrated software, media management on Windows is still a kludge, with the exception of iTunes+iPod. When MS opens a music store, who knows. But if WMP 10 is any indication, it will be a while before Apple has anything to worry about. Thanks to Sony's determination to try and force ATRAC. Sony doesn't understand Apple hasn't forced AAC. Most users are Apple people anyway, those of us who are not dedicated to Apple, well 95% of my music is in MP3 format.
I will not touch a player that doesn't play native MP3. <<< period
The iRiver products are probably technically superior but are a little cluttered for my tastes. Also, with no integrated software, media management on Windows is still a kludge, with the exception of iTunes+iPod. When MS opens a music store, who knows. But if WMP 10 is any indication, it will be a while before Apple has anything to worry about. Thanks to Sony's determination to try and force ATRAC. Sony doesn't understand Apple hasn't forced AAC. Most users are Apple people anyway, those of us who are not dedicated to Apple, well 95% of my music is in MP3 format.
I will not touch a player that doesn't play native MP3. <<< period
MorganX said:
But the iPod can play mp3 audio files....By default iTunes is AAC but you can change it to mp3. (Yes I know you know that, im sure, lol.) I dunno, I'm just not picky, AAC....mp3.....to me its the samething. As long as I can hear the music decently, im happy.
I dunno. I played with a friend's 20 GB Creative player, and the interface annoyed me to ranting within 5 minutes, specifically the scrolling. I don't think it's the hype.Abstract said:
I got an iPod not because it was cool, but because I was sick and tired of changing out the lame 64 MB of music allowed by the MP3 player I'd gotten free with my previous laptop. And since I was buying a PowerBook to replace said laptop, I figured I might as well get the player that integrated best with an Apple system. It was only after using it that I realized how much I love the little thing.
Sure, who wouldn't want more battery life? Nothing's perfect. But the iPod comes closer than any other player on the market for a lot of people. The rest are going to have very specific needs or complaints that make the iPod a bad choice for them, yes, but that doesn't invalidate it completely.
I'm just jumping into the thread here, but here is my opinion:
I think that everyone should buy an iPod! Go on! They are easy to use, the battery life is good enough for most people, and you get plenty of storage space.
So go on, get an iPod! Because I'm not!
And I'll tell you why...
Until the iPod has the following, I'm not buying one:
Better audio quality (I heard the iPod's sucks, and only someone with good ears will notice, like me)
Longer battery life (Creative has claimed thier Nomad Zen Touch will have 24 hours batter life. Creative normally dosen't lie about thier product's battery life. Thier claims are spot on, and are not based on weird options, like 20% audio volume, etc...)
Line in/Line out -Optical and Analouge for both (the iRivers have this, and can even record MP3s on the spot! Up to 320kbs, the highest MP3 quality)
An internal mic (The iRiver's mics record at full quality MP3 - up to 320kbs, not 16kbs or whatever the iPod does)
Driverless operation (iTunes counts as driver-required operation - In other words, you can't just drag your music on, using Explorer/Finder)
A good remote (Other brands have LCD screens, the ability to change playlists, etc... from the remote)
Vorbis support
Right, so thats why I'm not getting an iPod.
But that dosen't mean that everyone else shouldn't get one, because:
Intergration with iTunes (I use iTunes all the time, it's a great piece of software, and it helps by putting all my music in one folder, so I can just drag that one folder over to my Drag-and-Drop compatible MP3 player)
The ability to play iTMS songs (This is important (not to me, because I'm here in iTMS deprived Australia) - because you don't want to have to resort to PlayFair and other crap like that to play your music)
Games (I don't need this)
Intergrated Calender (I don't need this either)
The ability to download pictures off of your camera's card, for storage (I honestly don't need this)
So, everyone. Get an iPod!
I don't need one...
I think that everyone should buy an iPod! Go on! They are easy to use, the battery life is good enough for most people, and you get plenty of storage space.
So go on, get an iPod! Because I'm not!
And I'll tell you why...
Until the iPod has the following, I'm not buying one:
Better audio quality (I heard the iPod's sucks, and only someone with good ears will notice, like me)
Longer battery life (Creative has claimed thier Nomad Zen Touch will have 24 hours batter life. Creative normally dosen't lie about thier product's battery life. Thier claims are spot on, and are not based on weird options, like 20% audio volume, etc...)
Line in/Line out -Optical and Analouge for both (the iRivers have this, and can even record MP3s on the spot! Up to 320kbs, the highest MP3 quality)
An internal mic (The iRiver's mics record at full quality MP3 - up to 320kbs, not 16kbs or whatever the iPod does)
Driverless operation (iTunes counts as driver-required operation - In other words, you can't just drag your music on, using Explorer/Finder)
A good remote (Other brands have LCD screens, the ability to change playlists, etc... from the remote)
Vorbis support
Right, so thats why I'm not getting an iPod.
But that dosen't mean that everyone else shouldn't get one, because:
Intergration with iTunes (I use iTunes all the time, it's a great piece of software, and it helps by putting all my music in one folder, so I can just drag that one folder over to my Drag-and-Drop compatible MP3 player)
The ability to play iTMS songs (This is important (not to me, because I'm here in iTMS deprived Australia) - because you don't want to have to resort to PlayFair and other crap like that to play your music)
Games (I don't need this)
Intergrated Calender (I don't need this either)
The ability to download pictures off of your camera's card, for storage (I honestly don't need this)
So, everyone. Get an iPod!
I don't need one...
I have an iPod. I must say I dont like it that much but that's not because the battery power isnt good or anything, i think i just dont really like portable mp3 players.
i guess im just a bit self conscious when walking with headphones
i guess im just a bit self conscious when walking with headphones
Even totally non-techies I know speak to me (unbeknowngst of my affiliations with Apple) about the iPod , and how much they want it.
Strangely enough not many of those same people speak to me of the Creative Labs Jukebox Zen Xtra 30GB.
Funny that.
So to answer the main question, I'd say at the very least yes, you are certainly in a minority.
Strangely enough not many of those same people speak to me of the Creative Labs Jukebox Zen Xtra 30GB.
Funny that.
So to answer the main question, I'd say at the very least yes, you are certainly in a minority.
Can someone please explain how the music quality sucks? I'm just not agreeing with it. It's probably because I'm not a recording artist and don't know all the in-depth stuff about music. But I think for the average person the quality is very good.
I own a 40GB ipod.
I bought it because it's a very portable hard drive that plays music in all the formats I wanted it for. In all, at the time, it was worth it.
The battery thing doesn't effect me, because I rigged a D-cell battery pack which I have yet to drain over the past 3 months since I started using it. Sure is heavy though.
If I did need the internal battery, however, I'd like to remind all of you that a flight from the pacific coast to europe is more than 8 hours.
Also, the ipod really isn't worth the money anymore (for my purposes at least), with all the competitors having larger HDs which are cross-platform.
I bought it because it's a very portable hard drive that plays music in all the formats I wanted it for. In all, at the time, it was worth it.
The battery thing doesn't effect me, because I rigged a D-cell battery pack which I have yet to drain over the past 3 months since I started using it. Sure is heavy though.
If I did need the internal battery, however, I'd like to remind all of you that a flight from the pacific coast to europe is more than 8 hours.
Also, the ipod really isn't worth the money anymore (for my purposes at least), with all the competitors having larger HDs which are cross-platform.
Abstract, you are not alone mate. :co
I am not big fan of iPod either. Though, I'm glad that people are buying it because it is helping Apple stay relevant and afloat , so that maybe one day they can change their minds and release decently priced/powered Mac for the rest of us.
It would be wrong to say that iPod is not nice device,but it would also be wrong to say that it is device for everyone. What I like about iPod is its design/UI design, superb integration with iTunes music store, sound quality(if you buy decent pair of headphones) and its capacity. Main reasons it is not for me are: battery life, weak/non existent recording capabilities (i play few instruments and often want to take live recordings) ,being tied to PC/Mac to transfer/swap songs, there's still no iTunes store in Australia. That's why I still stick with MiniDisc.
I am not big fan of iPod either. Though, I'm glad that people are buying it because it is helping Apple stay relevant and afloat
, so that maybe one day they can change their minds and release decently priced/powered Mac for the rest of us.It would be wrong to say that iPod is not nice device,but it would also be wrong to say that it is device for everyone. What I like about iPod is its design/UI design, superb integration with iTunes music store, sound quality(if you buy decent pair of headphones) and its capacity. Main reasons it is not for me are: battery life, weak/non existent recording capabilities (i play few instruments and often want to take live recordings) ,being tied to PC/Mac to transfer/swap songs, there's still no iTunes store in Australia. That's why I still stick with MiniDisc.
Abstract said:
I totally agree with you. I dislike ipods as well. I have not yet seen 1 player that i really want to like. The ipod in particular, is more like a long-term investment, at the 18 months mark (or 12 if you use it a lot), you need to shell out 99 bucks US to get a new battery, every few years if you wish to use it. And then, it does break, and when it does, you may have to shell out a lot more to get another hard drive. It frequently falls and slips for people who prefer to use it actually outdoors and/or in the gym since it is very slippery with most types of clothing.
The reason I got my ipod (2, almost 2.5, years ago, I'd like to point out, before most of the people I knew had even heard about them), was mostly that it was just about the only option. But even now, when there are more choices, I would still prefer getting an ipod rather than any of the competing brands simply because the things that the other brands have over the ipod don't make as much of a difference to me as what the ipod has.
- Size: the only other mp3 players that I know of that are approximately the same size as the ipod are the iriver, the cowon, and the sony player. Unfortunately the iriver is slightly thicker, the cowon only has a screen on the remote, and the sony player doesn't work with macs.
- Operating system: The only other operating system that, to me, rivals the ipod's is that of the rio, which one of my friends has, and I do really like. However the rio is really thick, which gets to me. As for the iriver, the only other player I've actually used, it's really slow, and the system just isn't designed to well in my view.
- Battery life: admittedly, the ipod's shorter battery life is annoying, but I never use it for more than 8 hours straight without being near a plug. I never fly to europe, I have a car charger, and I personally can't deal with shopping or being alone in a mall-ish area for more than an hour and a half, so that isn't an issue.
- Features: The main good feature about the ipod is that it plays ITMS files, of which I have quite a few. It doesn't naturally have a microphone or radio, which aggravates me, but I would never use a microphone, and the only other HDD player that I know of which has a radio, once again the iriver, has awful reception, so I prbably wouldn't use the radio even if there was one.
So yeah. Sorry about the long post, but I just wanted to point out the pros of the ipod.
- Size: the only other mp3 players that I know of that are approximately the same size as the ipod are the iriver, the cowon, and the sony player. Unfortunately the iriver is slightly thicker, the cowon only has a screen on the remote, and the sony player doesn't work with macs.
- Operating system: The only other operating system that, to me, rivals the ipod's is that of the rio, which one of my friends has, and I do really like. However the rio is really thick, which gets to me. As for the iriver, the only other player I've actually used, it's really slow, and the system just isn't designed to well in my view.
- Battery life: admittedly, the ipod's shorter battery life is annoying, but I never use it for more than 8 hours straight without being near a plug. I never fly to europe, I have a car charger, and I personally can't deal with shopping or being alone in a mall-ish area for more than an hour and a half, so that isn't an issue.
- Features: The main good feature about the ipod is that it plays ITMS files, of which I have quite a few. It doesn't naturally have a microphone or radio, which aggravates me, but I would never use a microphone, and the only other HDD player that I know of which has a radio, once again the iriver, has awful reception, so I prbably wouldn't use the radio even if there was one.
So yeah. Sorry about the long post, but I just wanted to point out the pros of the ipod.
Oh yeah, I forgot, I think the ipod is the only player that supports playlists, which I use almost exclusively.
Voodoo Childe on Red Rock courtesy of my iPod
Totally, looks are of secondary importance. But, I get about 8 hours of battery life, and I was able to use it on my camping trip last year while hiking and bouldering. And just three weeks ago I travelled through Europe and used it the entire time. Obviously an extended battery life would be awesome, but except for the night we spent on the top of Red Rock I was near either a car or a source of electricity. If you go deep country backpacking this is going to be a problem with almost every device with rare exceptions and those have so many other shortcomings (Minidisk) that it's not worth it for me.
Now, as for jogging, I've carried mine with me and it works fine, just don't hang it on your waist or anywhere the ipod will be under constant shock, I use an arm-band and the mini-iPod is even better.
Furthermore, don't you listen to music near your house? Or even in your house? Or car? Then having a mediocre player that gets great battery-life but doesn't sync well, and is difficult to use, sucks.
Lastly, the iPod has a huge range of extras: transmitters, voice-recorders, memory card readers, and about a zillion different cases including water-proof ones for river-rafters.
All those things together.
The iPod wins hands down, even far from the city hanging by my fingertips with my other hand in my chalk-bag while Hendrix hits that guitar lick just right on Voodoo Childe.
I hope Apple extends the battery life to 16 hours+; if they do I'm selling my old one.
Abstract said:
Totally, looks are of secondary importance. But, I get about 8 hours of battery life, and I was able to use it on my camping trip last year while hiking and bouldering. And just three weeks ago I travelled through Europe and used it the entire time. Obviously an extended battery life would be awesome, but except for the night we spent on the top of Red Rock I was near either a car or a source of electricity. If you go deep country backpacking this is going to be a problem with almost every device with rare exceptions and those have so many other shortcomings (Minidisk) that it's not worth it for me.
Now, as for jogging, I've carried mine with me and it works fine, just don't hang it on your waist or anywhere the ipod will be under constant shock, I use an arm-band and the mini-iPod is even better.
Furthermore, don't you listen to music near your house? Or even in your house? Or car? Then having a mediocre player that gets great battery-life but doesn't sync well, and is difficult to use, sucks.
Lastly, the iPod has a huge range of extras: transmitters, voice-recorders, memory card readers, and about a zillion different cases including water-proof ones for river-rafters.
All those things together.
The iPod wins hands down, even far from the city hanging by my fingertips with my other hand in my chalk-bag while Hendrix hits that guitar lick just right on Voodoo Childe.
I hope Apple extends the battery life to 16 hours+; if they do I'm selling my old one.
Maxx Power said:
18 months; it happens but it's not like there's a viral bomb that goes off right then. I use the hell out of mine and it's been 20 months and I still get above 8 hours; it helps to read the instructions about charging from Apple.
Second, get a case! As I previously stated there's a zillion of them, water-tight ones, metal ones, arm-bands, fanny-packs, small ones, large ones that can hold earphones and the chargers, etc.
I would suggest Marware's. My iPod is 20 months old, has gone to San Francisco, Big Sur, Sedona and then all through Italy, Switzerland, and Paris.
comictimes said:
I haven't seen a player that DOESN'T support playlists, and I've seen at least 1 sony and 2 creatives.
I think the accessories for the iPod, and the fact that it uses HFS+ are the only real differing points (besides the silly scroll thing which I refuse to use 1 handed out of fear of dropping the $500 bastard).
hulugu said:
I can see it now. Like a mini atomic bomb - boom. Widespread devastation. Women and children running from iPods, for fear of their lives. Hehehehe. Alright I'm tired. But that's really, really funny to a really tired person. Thanks for the laugh.
I think this is more dependent on earphones and speakers, the Nomad Zen Touch sounded tiny when I listed to my friend's, but I'll concede that its the earphones.Jalexster said:
These things need to be judged on experience and not lab tests, Apple is more honest and wattage for their laptops than other companies, and I think it depends on the user. But, Apple does need to improve this as much as possible without adding weight or size. 24 versus 10 (max for iPod I heard) is really not competitive.
I think you can mount the iPod as a Firewire device, but iTunes is really very useful to name songs and make playlists, with 10Gb of music I'd like being able to play all my favorite Hendrix songs for example without paging through each song. But, I'd agree on these ideas, they're interesting, I'd like the remote to show information like the minimized version of iTunes.
What is with you people? Ogg! No FLAC! No wait...I need something more obscure.
Although the iPod is not the ultimate warrior of Mp3 players able to defeat all takers like Bruce Lee, it has some superior advantages.
This is my third post in a row, so I'm going to shut up now.
hulugu said:What is with you people? Ogg! No FLAC! No wait...I need something more obscure.
FLAC and OGG beat the pants off of "Apple Lossless" and AAC respectively.
FLAC is lossless, it's smaller than "Apple Lossless" by quite a bit, and it takes less processing power to decompress (so the only reason the iPod doesn't have it is because Apple is a buttmunch).
I would use FLAC if my iPod and iTunes could. Instead I use Mp3.
OGG is better than AAC, it's smaller, and it's l33t3r.
And what do you mean "you people"? .. you getting geekist on a computer board? So you can be geeky enough to know Macs are cool but the moment you point out FLAC is the shizzel it somehow crosses the line?
heh I made that 'geekist' word up. No seriously I'd think OGG and FLAC were silly if they were only a *tiny* bit better, but they seriously just blow AAC and AL away. Not to mention the fact that if you had all your files in OGG, what the hell are you going to do with them if you buy an iPod? you'll ruin them if you convert to mp3 or AAC! I guess it's .wav then (because quicktime doesn't support OGG so you can't use AIFF or AL).
By driverless operation, I meant the ability to drag audio files onto it, and actully play them on the player. Because if you mount the iPod as a drive, and try to copy music onto it using drag and drop, you can't play the music.
Also, OGG is the "container" for Vorbis. And FLAC is (I think) Vorbis-Lossless (I belive it's made by the same group).
And, about Creative. They are honest about thier battery life. They also have the best audio quality.
On that note, about audio quality, if you are listening to say, and iPod and a Creative Nomad, with a really good pair of earphones (like, for example Sony Nudes (Weird name, great quality)), the Creative will get better audio quality out of an MP3 file, than the iPod does out of an AIFF file. And when an uncompressed files on one player, is worse than a compressed file on anouter player, you can tell which is better. Although, Creative's last Remote, sucked royaly. iRivers are the most feature packed, and have the best remotes. They also have support for 36 lanuages.
Edit: I forgot to add, not only do the iRiver and Creative Nomads have better battery life, they have user replacable batteries. And they are easy to replace, you don't need a screwdriver or anything.
Also, OGG is the "container" for Vorbis. And FLAC is (I think) Vorbis-Lossless (I belive it's made by the same group).
And, about Creative. They are honest about thier battery life. They also have the best audio quality.
On that note, about audio quality, if you are listening to say, and iPod and a Creative Nomad, with a really good pair of earphones (like, for example Sony Nudes (Weird name, great quality)), the Creative will get better audio quality out of an MP3 file, than the iPod does out of an AIFF file. And when an uncompressed files on one player, is worse than a compressed file on anouter player, you can tell which is better. Although, Creative's last Remote, sucked royaly. iRivers are the most feature packed, and have the best remotes. They also have support for 36 lanuages.
Edit: I forgot to add, not only do the iRiver and Creative Nomads have better battery life, they have user replacable batteries. And they are easy to replace, you don't need a screwdriver or anything.
I often regret buying my 3G iPod. Why? Size, weight and most of all, battery life. I am another md'er that came over when the collection just became ummanagable. THe best feature of the iPod is iTunes integration even then I have a lot of things on my wishlist for iTunes.
Going from 30 hours and 55g (with battery) to the bulk and irritation of the iPod was very hard. I guess I am used to it but I am just praying for a minimum of 16 hours battery on the 4g iPod. Praying I tell you!
I feel like I am tied down with the iPod. I go out for days at a time and while I do have access to electricity the idea of carrying that bulky charger is not pleasant.
I could not honestly recommend it to anyone who I know. and i think that's kind of sad...
Going from 30 hours and 55g (with battery) to the bulk and irritation of the iPod was very hard. I guess I am used to it but I am just praying for a minimum of 16 hours battery on the 4g iPod. Praying I tell you!
I feel like I am tied down with the iPod. I go out for days at a time and while I do have access to electricity the idea of carrying that bulky charger is not pleasant.
I could not honestly recommend it to anyone who I know. and i think that's kind of sad...