MP3 player versus external hard drive - for music.

[RGA]

Ok I posted this on AA but something got lost in the translation.

I am heading to South Korea to teach English and I can't bring all my music with me. So I asked about MP3 players - Apple and Cowon seem to be rated the best.

However both players do not hold very mcu information -- the top ones store 60gigs and cost $500.00cad.

I have recorded a few of my cd's to my hard drive and with Lossless WMA each cd so far ranges between 350 - 550mb. (half a gig per cd which means that i would get about 120 discs on the top MP3 players.

External hard discs at 250gigs are half the price. Granted no video playback -- but I do not need that...nor do I really need the portability.

The big external hard drives are bulkier but I'm only really making ONE trip there and then a year later making one trip back.

So I am thinking rather than paying $500.00 for a 60 gig mp3 player that it makes more sense to spend $250.00 or so for a big storage (even 160gog would be a big increase) and then spend another $100.00 on a portable flash mp3 player(preferably one that runs on a AA or a AAA battery.

Is there a downside to this idea? It seems to me that all I lose is the all in one case portability but I gain huge storage space -- I am recording in a lossless format - I was unimpressed with the 128kbps (or whatever) with my HD 600s.

Anywho if anyone has some idea as a better alternative that would be nice -- I absolutely want to do this as cheaply as I can. My Laptop is 60gig but I don't want to load it up with too much music - the external drive would be a back-up drive as well which is why I am thinking going that route.

[SlumpBuster]

I think the answer is pretty obvious: External hard drive plus ipod suffle. And your still in 200 dollars less than a 60 gig player. Your clearly looking for quality over most other things. Ipods/mp3 players are convienent and super portable, but probablably not really suited for lossless. Using the laptop you'll be giving up portablity on the go, i.e. walking, on the tube, ect. The ipod suffle is good for that. You can always rip down your lossless files to 128 for the shuffle.

The external also has these benefits.
1. Always useful. You'll even use it when you get back home. Can be used even when you get a new computer. You'll have a swappable jukebox.
2. Cheaper.
3. Good chance the the headphone amp/soundcard in the laptop is better than ipod for serious listening.
4. You can rip all those ill Korean disks your sure to come across.

I don't know if you've traveled like this before, but I spent a semester abroad and lived in the an international dorm when I got back to the states. It was clear that music was a common language. People were eager to share back and forth. When I went to Europe I took a diskman and probably 50 disks. This was even before CD burners, so not alot of options. When I got to London I got a pair of powered speakers for the diskman for like 50 pounds. That came in handy on many occasions. My point is, first, you'll be glad you took the time to take your tunes. Second, they will go further than you think, there is going to be plenty of new music in Korea and plenty of Koreans to share it. Well, that is assuming Korea is like most other places in the world.

[Woochifer]

iPods are basically storage devices with the format decoding and audio output built in. If you have no plans or needs to keep all of your music in one place while on the go, then the external HD is definitely the way to go for getting the most storage for the money, especially since you're using lossless formats. I keep a mirror of my company's network server, along with MP3 files of all the CDs I've bought within the past year on a portable HD. I shuttle it back and forth between home and office.

As SlumpBuster mentioned, another advantage of an external HD is that you can run it through your laptop, which might have more advanced sound processing options available. You can also use an external sound card that might have higher quality DACs and use those with either headphones or an external system.

Depending on how much music you plan to take with you, you should try the different MP3 bitrates to stretch out the storage space. Bitrates above about 192k are pretty difficult to distinguish from the CDs unless you listen really carefully, and different MP3 encoders that I've tried definitely produce differing levels of sound quality at the lower bitrates. The Real Player has worked well for me.

How long you planning to stay in Korea? That might also factor into how much you would invest in this.

[RGA]

I think the portable HD makes the most sense -- I hate the idea of those lithium batterries because tibasically makes the thing disposable (I hate the waste). RCA has a little MP3 player that takes SD cards -- I use the SD card in my camera -- the thing is $129.00. and would be more than good enough for the bus and trains.

My laptop is fairly new under a year old. It would be nice if the external HD would not need to be plugged into the wall -- the little expensive ones you can power through the USB but no big deal.

I am signing a 1 year contract to teach K-1 kids -- they want to be immersed in English very young when language is best learned.

I am bringing my HD 600's and I need a headphone amp because mine is too heavy and bulky. So I may opt fopr the stereo link DAC. the advantage of this unit is that it completely bypasses the DAC in the computer and directly sends the info from USB cable into the unit. The unit is also a Headphone amplifier and can also connect to a stereo. It's cheap enough as well at $170.00. http://www.stereo-link.com/Static/Products.html

I'm going to be selling my X-Box in order to buy this link dac thingy and hopefully sell my 300 disc player.

[Feanor]

I...

I am bringing my HD 600's and I need a headphone amp because mine is too heavy and bulky. So I may opt fopr the stereo link DAC. the advantage of this unit is that it completely bypasses the DAC in the computer and directly sends the info from USB cable into the unit. The unit is also a Headphone amplifier and can also connect to a stereo. It's cheap enough as well at $170.00. http://www.stereo-link.com/Static/Products.html

...
.

The device is the concept I've been thinking about for a while but hadn't found. This unit has the right functionality and price.

By the way the external HD is a no brainer if walk-around portability for your whole collection is not a priortity. I have an iPod Mini which as more than enough capacity for my portable needs. I load a few day's worth of listening from my main HD, (an external attached to my desktop), to my iPod and away I go. Personnally if I were buying a portable player today, I'd go for the Apple Nano.

At the office I don't listen to music, but people who do most often use portable HD attached to their company-provided laptops or desktops.

[noddin0ff]

Since you have a laptop. I'd consider getting a 2.5" external hard drive and an enclosure. You could upgrade your laptop's hard drive with it and then use the one you took out as an external. Win-win. There's also a portability benefit because enclosures for 2.5" drives are just about pocket sized.

The downside is that 2.5" drives for laptops are more expensive per Gig than 3.5". But if you consider it an upgrade for your laptop...that takes the sting out.

I've bought most my laptop drives here

and 2.5" enclosures here

Putting a drive in an enclosure is simple. I've had very good experiences with the IBM/Hitachi Travelstar drives.

[emorphien]

I don't think a 2.5" external drive is going to be wise for him in this situation. As he said the 60gb players don't hold enough for him and laptop hard drives reach 100gb, which isn't much improvement. A 250-300 gb hard drive in an external 3.5" enclosure (I recommend Mapower if you can get it in Canada, I know newegg has them) will be more cost effective and hopefully hold most if not all of his collection.

The laptop can certainly store some data though, but 2.5" drives just aren't that cost effective.

edit: and that macsales site is a bit pricy for those hard drives, probably for the enclosures too but I'm not going to bother comparing to newegg, zzf, chiefvalue and the like

[noddin0ff]

I don't think a 2.5" external drive is going to be wise for him in this situation. As he said the 60gb players don't hold enough for him and laptop hard drives reach 100gb, which isn't much improvement. A 250-300 gb hard drive in an external 3.5" enclosure (I recommend Mapower if you can get it in Canada, I know newegg has them) will be more cost effective and hopefully hold most if not all of his collection.

The laptop can certainly store some data though, but 2.5" drives just aren't that cost effective.

edit: and that macsales site is a bit pricy for those hard drives, probably for the enclosures too but I'm not going to bother comparing to newegg, zzf, chiefvalue and the like

I'll let him decide what's wise, but I mostly agree on the $/GB argument. Just presenting another kind of option. Good point on the prices. Newegg was about 7-12% less on list price.

Seagate has a 160GB 2.5" but it's over $300. Still less than an iPod though.
The value per gig is in favor of 3.5". However, portability, the upgrade factor, and the backup drive factor should be considered. Having everything as 2.5" means that you have a ready replacement for when your laptop HD fails (if you install an OS on it).

[RGA]

thanks for the suggestion -- but I think i will go for a little less in the way of portability and go with mass storage -- I am considering this 250gig unit for $161.00 Cad http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...5613&CatId=530

For a bit more they have a beefed up case (indistructable hard drive -- lol let's get the sledge hammer out to see. http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...4218&CatId=530

[emorphien]

Seagate has a 160GB 2.5" but it's over $300.

Ahh that's true I forgot those were out now. It's so expensive I tend to stop paying attention to the high end 2.5" drives.

Sounds like he's going to go with the 3.5" drive though from the post above this... $300 buys you about what, 400 or 500 gigs now? That one drive is bigger than the two in my deskop combined.

[noddin0ff]

thanks for the suggestion -- but I think i will go for a little less in the way of portability and go with mass storage -- I am considering this 250gig unit for $161.00 Cad http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...5613&CatId=530

For a bit more they have a beefed up case (indistructable hard drive -- lol let's get the sledge hammer out to see. http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...4218&CatId=530

good prices for $CAD! I probably don't need to mention this but make sure your computer supports USB2.0 otherwise you're stuck with transfer at USB1.1 and that is painful. Make sure you post the before and after Sledge-O-Matic shots.

[Woochifer]

good prices for $CAD! I probably don't need to mention this but make sure your computer supports USB2.0 otherwise you're stuck with transfer at USB1.1 and that is painful. Make sure you post the before and after Sledge-O-Matic shots.

Definitely an issue, but not a dealbreaker. My laptop only supports USB 1.1, but after I plugged a USB 2.0 card into the PC card slot, the transfers with my external HD worked fine. Not sure if the USB 2.0 card though can charge/power up devices that draw their power from the USB port (such as iPods or those smaller external HDs that don't need external adaptors).

[emorphien]

Definitely an issue, but not a dealbreaker. My laptop only supports USB 1.1, but after I plugged a USB 2.0 card into the PC card slot, the transfers with my external HD worked fine. Not sure if the USB 2.0 card though can charge/power up devices that draw their power from the USB port (such as iPods or those smaller external HDs that don't need external adaptors).

Hmm no idea. I know the firewire cards don't.

[RGA]

I'm not the most computer savy -- I largely went with the one that owners seemed to like the best and that got pretty high reviews from PC World and CNET. It seemed the big downside was that the laptop isn't too fast and it's not great for games -- I don't play games on it anyway -- and I'm not in a big hurry.

It has 3 USB 2.0 slots

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/g...00245293&lc=en

For those interested in the external DAC/Headphone amp I found one that may be better -- still researching but it's called the Bithead from headroom - a bit more money but more portable http://www.headphone.com/products/he...head-clear.php and can run off of batteries.

[noddin0ff]

I'm not the most computer savy -- I largely went with the one that owners seemed to like the best and that got pretty high reviews from PC World and CNET. It seemed the big downside was that the laptop isn't too fast and it's not great for games -- I don't play games on it anyway -- and I'm not in a big hurry.

It has 3 USB 2.0 slots

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/g...00245293&lc=en

For those interested in the external DAC/Headphone amp I found one that may be better -- still researching but it's called the Bithead from headroom - a bit more money but more portable http://www.headphone.com/products/he...head-clear.php and can run off of batteries.

I checked the link. It says all your USB port are 2.0. You're good to go! USB has two standards that both use the same connector. 2.0 is the newer standard and transfers data up to 480Mb/sec I believe. The older 1.1 standard transfers somewhere around 12Mb/Sec. That's a 40x difference in how long you wait. 10 minutes with USB2.0 is 6 hours with USB1.1

[topspeed]

Stay away from that RCA MP3 player, RGA. A friend of mine had it and it sounds horrible. When he heard my Shuffle, he immediately returned it and got an iPod. AAC sounds much better than MP3, IMO.

Good luck on your new job.

[emorphien]

Stay away from that RCA MP3 player, RGA. A friend of mine had it and it sounds horrible. When he heard my Shuffle, he immediately returned it and got an iPod. AAC sounds much better than MP3, IMO.

Good luck on your new job.

Well I don't think any of this matters anymore but I've never much cared for the sound of the iPod on MP3 and while AAC is better sounding on it there are other MP3 capable players with better SQ still (look at creative, iRiver, Rio possibly Cowon but I've never heard theirs).

AAC is definitely better than MP3 at lower bitrate but high bitrate MP3s IMO are better still.

[dmb_fan]

This is totally unsolicited advice...

I'd think carefully about whether it's the right decision to rip to WMA lossless. I recently ripped all my CD's (800+) to Apple Lossless and couldn't be happier.

When searching for a lossless format, I considered many factors including compression and speed of conversion etc. But the big questions for me were things like, which format is going to be the most versatile in years to come? Which format is going to be around the longest? Which format plays best with other needs (like quick conversion to low bitrates)? And in all these questions, Apple Lossless seemed heads and tails the winner over any of the other lossless formats.

With Ipods flying off the shelves and millions of people downloading itunes, I feel confident that this format will be around for a long long time. And combined with an Ipod, you've got some serious power and flexibility. When you plug in an Ipod to your computer, Itunes will ask if you'd like to automatically convert songs to 128AAC before loading them on your Ipod. Easy as pie. And Itunes is sooo stable!

Anyway, that's my $.02.

-Adam

[RGA]

Well dmb_fan you may be right -- Both my HP PC and my Laptop come with iTunes -- so they may know something -- considering that these are not Apple computers that must mean something.

I frankly don't see the superiority with iTunes. WMP -- you stick the cd in the drive and select which format you want to record in - ionce set it remembers it - then you click the Rip button and it automatically creates a file in My Music with a Folder such as Madonna - then if you record a second Madonna CD it stick it in that file. WMP from what i can tell is about as easy as it could possibly get.

I confess I have not tried iTunes as much in this regard.

My professor brings three laptops to the class - one is an Apple. He is a major major computer guru. He obviously likes Apple the best but I felt his reasoning made less sense -- he made the note that Microsoft is continously copying Apple's ideas to implement those same ideas in their newer computers -- but ultimately they do catch up. he noted that Apple does indeed suffer viruses and in no small number 1/10 as often as Microsoft -- but then they sell abou 1/10 the numbers.

I was considering an Apple laptop but my problem at that time was that my Computer was $1499Cad and the Apple counterpart was $1799.00. The HP had a 60gg drive versus 30gig in the apple, the HP had a 512 ram, the Apple 256ram, the HP could start up without the processor so it serves as portable DVD player (the Apple could not), the HP had a bright view Wide screen (the apple did not), the HP had a dvd burner, the Apple did not but what was worse was that I could not even order one as an upgrade?? The HP comes with all of the start up discs, the Apple I would have to order and then wait while it is mailed to me should something have gone wrong, the HP also scored better on less breakdown rates and higher customer satisfaction, the HP was lighter at 5 pounds, had a nicer keyboard -- and I didn't have to learn a whole bunch of new programs or ways of doing things. And I have a copy of Microsoft Office which would not go one the apple -- lot of "ahem free" programs you can get from your friends -- more chance those friends are gonna own Microsoft based set-up.

Ultimately I could not be bothered to pay more to seemingly get less -- and the one arguement everyone made to me was that Microsoft always crashes -- but having had Windows 98SE I never found that to be a big issue -- though yes it did do it on occasion -- I have had XP for a year and it has never crashed once -- on either computer - granted my friend had ME which was a colossal nightmare for him.

ITunes must be good because even the Micorosft based systems seem to have given up and put it on the machines.

I wish all this crap could be simplified -- pick a freaking standard. ONE standrd. Lossless -- all these terms frankly make me tired -- FLACC, WMA, MP3 (and all the versions of it with different bitrates) and all the other variants.

IT IS DRIVING ME BATS.

I have spent 3 hours looking ionto hard drives and have gotten nowhere -- The beyond Micro one I posted I have no idea if it is any good -- I can track down no reviews and it is cheap so it must suck right -- but then I see some cheap Fantom one that seems to be liked -- then an expensive Maxtor which people don't like but the brand seems to be one of the biggest.

A place in town told me to buy their Samsung case and then I could put any internal drive in it - they recommended Western Digital -- but that whole thing is $100.00 more than the one on the net. ARGGH.. And then one of the maxtors has a buck-up buttom that is supposed to be great -- but customer reviews seem to say it's total crap program and don't waste the extra money on it.

I worked for Seagate -- but it seems some of their drives got the worst reviews of the lot.

The only thing going for Beyond Micro is that there is not bad information on them -- there is NO information on them so I could gamble that they'll be good and are only cheap because they;re trying to break into the market -- so I hope

[emorphien]

My professor brings three laptops to the class - one is an Apple. He is a major major computer guru. He obviously likes Apple the best but I felt his reasoning made less sense -- he made the note that Microsoft is continously copying Apple's ideas to implement those same ideas in their newer computers -- but ultimately they do catch up. he noted that Apple does indeed suffer viruses and in no small number 1/10 as often as Microsoft -- but then they sell abou 1/10 the numbers.

Your professor must not know how many things Apple has copied from MS. That is really a non-issue.

[The One]

I have heard about the latest Panasonic SD-350 MP3 Player, it looks really nice :-) Price should be in your range.

As far as I know, this player supports SD card with FM Tuner.

Hope this helps...

[bacchanal]

Fwiw...for those looking at buying hds...Seagate just bought Maxtor not too long ago. Not sure how that will affect the brands, but it's something to note. That makes seagate one of, if not the biggest hd vendor in the world. Also Seagate offers a 5yr warrantee instead of the usual 3.

I've owned many hds over the years, and have had few problems. I had a couple maxtors go bad, and IBM had some serious problems a few years ago, but I don't know of any major problems with any current model drives. Western Digital, Maxtor, Seatgate, Samsung, Fujitsu, Hitachi have all been pretty reliable lately, I usually go with Seagate because of the warrantee though. Noise is another thing to consider. Some drives can be pretty noisy.

Check AnandTech for and Newegg for reviews and prices.

If you're thinking about getting an external drive, an external enclosure with an internal drive is the way to go. That way you can just replace the drive with a less expensive internal drive insead of buying a new external drive if you ever need more storage.

[The One]

Oh really, SD350 supports for 2G SD Card, I might need to do some more searching for that, hope I can give you a solid news

[The One]

60 to 70 bucks for a 2G card, May I know where you find it out?

[noddin0ff]

The One, meet Hocc. Hocc, meet The One. I seems you two have a lot in common.