Okay, I think I've finally decided to buy an MP3 player. I was looking at 60gb hard drive players first, so I could transfer my entire collection to it but I think I've decided to go opposite and get a smaller at least 2gb flash player for cost and reliability reasons.

So I'm looking at Best Buy...because I have a Best Buy credit card with 6 months free financing and the main ones I liked are the Sandisk Sansa 2gb and of course the iPod 2gb dealie.

My main concern in flash player is this...I want to plug it into a USB port and copy my files to it, then play them. That simple. I don't want any other software involved. Can the iPod work like this, or does it have to use iTunes?

Anybody have the Sandisk Sansa? It says it works like this, but I'd like to hear from a user here. I'm already leaning towards the Sansa because it's cheaper, it's not Apple, and the iPod does not play WMA files which is a deal killer unless I hear something that negates that. I don't want to re-rip as MP3, but I can if needed. Since it's only 2gb I will only need to rip a little anyway.