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Re: [ProgSoc] Better than an iPod shuffle?



On Tue, 12 Jul 2005 15:06 pm, Joseph Madani wrote:
 ] On Tue, 12 Jul 2005, arp wrote:
 ] > * User replacable battery (standard battery ie AA or AAA even better)
 ] Big Check here...

 Ditto on this one.  I'm amazed that rechargeable commodity batteries
 aren't a more common requirement.  My digital camera takes these,
 and I can't imagine buying any kit that doesn't.

 ] > * Mountable as a USB drive because it would allow me to use it as an
 ] highly desirable, but not necessary.

 What OS are you using, and do you ever want to transport data
 between yours and someone else's computer, say?  A USB drive is
 a handy thing, but I imagine it'd be frustrating to have to carry two
 devices around.  There's a convergence of functionality with these
 things already -- even if we're a long way from having a decent
 dap/phone, say.

 ] > * No fscking joystick controller. Personal HATE HATE HATE HATE. I've
 ] Not important to me

 Have you any experience with any of the available UI's?  It's probably
 worth trying out a few before deciding this isn't important.  Some are
 truly horrendous.

 ] > * Gotta play what I consider to be the common music formats (this
 ] >  includes ogg)
 ] Have no idea about this, except for the fact that I'd like to be able to
 ] play midi's from my old Amiga 500 if I could. All my stuff is still on CD
 ] or LP. Haven't even ripped them onto my PC yet. (No i don't wear pyjamas 
 ] in the daytime and I don't eat my steaks after they've been through the 
 ] blender)

 Hmm .. 

 Anyhoo, native midi?  Don't like your chances.  But it should be
 easy to do a batch convert of those into something more useful.

 If and when you do rip them, I recommend the FLAC format
 (at least for master copies).

 Btw, if you don't have any existing music in a portable format,
 why do you want to go and buy an audio player?

 ] > * FM Radio because there are were times in the past where I chose to
 ] Not important again. The radio I had on the ol' walkman was useless 
 ] anyway. I don't know what it is about being on a bus that disrupts 
 ] reception but radio's are useless when you're on the move.

 As an aside, what is it with apostrophes these days?  I notice a
 growing and disturbing trend to whack one in whenever there's
 an s near the end of a word.  Plurals don't get apostrophes.  It's
 just the way it is.

 My FM radio in my rinky dinky Nokia (8310 ?) is superb, and gets a
 lot of use.  It's a feature they seem to have removed from the newer
 models, for reasons that aren't clear.  Newer models seem to be
 bigger, heavier, and have a shorter battery life.  Go figure.

 Anyway, it works perfectly on the bus - where I listen to it the
 most, primarily as an escape from knobbers with their iPods
 turned up way too high.   And why do people who can afford so much
 money on technology all suffer from such bad taste in music?

 ] > * Pocketsized because I should not need a backpack for it :)
 ] Big check here too...

 Subjective stuff.  You need to go play with some of them, and
 find the biggest / heaviest model that you'd put up with, and then
 write down its dimensions and mass.

 ] > * User replaceable storage media (not seen by me anywhere yet and it's
 ] Nice, bot not necessary for me. Just want it to hold more than a 1000 
 ] songs whatever that equates to in memory terms.

 One of my (you might be getting the idea that there's lots of these)
 current bugbears is the advertising that pushes the number of songs
 a device can store.  This is bordering on pointless.  As I understand
 it, this is usually based on two [ludicrous] assumptions.  The first,
 that every track that every person has is 3 minutes long.  The second,
 that every track is encoded at 128 (corollary - that everyone is happy
 with the sound quality this implies).  More and more I'm seeing this
 number cited, and the actual, physical capacity of the device not
 actually mentioned out loud.  </rant>

 Anyhoo, I think this fits the above categories insofar as you should
 buy the one with :
 o  biggest storage capacity, 
 o  longest life battery,
 o  smallest mass,
 o  smallest dimensions

 These are all going to be traded off against each other, which is
 where the fun comes in.

 ] Accessories that don't cost as much as the player

 Oh.  If you'd just said that at the outside, I could have told
 you right off that you don't want an iPod.

 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/17/review_focal_icub/

 Jedd.

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