Should I switch to the iPod?

[TheAntiChrist]

Around May I wanted to get a Digital Music player and was opting for the Ipod, but the price threw me off slightly (didnt have a job at the time) and its battery horror stories swayed me over to get the RIO Karma instead. I've enjoyed the Karma a lot, with its great support for FLAC and ogg vorbis, but the mistifying iPod has lured my eye and is tempting me at the moment. Maybe it's all the press it's getting, or the dedicated community of 3,000,000+ that's luring me in, or just the hipness factor of it (especially in the metro setting). I figure I can get at least $230 for my Karma on eBay, since its in great condition being only a couple months old and I also have a really nice carrying case as well. The 4th gen iPod is debuting in about a month and the 20gb model will retail for $299 (and thats retail mind you ;-) ), so it wouldn't be all of an expensive upgrade. I'm happy with what I have, but theres just something about the iPod that is making me think twice about keeping my current player. Any thoughts? THANKS

 

[FishTankX]

I think the question is why.

The iPod has very little over the Rio Karma, besides reliability and mass storage support and a remote.(which isn't a problem for you, obviously, since your karma has lived this long)

The Rio karma has
-Flac support
-OGG support
-Graphical EQ that doesn't suck donkey
-Battery life

 

[AT100]

Illissius has posted this:
Candidates:

- Apple iPod 20/40GB
- iRiver iHP-120/140
- Rio Karma 20GB

Pros/cons of each:

iPod:
+ Best UI
+ Most popular
+ Arguably looks the best
+ Supports AAC including DRM
- mediocre battery life (~6hrs)
- $100 more expensive than the other two

iHP-120:
+ Analog/digital in/out
+ FM tuner
+ voice recording
+ Looks better than the iPod if you prefer black to white, though not as good as a black iPod
+ works as USB mass storage (this is the biggest reason I'm getting one myself)
+ Comes with a fully functional remote, complete with LCD - everything you can do with the main unit, you can with the remote (and this is second)
+ Supports Ogg Vorbis and WMA sans DRM
+ Good battery life (~16hrs)
+ Better sound than the iPod (according to IGN Gear, anyways)
- No on the fly playlisting, though they're promising it in a firmware upgrade (this is the *sole* reason I would get a different player, otherwise it's nigh-perfect)

Karma:
+ Powerful on-the-fly playlisting
+ Ethernet connection
+ Supports Ogg Vorbis, FLAC, and WMA including DRM
+ Good battery life (~15hrs)
-+ Less flashy, but possibly more practical - it's thick rather than tall
- Reliability issues - the hard drive tends to die

I'll let you make your own evaluation. Useful resources while researching are misticriver.net for iRiver stuff, riovolution.com for Rio stuff, and the rest of the intarweb for iPod stuff.

edit: me: Also consider that you can get a student discount with the iPod (30 bucks and 5 on perphierals) and right now laser engraving is free.

BTW I visit some hipster boards and its becoming popular to hate the iPod

 

[Wahsapa]

i think you should keep with the karma if its been so good to you

 

[ViRGE]

AT100, I have a couple of corrections if you don't mind: The iPod supports being a USB/Firewire mass storage device(so it's not just the iHP-120), and the average battery life on the iPod really is about 8 hours in my experience.

 

[silen]

I might be biased, i love my ipod. My sister kept stealing mine so I bought here a pink ipod mini, she bought here husband a 30gig ipod. Who gave my mother an ipod....she actually uses it listen to audiobooks...

Thing i like best about ipods, I don't think about it much, Since I got it, and for most of family there ipods integrate great. Fast and easy to put songs on. get books for audible.com (which rocks by the way). If you ever get a song stuck in your head, just download of itunes takes 10secs.... and bam its on your ipod 99 cents is not bad.

The fact that ipod has 50% of the digital music player business, means 3rd party support for it is great. Check out ipodlouge.com for the software additions, cases, and all sorts of wacky stuff. Took me 2 weeks to decide on a case, there just so many out there, eventually went with vaja cases.... at vajacases.com which make great quality cases really impressed.

the new ipods, sport a longer battery life, which i think was an issue for many, and alot smaller. Jealous of those getting the new ipods.

No product is perfect. The negative points i experienced with ipods are.

I found the remote, pretty cheapy made, and broke quickly ( might change in new ipod). The earphones are subpar, bought some B&G ones to go with it. Itunes has most popular songs, but alot of the alternative or weird stuff i listen to hasn't made it there yet, but its growing and growing quickly.


If your happy with your rio you could wait tell next gen ipod to upgrade, but if the cash difference isn't much i'd go for it.

If cash is a problem, enroll in duke university, supposedly there going to give there new students a free ipod, for audio lectures and such.

Hope you enjoy your new ipod if you get it

 

[Lyfer]

The new Ipods feature up to 12HRS batter life and one click shuffling. I think Imma get one too, ditch the RIO karma. CHICKS dig ipods.

 

[gullyrip1]

The new Ipod is already available at apple.com and should be in b&m's by the end of the month)

 

[TerryMathews]

To me, the biggest advantage the iPod has is iTunes. Some people don't like it, but to me it's a godsend. The library functionality is fantastic when you've got as much music as I do (1525 songs and counting). Being able to pull up every song by Dave Matthews Band, in alphabetical order is great for making Best Of playlists; I can listen to all the different cuts of Ants Marching I've got and decide on the best one (Live At Red Rocks 8.15.95, by far BTW).

Plus, iTunes is girlfriend friendly. My girlfriend has never been able to burn a CD. Until iTunes. Drag, drop, and burn. You don't have to be very computer literate to do that. Much, much easier than trying to explain Nero.

iTunes is a little bit of a resource hog (With serving enabled and playing a song, it's consuming roughly 37MB of RAM), but I've got 1GB of RAM and a 3GHz processor, so I'm not really all that concerned about it.

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: TerryMathews
To me, the biggest advantage the iPod has is iTunes. Some people don't like it, but to me it's a godsend. The library functionality is fantastic when you've got as much music as I do (1525 songs and counting). Being able to pull up every song by Dave Matthews Band, in alphabetical order is great for making Best Of playlists; I can listen to all the different cuts of Ants Marching I've got and decide on the best one (Live At Red Rocks 8.15.95, by far BTW).

Plus, iTunes is girlfriend friendly. My girlfriend has never been able to burn a CD. Until iTunes. Drag, drop, and burn. You don't have to be very computer literate to do that. Much, much easier than trying to explain Nero.

iTunes is a little bit of a resource hog (With serving enabled and playing a song, it's consuming roughly 37MB of RAM), but I've got 1GB of RAM and a 3GHz processor, so I'm not really all that concerned about it.

agreed. Itunes is great (i don't have a desire to get a Ipod though~ I'd probably jump on minidisc instead) for its library ability and is THE reason I use it. I also agree its a resource hog (25 megs with a song playing ATM for me) but being on my 2800+ and 512 megs of ram doesn't make me sweat (Though some lag occurs when I hit a 1.5 Gig Pagefile as I have a habit of leaving windows open, but that isn't my fault by any means)

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: ViRGE
AT100, I have a couple of corrections if you don't mind: The iPod supports being a USB/Firewire mass storage device(so it's not just the iHP-120), and the average battery life on the iPod really is about 8 hours in my experience.

Yes, that plus the iPod is not $100 more for at least 50% of the people who use AT; here in Canada they give a 15% student discount, making it more like a $50 price delta if that. I'm not sure what the US equlivalent is; someone said $30, but that sounds like too little.

It should also be pointed out that the iPod basically supports FLAC; it has Apple Lossless which basically does the exact same thing.

Another thing that requires mention is the fact that the iPod is thinner and possibly lighter than any of the other players mentionned.

From the sounds of it, whoever made that list owns an iHP-120, and/or doesn't have any knowledge/experience with an iPod.

 

[Grafik]

Somethin you might be interested in is the Dell DJ Jukebox - i know i know, who wants to buy a dell - but i found one thru a hot deals thread for 15gb refurb at 160 shipped - that destroys the ipods prices, and there is still a one year warranty standard on it - you can opt for a 2 or 3 year as well - the battery life on my dj rocks a friend at works, and she complains cause she dropped double what i paid on her ipod - the playlists are very easy to make and it came with a sweet belt clip case - the headfones suck, but what free ones don't - i was skeptical at first but now very happy i didn't pay $250 + for an ipod

 

[splashchris]

TerryMathews said,

"To me, the biggest advantage the iPod has is iTunes. Some people don't like it, but to me it's a godsend. The library functionality is fantastic when you've got as much music as I do (1525 songs and counting). Being able to pull up every song by Dave Matthews Band, in alphabetical order is great for making Best Of playlists; I can listen to all the different cuts of Ants Marching I've got and decide on the best one (Live At Red Rocks 8.15.95, by far BTW)."

One thing has me confused. The iTunes service does not offer Dave Matthews Band music. I've been considering an iPod, but haven't purchased one yet because I didn't think I could put all my DMB songs on it. I assumed the iPod would only play iTunes music.

BTW, Ants Marching is my favorite. I search out different versions too.

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: splashchris
One thing has me confused. The iTunes service does not offer Dave Matthews Band music. I've been considering an iPod, but haven't purchased one yet because I didn't think I could put all my DMB songs on it. I assumed the iPod would only play iTunes music.

The iPod will play any MP3 or AAC file, regardless of where it came from (provided it does not use DRM). If you own a DMB CD and you ripped it to MP3, the iPod will play them.

 

[TerryMathews]

Originally posted by: splashchris
TerryMathews said,

"To me, the biggest advantage the iPod has is iTunes. Some people don't like it, but to me it's a godsend. The library functionality is fantastic when you've got as much music as I do (1525 songs and counting). Being able to pull up every song by Dave Matthews Band, in alphabetical order is great for making Best Of playlists; I can listen to all the different cuts of Ants Marching I've got and decide on the best one (Live At Red Rocks 8.15.95, by far BTW)."

One thing has me confused. The iTunes service does not offer Dave Matthews Band music. I've been considering an iPod, but haven't purchased one yet because I didn't think I could put all my DMB songs on it. I assumed the iPod would only play iTunes music.

BTW, Ants Marching is my favorite. I search out different versions too.

You're confused, my friend. The iPod will copy over anything in your iTunes library, whether you purchased it from the iTunes Music Store or not.

And, you're correct. DMB isn't available from the iTMS. I've got all the CDs and get bootlegs of concerts not published via BitTorrent.

In case you're wondering, DMB supports bootleg recording of concerts as long as the bootleg isn't sold for profit. The bootlegs that are made of concerts sound like studio recordings; that's the calibur equipment fans bring to the show. I know one guy brought a PowerBook G4, FireWire audio recording device, two parabolic mics and stands to record everything. Very sweet download.

I used to love Ants Marching, but it's a bit overdone these days. Rhyme and Reason is nice, as is Stay (Wasting Time).

 

[Kishan]

first, one of the biggest attractions of the ipod is that everyone knows what an ipod is, even if they don't know what a fraunhoffer mp3 is. second even though you have anandtech, check ipodlounge.com, they have some good stuff too. I have a 3G (touch wheel) 15 GB that I got last november with dock/case/remote fo $279-refurb off apple's website. You could get a good deal now cuz the 3G's refurb's are on sale...
Good luck,
Kishan

 

[jeromysmith]

are these arguments still valid? I'm looking at a karma now.

And for DMB fans, you should be concerned with FLAC support. You'd be able to trade for / buy the FLAC sourced concerts. And if you have SHNS, you could SHN > WAV > FLAC and have them on your portable.

 

[Gurck]

iPods are the worst DAPs you can buy, unless you're able to get one for a low price (Student discount or the $200 off deal if you buy an Apple notebook). I'd stay with the Karma or, for that matter, any other DAP.

 

[torpid]

Originally posted by: Gurck
iPods are the worst DAPs you can buy, unless you're able to get one for a low price (Student discount or the $200 off deal if you buy an Apple notebook). I'd stay with the Karma or, for that matter, any other DAP.

There are a lot of bad ones out there. No matter how little you think of the iPod, you can't possibly claim it's worse than some of those junk ones which are the same price with less features and worse sound quality.

I'd keep the karma too unless you have specific issues with it. I don't know why anyone would give you that much for a used karma since you can get them for about that price new anyway.

 

[Gurck]

Originally posted by: torpid

Originally posted by: Gurck
iPods are the worst DAPs you can buy, unless you're able to get one for a low price (Student discount or the $200 off deal if you buy an Apple notebook). I'd stay with the Karma or, for that matter, any other DAP.

There are a lot of bad ones out there. No matter how little you think of the iPod, you can't possibly claim it's worse than some of those junk ones which are the same price with less features and worse sound quality.

I'd keep the karma too unless you have specific issues with it. I don't know why anyone would give you that much for a used karma since you can get them for about that price new anyway.

No other player is as expensive as the iPod and few have less features/options. If price were no object it'd be middle of the road, but including that as a factor it's definitely bottom of the barrel. I have nothing against it, just a hard-on for truth.

 

[torpid]

How about the odyssey 20gb which is $50 more? Maybe you like FM radio and voice recorder more than I do... that unit is a POS for the price otherwise.

 

[Gurck]

Originally posted by: torpid
How about the odyssey 20gb which is $50 more? Maybe you like FM radio and voice recorder more than I do... that unit is a POS for the price otherwise.

Options cost more. Pretty simple concept... And how exactly is it a pos? Does it have bad sound quality, like the iPod? Low battery life like the iPod? No support for popular file formats like the iPod? etc. etc. etc....

 

[CraigRT]

iPod sucks.
I bought one for the GF.. not only does the battery suck, but now the connection for syncing the iPod with the PC is starting to go flakey.
the iPod won't connect unless I wiggle the connection, and then the PC finally picks it up.. but what's even more fun is it randomly drops off the PC so I have to reconnect it by wiggling the cord around (the dock no longer works because you can't wiggle it much while sitting in the dock)

This thing is definitely an over-rated pile of crap, much like Apple's other products.

 

[torpid]

Originally posted by: Gurck

Originally posted by: torpid
How about the odyssey 20gb which is $50 more? Maybe you like FM radio and voice recorder more than I do... that unit is a POS for the price otherwise.

Options cost more. Pretty simple concept... And how exactly is it a pos? Does it have bad sound quality, like the iPod? Low battery life like the iPod? No support for popular file formats like the iPod? etc. etc. etc....

All of the above.