New 2 gb Ilo at Walmart

[Jeff]

I saw a new 2 gb Ilo at my local Walmart today. It was priced at $158+.
In my opinion, it looks really "cool", especially compared to the 1 gb
Ilo. It is a flash player using a AAA battery, which I prefer. It also
comes with a belt clip which I also prefer.

[Hartmeister]

Does it allow you to add an SD card to?

[Jeff]

I will check the next time I stop at Walmart. I will post in about one
week.

[Mark Florence]

does it look like this:

 

 

http://www.sirenplayer.com/edge.php

Jeff <Jeff...@hotmail.com> wrote:

[Jeff]

No, it does not look like the Mp3 player in your posted link. In my
opinion, it looks better than the one in your post.

[TheMP3Players]

Cool! Please keep us updated ;)

[Jeff]

Yes I will be stopping at Walmart this weekend. Interesting side
note-Walmart on-line did not have the Ilo 256 on it's site for some
time and this morning they have the Ilo 256 available in three
colors-silver at $49 +, and the green and blue at $54+.

[Jeff]

I stopped at Walmart and checked if the new 2 gb Ilo is expandable. It
is not expandable.

[David Hart]

I'm not surprised. The current limit on SD cards is 2GB because they use FAT16. To go beyond that the drives would have to be formated via FAT32 which is not part of the SD spec. The SD expansion idea has been a great teaser "buy a 256M drive, expandable to 1.25 (or 2.25)G)". A 2G drive could only double the units memory size with a 2GB SD card. Also we know that the iLo has always had problems with the Lexar SD cards which are a major SD supplier to Wal-Mart.

Plus the SD card expansion idea used to make the iLo's competitive against the Rio units. Now that Rio is defunct there isn't a line which is totally committed to the idea of SD expansion. iPod is the big enchilada and they are completely unexpandable (memory) and fixable (no user replaceable batteries). Unfortunately they are the target of the market today.

Unfortunately without SD expansion it make the units one less thing that is different than the iLo units. This really leaves only on two major MP3 makers with significant differences (iRiver and Cowon who have OGG support) to the iPod other than FM support. Almost all MP3 units (other than Apple) have MP3, WMA and an FM tuner. I think most users will treat WMA as inferior to to AAC and the FM tuners (except for iRiver and Sony) usually leave most people wanting something better. The largest competitor, Sony, gives the horrible SonicStage software with its unit and includes ATRAC instead of WMA ; an even worse competitive situation. Creative is coming out with some interesting models but it really is a drop in the bucket.

Also what hurts (in the low-end memory devices) is the fact that it Apple has a significant quality advantage over its competition. For instance, when independent testing was made of the Shuffle it was found that the audio quality of its amplifier was significantly improved (and quite superior to its competitors)  over earlier iPod generations. Apple chose to improve its lowest end product. That resonates with the public who is trying to find out which MP3 player to purchase. Increasingly it is becoming iPod and everybody else.

Creative is trying its best effort yet against the 30G iPod with the Vision:M but if this works we'll have to declare Apple the winner for now. Of course if the Vision:M fails execpt Micro$oft to enter the market directly (or to make such a significant investment in one of them that they merely become a surrogate).. I can't imagine Micro$oft allowing its market share to decline forever, because that is what we are talking about here. A certain percentage of those who buy iPods are also buying iMacs and iBooks. They are making converts here. The purpose of the iPod isn't to make  a great MP3 player and a profit; its to make such a great MP3 that people will buy desktop and laptop computers from Apple.

[Jeff]

David,

Your knowledge of the MP3 market is extraordinary. Maybe you or others
can help find a different set of earphones for my Ilo 256. I use my Ilo
for running and weight machines in a club. I am not happy with earbuds
because they keep falling out. I would prefer earbuds if they had an
ear hook . An interesting earphone is the RCA 290 sport hook. Can
anybody comment on this product or recommend another?

Jeff

[David Hart]

If you want a good cheap headphone I generally recommend Sony's. Their neodymium magnet design is pretty good for a cheap design. For a sports style perhaps the MDR-J20 ($20) would be good. If you want something over the head but still pretty light, sporty and waterproof a MDR-W20G ( $25) would be good too. I don't think you want to spend anything over $25 with something like the iLo. You can get both of them from the Sony website.

If you really want to go and spend some money you might want to try some of the in-the-ear designs. A good design for the price is the $99 Super.Fi 3 Studio from Ultimate Ears (http://www.ultimateears.com/superfi/superfi-3-studio_white.htm ). It's about a 1/3 less than the comparable Shure and Etymotic designs. I've tried several of the budget-in-the-ear designs and I've been less than impressed. The only real disadvantage of in-the-ear models is their maintenance. You have to clean ear wax from them and the inserts wear out much quicker than pads do on regular headphones. The advantages are the incredible details you are able to listen to on recording.

BTW, I recommend for anybody on the list that you rip your recordings via Exact Audio Copy (http://www.exactaudiocopy.org/ )  and encode with the LAME MP3 encoder. Both of these products are available free on the 'Net. A great resource for high-end audio is http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php and the wiki for it is at http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Main_Page .

On 1/15/06, Jeff <Jeff...@hotmail.com> wrote:

[Martin]

I just purchased the new 2gig player and it works really well. I've
even dropped it twice and it still works. The only thing that kind of
sucks is the belt clip that comes with it, the player will fall of that
in a hear beat. However, it does a "lock player" button that allows
you put the player in your pocket if you need to. The sound quality is
great especiallys with the XBASS setting. I'm still upsed that I can't
get my DRM media to run on it. I've been checking out audiobooks from
the library, but the drm license for these things won't work on this
player. Maybe it's because the license expires in 21 days?

I really like this player over all. Especially since all my other
players (Rio Niturs and another mini hard drive player) have always
tended to flake out. Of course i'm pretty hard on these things to
since I carry them around in my work satchel. I hope that this flash
player will hold up better to the kind of wear and tear I put on it.

[David Hart]

Martin,

How does the resume work? Does it go back to where you left off when you turn the unit on and off. How about when you go the tuner and back? That is where I feel that most design of MP3 players tends to loose it. Most manufacturers give a list of specs that they want to see in a player but it tends to loose in the actual use of the unit. For instance most units have poor resumes and then even if it resumes right if you go to the tuner and back it resets again. If I have a unit that resets after going to the tuner I'll probably never ever use the tuner because I'll loose where I was. Of course my perspective is one of an audio book lover, not of a music lover who might care less that it goes where they were last at the same point in a song.

You can see from my perspective that I against the concept of the iPod shuffle though I think that Apple made an excellent product from a bad idea.

[Trapper]

How does the resume work? Does it go back to where you left off when you turn the unit on and off. How about when you go the tuner and back? That is where I feel that most design of MP3 players tends to loose it. Most manufacturers give a list of specs that they want to see in a player but it tends to loose in the actual use of the unit. For instance most units have poor resumes and then even if it resumes right if you go to the tuner and back it resets again. If I have a unit that resets after going to the tuner I'll probably never ever use the tuner because I'll loose where I was. Of course my perspective is one of an audio book lover, not of a music lover who might care less that it goes where they were last at the same point in a song. 

 

I bought a Rave AMP512 last May and although it had settings for Resume, they didn't work.  It was one of several things about that player that doesn't work or doesn't work very well.   But a firmware upgrade did solve that problem. 

 

A few weeks ago, I bought a SanDisk Sansa512.  The Resume settings work well on it, also.  I never use the tuner so I don't know if that affects the Resume settings or not. 

 

I also use one player primarily to listen to audio books, and was using the Rave player for that and keeping the Sansa stocked with music.  But the Rave has always had intermittent problems with going berserk after I change its contents, about half the time requiring a reinstallation of the firmware.  The only benefit that player offered was that it has the case with the clip so you can hang it on a back pocket.  The Sansa comes with this dreadful little plastic case that its hard to get the player in and out of, and the thing has only a belt clip, the kind you actually have to thread a belt through. 

 

So lately, I've been using the Sansa for books and it's a vast improvement.  It handles having its contents changed without any problem and rebuilds its library in a flash.  Another difference is that you can pause the Rave and it'll stay paused until the battery runs out, but the Sansa just turns itself off after a very short time.  It has never failed to start up again at the very place I left off when I paused it.

 

Something interesting I've noticed and have no explanation for is this -- I have Windows XP Home on one computer and 2000 Pro on another.  If I load either player on one computer, the other computer cannot see the contents.  I use Windows Explorer to add and delete.  I don't know if the computers would be able to find contents added on the other computer if I used a different program, but I don't see why that would make a difference. It's not a problem, just something I've noticed and wondered about.

 

Trapper