i want to get my wife an MP3 player for xmas since she is a bit of a raver bless her, and it will get her motivated to get onto the computer a bit more.
any ideas on a good buy? i am looking to spend around $100-150 i expect i can get something half decent for that- and i expect that will last 2-4 hours of music.
so questions- are some brands better than others?
are some brands/software more user friendly?
are they easy/cheap to upgrade the memory?
Bruce we bought LazyBoy the Rca Lyra 128 Meg Player, REVIEW FOUND HERE . No complaints so far other than I would prefer being able to drag and drop files in windows explorer rather than having to use the bundled software to transfer files. 128 Megs of internal storage and the add on memory cards are reasonably priced to expand your storage space.
I have that exact MP3 player, the IRiver 128MB. I like it alot. You can go to the iRiver website and download updates and other features for the player. The program that comes with it is pretty straight forward, click and drag files kinda thing. It also has a AM/FM radio in it and a Mic for recording voice. You can also record radio on it. The radio part is nice if you go to the gym and they have the TVs sound playing on the radio.
It's a little out of the price range you want, but I'd vote for the iPod also. Awesome capacity (I have 8 _days_ of music on mine, and it is not even half full), great UI on both the device and the software(iTunes rocks!), and it now works with Macs or Windows.
I wouldn't count on being able to upgrade any consumer electronics device, unless the manufacturer explicitly states that as a feature.
LOL- i just found another one- $150 for 256mb is real good value and it gets elxcellent reviews. i was getting lured by the ipod until i realised it is actually a hard drive and thus moving parts etc. i think the one below should serve us good