Audio on PPC

[ruffas]

I have been trying to find out if many people use their PPC for listening to music (MP3, WMA) but it doesn't appear that too many people do.

I have just bought an MP3 player from http://www.mp3-plus.net, an ORC-200 (I think it is on Amazon now) as I was getting a bit worried about my using my PPC as a walkman.

I am really interested in this, as a PPC is perfectly designed for multimedia but it isn't a common use.

Humour me and take part in my Poll please!

:mrgreen: Ruffas

[rhmorrison]

I have just bought an MP3 player from http://www.mp3-plus.net, an ORC-200
My GOD! WHY would you do something like this? :multi:

For the amount of money that you spent for the MP3 player you could have bought a 512 MB CF! Are you really going to carry around BOTH your PDA and a seperate MP3 Player?

Here at my company a whole group of us bought the hp Jornada 525 when it was put on sale for 150 Euros a year ago JUST FOR USE AS AN MP3 PLAYER. Since then many have upgraded to better units (I and my wife have hp Jornada 56x units with StowAway keyboards) and others have added GPS receivers, etc.

You now have a nice present to give a brother, sister, nephew, niece, girlfriend, etc... The MP3 player of course, NOT THE PDA!!!

[JoeMoon]

I have been using my PDA as a walkman more and more lately. The more music I compress down to 48K, the easier it is getting to get music onto my PDA. I now have my church recording messages digitally so that I can get them onto my PDA and listen again and again...

It is nice to be able to listen to music and play a game of chess while on the same device... Why would anyone by a limited memory device like a MP3 player when you can get a Dell Axim with expansion slots for about $150?

Joe...

[ruffas]

Duh!

The idea is that I get a light weight MP3 player. the ORC-200 is only about 40 grammes.

I don't take a PDA everywhere, in fact I don't use it as much as I should. The ORC-200 is great as I can load tunes onto it for the tube and copy work onto it to take home.

I actually use it as much to transfer digital image files to an from the office as I do music.

Ruffas

[Kati Compton]

I use my PDA to listen to mp3's when I'm away from my computer. But when I'm at the gym I use a dedicated mp3 player that also takes CF cards.

[Noel]

iPOD.
I lusted for iPOD I lusted for iPOD and finally got one!
Fabulous device. Beautiful. Wonderfull design. Impeccable finish. Great sound. Coolest twiddle-factor wheel.
Then the awful reality - a lifestyle reality.
I found myself placing it VERY carefully on a desk or table (away from edge) after brushing the surface of any grain of anything that could scratch the polished metal back. The perfect crystal plexi edges were a real worry. I wound up putting it in a little silicon rubber (iSkin) suit, which did protect it but also came out of my pocket looking as if it had been playing under the bed. Still it was very cool to have 1,500+ tunes at my thumbtips, even if I had to buy and go through third party playlist software to get music on my device. Oh ya, I did spend hours converting all my desktop wma files (which I find better and smaller) to mp3.
After a few months I realized that from week to week I was only listening to about 50 selections. Hmmm. And since I was using commute time to do email and catch up on AvantGo stuff etc. on my Ax, it was lucky I had another pocket for the iPOD - how many times did I have to do The Pocket Shuffle?

Then I got a 512M CF card.
Threw 85 wmas on it (drag n drop done) before work, left the iPOD @ home.
Never looked back.

Noel

[Jason Dunn]

It depends what I'm doing. When I travel anywhere, 100% of the time I bring my headphones and load up on music. But since I work from home, I don't use my Pocket PC for music very much. It's just not as nice as my Klipsch speakers. :mrgreen:

[Xianfox]

I am really interested in this, as a PPC is perfectly designed for multimedia but it isn't a common use.

Who's got room for music? I've got too many books on mine.

[ekconrad]

It's pretty nice to be able to punch out some e-mails or finish up some work while jamming to some good tunes at the same time.... in the middle of nowhere.

[TheNewSteve]

WinamPaq is fantastic, and free.

I have a bunch of CDs on my 1 gig card (not full yet, and I have a nearly empty 256MB SD card since the 1 gig CF arrived) ripped into 96kbp/s .ogg files.

I just wish those FM radio adapters worked for my car. I got one from Best Buy and it did not seem to function at all. At least I got a good deal after all, when I returned it, it automatically gave me $5 more in refund AND that night there was a ridiculous sale that allowed me to get Rushmore and Swingers on DVD for $20 total (I had originally paid $15 or $16)...

Just wish I could put a movie on my PPC somehow.... no DVD drive on PC, not sure sure how to do it on roommate's iMac with DVD drive... oh well...

-Steve

[ruffas]

:mrgreen:
This is good stuff.

I use my PDA to listen to mp3's when I'm away from my computer. But when I'm at the gym I use a dedicated mp3 player that also takes CF cards.

this is the kind of point i was trying to make, you don't want to take your PDA on a work out do you. unless some of you have yours hardwired to your hand and can't possibly live without it! :wink:

Ruffas

Personally I think this is a great little product...

http://www.mp3-plus.net/images/addimages/orc2003.jpg
http://www.mp3-plus.net

[dh]

Actually I have been thinking of getting a small player to use when running. The Axim is slightly big for that one application. It was OK in the winter when wearing clothes with pockets, but I don't have anywhere to put it now.

I've never done any research on MP3 players and didn't know that some use CF cards. That would be nice.

Anyone know of a good, really small player that uses CF cards and plays .ogg files? (I wonder if such a device even exists?)

[Kati Compton]

Looks like it doesn't support ogg yet, but I can't tell for sure by the wording:

http://www.frontierlabs.com/NEXIA.html

[dh]

Looks like it doesn't support ogg yet, but I can't tell for sure by the wording:

http://www.frontierlabs.com/NEXIA.html

Thanks Kati. That is a super looking player. Is it the one that you use?

Their site does say that it can play .ogg files "with firmware upgrades". I'll have to investigate what this actually means.

[Kati Compton]

I have the NexIIe. I'm still waiting for the firmware upgrades for ogg. ;)

[M@]

So what are the best Pocket PC's for MP3's?

[Janak Parekh]

So what are the best Pocket PC's for MP3's?
Generally, the iPAQs have had the loudest, clearest audio, and a nice DSP for base (and sometimes treble) boost. The others aren't too shabby, but you often need a MP3 player with built-in mixer capabilities to get decent bass (at least, in my opinion).

--janak

[middleman]

This topic is a bit old now but thought I'd use it to make my first post on the board :)

I just bought an IPAQ 5450 2 days ago. One use I have already found for it is as an MP3 player in my car.
I only have the standard cassette player in my car and was going to upgrade it to a CD player in a few weeks but now I dont think I will bother ..just use my ipaq instead!.
My car stereo has a cd input so all I have done is plug a lead into the headphone output of the ipaq and into the cd input and i have a great mp3 player for my car. The sound is great.

What I am thinking of doing is mounting a compact flash adapter kit (I got 1 free with my ipaq) in my car and wiring a car charger and lead from my car stereo cd input to it.

I have a 256 meg compact flash card I am going to use just for music.
That way when I get into the car I just put the Ipaq in the CF Adapter and have an mp3 player with 256 meg of mp3s playing through my car stereo :)...will also charge while I am driving and wont float around in my car either.

cheers
leigh

[jeffmd]

my main form of listening to mp3's is my riovolt 250 cdmp3 player. when I get a full cd of mp3's I allways burn them. Usualy I will load new mp3's not yet burned onto the ppc to hear them out before commiting them to cd. Also obviously carrying around the ppc is easier then carrying around both the ppc and mp3cd player at once.

[dean_shan]

I use my PPC for MP3s and books. I'm not into putting full movies on it. The only video I do is some of the Plus Sync & Go features. It's not the best MP3 player but I like it because I already have it with me and so there is no need to go and buy a dedicated Mp3 player.