Unless it has changed, ipods will not play other audio formats besides the mp3/mp4. Most other players will.
I'm guessing some can play lossless flac or other lossless file types? That's kind of cool. I'm an ipod girl too, but that might make me consider another player.
Meaning better sound quality? I guess that would be nice, but I generally play CDs/records at home and don't need hi-fi sound from my iPod. I would think any audiophile would scoff at using a music storage device (iPod or otherwise) as their primary playback method. And can you really tell a difference in sound quality when you're out walking about, or plugging your iPod into your work computer?
Apple offers a 'lossless' compression as well that you can rip CDs to, although i'd say MP3s are just fine for most people. There are all kinds of portable audio devices out there that support way more audio formats etc, but if you dont use that functionality, what's the point?
That I ripped myself. I will make a playlist with a bunch of various album's on it & try to burn it & it says some files cannot be burned.
I'd make sure that they are MP3 first, iTunes defaults to AAC when importing music, which can't be used to make an MP3 CD, but can be used to make regular audio discs
As long as you ditch the headphones that the ipods come with, god they are a vile piece of kit. I quite like how each generation they give you less and less in the box. I had one aaaages ago and it came with chargers, cd's etc. The last one I got came with virtually nothing. I've given up with it though and changed the OS. Can finally get it to play .ogg and .flac. Kills the battery pretty quickly though. Oh and iTunes, I hate that piece of crap software.
ipods support: AAC (16 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), MP3 (16 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible (formats 2, 3, and 4), Apple Lossless, AIFF, and WAV I, like atease, totally love Apple. I'm confused when you say it's not user friendly. I think the ipod is probably one of the easiest devices to use that exists. I had 2 other mp3 players before my first ipod. It was a joke once I got my ipod. If you're concerned about sound quality you can manually change the settings in itunes when you rip cds. I rip at the highest quality that an mp3 can be formatted at. If you're truly worried about losing sound quality, rip in WAV format. That's as good as it gets.
I'm speaking to no fm radio, limited formats, etc. For me its all about the way they did business with DRM etc and bowing to the RIAA. Carry on, Roger, I'm sure, would jump me for hating on this thread.
Don't take this the wrong way, but your iPod hate comes across as snobbery due to it's popularity rather than complaints about the actual product. It's a great product - if it wasn't it wouldn't be nearly as successful as it is. The format of the music is just fine, and apparently it supports multiple formats. And most people couldn't care less about FM radio on a digital music device - why the hell would I want to listen to radio when I have my entire music collection and podcasts? It's fine that it's not for you, but it's not a bad product and people aren't "sheep" just for buying/liking them. (My only complaint is the damn battery. I wish I could replace it myself for a fraction of the cost. That's the only thing that pisses me off about the iPod.) And I really don't mean to offend with the "snob" comment - I openly admit that I can be quite snobbish with regards to stuff I'm into. I think we all are.
I have a very sensitive spot about how hard the RIAA has fucked over everyone. Apple helped, so thats where most of it comes from. I've also had devicies that make it simple easy to rip your cds right to the device etc. Its more of an ethics thing for me at times, along with just the fact that I like a drag and drop format player that I can use anywhere and give anyone anything off of. edit: You're a snob.
I don't know anything about RIAA - all I know is that it's supposedly bad. I just haven't cared enough to find out why. If it's something you're passionate about and you see Apple as being complicit that's a good enough reason for you not to like the product. But I still think it's a great product for me. And I am definitely a snob when it comes to products I'm passionate about. I use to be quite the beer snob - but now I mainly drink PBR or whatever's cheap.
OMG, 928 albums & I didn't have it set to mp3. Is there any way to change them to mp3, or do I have to delete & re-rip?
I'm not sure you want to create a new compressed audio file using an already compressed audio file as the source. I think that will tear a hole in the universe or something. -- jJ
Yes, change the format to MP3 in the preferences. Then after that select the songs you want to convert, go to the "advanced" menu and at some point on there it should say "create mp3 version." Hope that helps.
any chance your with at&t bryce_r? that new iphone would probably be good for you if you were getting or looking for a new contract for a phone. would be 200 for the 16gb version and you'd only have to carry around one device for a phone, ipod, apps and anything else you can do with it.
audiodifficulties said tons of stuff. Here's my 2 cents. FM radio? Have you ever listened to FM radio nowadays? There's a reason why it's dying. Most FM stations sound like an iPod on shuffle with a random robo-DJ spot every few songs. It's pathetic. I don't miss it one bit. Shove a bunch of tunes on a 1 Gig iPod Shuffle and you have a better selection than FM radio. Also, the RIAA sucks, but guess what... Anyone doing business in music nowadays must deal with them. And for all your talk about them bowing down to the RIAA you ignore the fact that when Apple had a large enough market share to “bark back” at the RIAA they did and started releasing DRM free music via the Apple store. Higher bitrate and DRM free. Sometimes you have to grow to negotiate and get your way. Audio formats are no big deal. Ogg Vorbis support would be cool, but outside of that format the iPod plays everything else in the world. Also, Ogg Vorbis was developed as a better way to compress audio back in 1998. It works well and creates slightly smaller/higher-quality files... But there's one issue... Storage space is costing less and less. So it gets to the point of... Whatever... Few people I know keep their whole song libraries on their iPod... Also, as far as AT&T goes... They suck horribly. That's why folks need to pay attention to the iPod Touch. Apple is not stupid. They released that as an alternative for folks who don't want an iPhone but want everything else. Which brings be back to this thread's original topic. I'm not 100% clear on whether the 2nd Gen iPod Touch is 100% on par with the iPhone 3GS. But I do know one thing. The new software/firmware OS update will finally activate Bluetooth headphone support on the iPod Touch. That's pretty awesome. Because while you now have to get a special set of headphones with a mic to do VoIP on the Touch, this activation of Bluetooth hardware that was sitting dormant means more people will have easier options to simply use VoIP on their iPod Touch's. Which to me makes it a very lucrative alternative for folks who would like phone service without a contract. An iPhone will still get more coverage than an iPod Touch that is restricted to WiFi... But for most folks, whatever. People who use their phone all the time will need an iPhone. Folks like me who don't need to be in contact 24/7... Wow... This might give me a reason to break my cell contract for once. Also, audiodifficulties you say there are alternatives, but you don't mention any. Truth be told there are few if any viable audio/video player alternatives that come close to what the iPod can do. Which is amazing. Maybe the Zune, but not really. As much as I am a scrapper and dumpster diver and how much I like fixing things, some things that just work well should be appreciated as something that just works well. And to me, even the iPod Shuffle is tons better than alternatives. Will say this tough. I think the way someone looks when they are sliding their hands across the face of an iPhone/iPod Touch looks ridiculous... But whatever...
my wife has an iphone and i use it all the time, except for music. i love windows media player, and it makes things sooooo much easier than itunes. with itunes i get lost easily, and it seems like you have to find buttons that aren't readily seeable to do common tasks. with wmp, you wanna rip, burn, or sync, there are big huge buttons at the top. click and drag! it is so fucking easy. and it looks better as well. itunes looks 10 years old. i also don't like that the music you have in an ipod doesn't stay in there after you burn in more songs. you have to put them into the new playlist again. (is this only the shuffle?) is it true that the microsoft zune also doesn't use windows media player? pisses me off!
Not too clear on this. On the iPod Shuffle, the software is designed to randomly pick stuff and then put it on your shuffle... But you can also set it so the shuffle is connected to a special playlist where you can either have random songs picked out of your playlist or just have the whole list added in the order you set it. The shuffle is a tad more hands on that way. The iPod (anything but the shuffle) allows you to automatically sync anything/everything each time you update it.
