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Battle of the Nomad and the iPod
Posted by Skrud at Sunday, June 19th 2005 at 7:04pm
Alright … I’ve read some of the blog comments on the last post and I’ve done some more research. Here’s the breakdown of where I’m leaning to:
Requirements
This is what I’m looking for in my music player-to-be:
- Able to hold all my music (~ 56 GB)
- Small and lightweight, so that it fits easily in a pocket
- Durable, because I’m pretty harsh on my gadgets
- Works well with Mac OS X, Linux, and even Windows
- Supporting (at least one) lossless codec would be nice.
- Support for Unicode tags (I’m a freak - and have songs tagged in Japanese, as well as Swedish)
- Asking for Musepack is too much, so I won’t. And no player that supports OGG comes with more than 40GB of storage.
iPod Pros
- Integrates seamlessly with Mac OS X; iTunes for Windows, gtkpod for Linux
- Smaller, lighter, sleeker than Zen Nomad & free custom engraving
- Colour screen that shows album covers
- Supports Apple Lossless format
- Best-in-the-business user interface.
- Syncs up with iCal and Address Book.
- Supports a ridiculous number of languages and locales.
- Random really cool things to do with an iPod
iPod Cons
- Kind of expensive, especially with the AppleCare warranty and battery issue
- Battery will die permanently after ~1.5 years. (But AppleCare will replace it for free if this is <2 years)
Creative Zen Nomad Xtra Pros
- Better sound quality (~98dB signal-to-noise ratio. iPod is ~90dB. Most other players are ~80dB)
- Cheaper than the iPod
- Works with Windows and Linux (gnomad2)
- Removeable battery (new batteries ~$40 US)
Creative Zen Nomad Xtra Cons
- Clunky user interface
- Nomad on Mac OS X? Doesn’t look good, even though iTunes supports a number of other Creative players
- No lossless formats, only raw WAV files
The other question is whether or not I really want to have my entire music collection on a sleek little portable thing, or just get a smaller one (say, iPod Mini vs. Zen Micro or Cowon iAUDIO) that’s around 5GB or so and “keep it fresh”.
I’d go iPod. Just seems better to me. Plus the random stuff is pretty awesome!
oh yeah the battery is pretty much a moot point. you can get ipod batteries now at any Mac store for pretty cheap.
they even include the tools to open the ipod without damaging the case. so if the battery dies in >2years you still have options open to you.
kevin beat me to it. i was gonna mention the battery thing…
I say the solution is MP3 CDs. Sure it’s bulky, has moving parts, and it’s very conventional, but you can still fit 160 songs in there and they are priced at a reasonnable $32 at wal-mart. They take standard AA batteries that you can buy with a charger for a mere $20.
^^ Spiro: That doesn’t satisfy requirement #1 or #2 :P
But thanks for the input.
I had a CD player capable of playing mp3 encoded music files, and I have to say that song navigation proved “le grand suck”. I spent more time skipping songs than listening to them.
CDs have a relatively short lifespan, especially when kept in your backpack.
I think iPod is the way to go. The thing *is* going to break, and I’d rather have Apple take care of me than anyone else.
I agree. And I found out some wonderful wonderful news about my ipod last night. I can sync it up wiht my desktop AND my laptop without it wiping itself out. This is great as my laptop has been wiped clean and i have ALL of my pix from the past 2yrs on hte iPod. So wonderful to have something that truly works all by itself (it started syncing itself up the second i plugged it in).
Go for gold and get the iPod Skrud.
You got brainwashed into getting the Powerbook. Now that you have it, whatever mind-control drug Apple coats the keyboard with that seeps into your bloodstream through the fingertips will keep you coming back to Apple products. That’s why you have to send them back to Apple for batteries, so they can re-coat the control pad with Gleemonex.
You know you’re getting an iPod.
We all know you’re getting an iPod.
Get an iPod already!
Skrud, didn’t you learn that not all requirements need to be implemented in the design? SHEESH!!! :P
^^ Yeah but it defeats the whole purpose of an mp3 player, which is: I’m too lazy to burn a new CD every week.
Good design is always worth an extra couple of bucks…as long as you have it.
The Creative Zen is not limited to WAV files.
^^ No, but that’s the only lossless format it supports. At twice the size of FLAC, I’m not really interested.
Old post but Ipod is way expensive for the quality of product. File format doesnt matter as the frequency response of the Ipod cuts off music at the same point as the MP3 compression does, so whatever quality the “lossless” format keeps, the ipod itself will remove. Anything over a 320kbps MP3 in my opinion is pretty much useless on the pod so dont waste the memory =) If you really care about audio quality you’de go creative and lose the cheap apple DAC
New zen will give you 60 gigs for the price of apple 40 and sound quality only found on highest end audio. But its huge and has no cool doohickys (flashlights and FM tuners).
Unless you are looking to use it for professional sampling…in which case, buy a minidisc recorder.
“techie” is a moron. His complaints about the iPod DAC are completely groundless, and he’s apparently unaware that a minidisc recorder uses lossy compression, making it a STUPID choice for “professional sampling”.
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