5. Portable MP3 Players (Flash Based)

Two companies decided to send along MP3 players some time ago and since decided to use them as good examples of the general types of portable hardware MP3 players available.

The first example is from Yuan who sent me their 64 MB flash-memory based MP-300 portable MP3 player.

This unit comes with a USB cable (for data transfers and power), earphones, rechargeable batteries, CD of software and a one-page manual. This is probably one of the more inexpensive MP3 players on the market and you'll see why. The player offers the basics and does it well. The benefits of it are that it stores 64 MBs of music (about 12-13 songs at 128k-bit rates), it's portable, rechargeable, does obviously not skip with movement, can record voice samples, treble/bass control, has 6 hours of power on the batteries (I could only get 3 hours with my testing), and is upgradeable with a 128 MB module as well as a decent LCD display.

The MP-300 comes with software that lets you play, create and store MP3s. The software can play MP3's just like any other software MP3 player but stays pretty basic. Creating MP3's is also very simple but does the job fairly well. You won't get near the same options as we saw in our fancy MP3 encoder with Nero however. To store MP3's on the actual unit, you'll need to plug the MP-300 into your USB port (where it can charge itself as well). Keep in mind that you'll need to install the proprietary software before plugging in the unit in just anywhere.

The biggest drawback of the flash based players in general is the limit storage space. 12-13 songs (with the 64 MB version) might be enough time for a good workout, especially since it won't skip with rigorous movement, but 64 MB of storage doesn't cut it for a long trip. Having no easily accessible devices to change the music in the device is not a good thing. If I could have modules I carried around with all the various music, that might be ok but even that would be annoying.

Overall I think this device is best suited for those who don't mind the limited storage and/or use it in an environment where the device will be rattled constantly (i.e. during a workout). At a little over $100 this isn't a bad deal but competitive products available in the US might a little bit pricier. I wasn't quoted memory upgrade prices but I don't think those will be too cheap as I've seen competitive products sell something similar for a decent price tag (like 64 MB for about $60-70).

Portable MP3 Players (CD Based)

Our second player is a hybrid CD-based player from ENCiNO called the Voyager.

A package like this will come with the CD player, rechargeable batteries, and mini-jack to RCA converter cable, earphones, and power adapter. The Voyager looks like your average portable CD player and it can be but it also is able to play CD-R or CR-RW disks with MP3 files on them. This means you can have about 650 MBs of MP3's on one CD. Using our 5 MB per song average, you can store about 130+ songs or over 10 times more than the flashed based player. MP3 CD's can have directories along with the MP3 files for easier navigation as the unit can skip directories.

If you're worried about the occasional bump in a car or while walking, don't worry too much as the unit has a 60 second buffer. This worked well for some things but it's not as forgiving while jogging, the buffer definitely has its limitations.

Keep in mind that you'll need your own CD burner to copy MP3 data files to CD so that you can use this. Without this ability, you can't make your own MP3 CDs. With the cost of $169 for the Voyager and about $100 for a decent IDE CD burner and about $1 per blank CD, the investment isn't a small one but hardly unreasonable.

The clear advantage of this unit is the enormous amount of MP3 storage space it offers. I personally feel that this is the way to go as long as you have the CD burner to compliment it.

The obvious disadvantage compared to a flash-memory based player is that the initial costs is going to be higher and the ability to go running, jogging or any other "shaky" environment is limited.