Help a noob out w/portable mp3 players

G

gapeachsp5

Member
:
03 Mazda 6s
I'm looking for a portable mp3 player. It doesn't need much space b/c I don't have that many songs. (I'm not interested in an iPod that can store 1000 songs.) Price is an issue, meaning I'm broke and need something that doesn't cost a lot. On the other hand, I don't want something crappy. Suggestions?

Ok, don't make too much fun, but I really don't know much about mp3s, so please help me out w/this issue:

I, for the longest time, just burned mp3s from my computer onto a cd as a data disk, and it works fine on the stock Mazda MP3 cd player. Why does it not work on diff cd players? My real question is, I know that burning songs as data saves a lot of space and takes much less time. Do portable mp3 players accept songs transferred as data? I'd really like that feature if possible.

Help! :)
 
gapeachsp5 said:
I'm looking for a portable mp3 player. It doesn't need much space b/c I don't have that many songs. (I'm not interested in an iPod that can store 1000 songs.) Price is an issue, meaning I'm broke and need something that doesn't cost a lot. On the other hand, I don't want something crappy. Suggestions?

Ok, don't make too much fun, but I really don't know much about mp3s, so please help me out w/this issue:

I, for the longest time, just burned mp3s from my computer onto a cd as a data disk, and it works fine on the stock Mazda MP3 cd player. Why does it not work on diff cd players? My real question is, I know that burning songs as data saves a lot of space and takes much less time. Do portable mp3 players accept songs transferred as data? I'd really like that feature if possible.

Help! :)
Click to expand...

Your stock MP3 cd player can play those data files on CD because it IS an MP3 CD player (and it's supposed to be the reason why Mazda called it the MP3). The CD is just a storage media. It's the file format that counts. If your player can read MP3 files, then it will play it.

If you stick the CD with MP3 files into any other player (that does not play mp3s), it won't play because it does not read MP3 files.

And yes, portable MP3 players do play MP3 files (duh... man i sound stupid saying that) :D
 
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If cost is a major issue, then you can just buy a portable cd/mp3 player. It would work just like the one in your car. You could buy a good one for around 50 bucks.
 
I'm not asking if a portable player plays mp3 files...I understand that. What I'm asking is, can you write them as data and then put them on a portable. On my computer, you burn cds either as audio cds or data cds, and you can format mp3 songs (that take up a lot of space) as data files (that don't take up much space).

My boyfriend has a Kenwood receiver in his car that accepts mp3 files, but it won't accept mp3 files written as data. (The whole reason I asked if mp3 files written as data will work for a portable mp3 player.)
 
.mp3 files work burn to a CD at data. Ex. If you open up the cd in Windows you see the .mp3 files on there. Those will play in a CD player with MP3 playing ability

Burning .mp3 files as a Audio CD will play in any CD player, but you can't have as many files on there.

Portable mp3 players use .mp3 files. Most show up as another drive on your computer that you can copy your .mp3 files onto. Some others come with software that allow you to.

For the price i'd buy this from walmart, i did!
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product_id=3132182

256k holds about 100 mp3s, depending on their size of course. FM radio is a plus. Works on any Windows computer.
 
You have a couple options for good low cost portable MP3 players.

You could get the ipod shuffle, starts at about 100 bucks. Small, nice, holds a good number of songs.

You could get the Dell DJ, you can pick one up for about the same price. I have used it and it is a nice mp3 player. Has lots of great features, and the battery life on this thing is insane.

Almost any Creative portable mp3 player. You can pick these up at WalMart for 40-100 bucks or so depending on which one you get. They are usally pretty durable and the battery life isn't to bad. You will get different features based on which one you get.

So those would be my top choices, I don't think you could go wrong with any of them.


As for the data question, when you burn a CD as an Audio CD it is laid out in tracks, so you can't fit as many on the CD. When you have an MP3 player and you transfer .mp3's to it, the player doesn't store them in tracks like on a cd. It stored just like on your system.
 
gapeachsp5 said:
I'm not asking if a portable player plays mp3 files...I understand that. What I'm asking is, can you write them as data and then put them on a portable. On my computer, you burn cds either as audio cds or data cds, and you can format mp3 songs (that take up a lot of space) as data files (that don't take up much space).

My boyfriend has a Kenwood receiver in his car that accepts mp3 files, but it won't accept mp3 files written as data. (The whole reason I asked if mp3 files written as data will work for a portable mp3 player.)
Click to expand...

Sorry, but I think you're confused about MP3s. Like we said, if the player can take MP3 files, then you can burn them as data. If not, then you have to convert the MP3 files back to Audio CD (you may not be aware of this, but yes, there is conversion going on when you burn as Audio CDs). If you burn them to Audio CD, what is stored on the CD is no longer MP3 files. Yes, it started with MP3, but it was CONVERTED.
 
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As for the data question, when you burn a CD as an Audio CD it is laid out in tracks, so you can't fit as many on the CD. When you have an MP3 player and you transfer .mp3's to it, the player doesn't store them in tracks like on a cd. It stored just like on your system.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Finally, a simple explanation I can understand! :) Again, thanks for all the input, everyone. I'm definitely on the right track now.
 
gapeachsp5 said:
Hello? That's why I was asking for help, but I understand now, so thanks anyway.
Click to expand...

Sorry, just that u said you understand some parts of it, then you said:

"I'm not asking if a portable player plays mp3 files...I understand that. What I'm asking is, can you write them as data and then put them on a portable. On my computer, you burn cds either as audio cds or data cds, and you can format mp3 songs (that take up a lot of space) as data files (that don't take up much space)."

Which didn't make a whole lot of sense.... :)

Anyway, glad to be of service :)
 
Yeah, I really have no clue b/c no one ever taught me anything about it. So, it's pretty much what I know from poking around on my computer. :) (Which, as you can tell, isn't much.)

You can tell I'm an English major, not Computer Science!
 
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