Which gapless DAP? - Riovolution

tom56

2006-12-02, 12:06 #1

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Subject: Which gapless DAP?

I'm in the market for a gapless MP3 player. Currently all my music is in Ogg Vorbis but I'm not opposed to re-ripping if that is the best solution. I want to be able to fit all my music on it (in whatever codec I end up using), so it needs to have space for about 200 albums. I use Ubuntu Linux so I'd rather not have something Windows-dependent, but it's not a deal-breaker as I've got Windows for emergencies (i.e. badly designed gadgets that only work on one OS). As far as I can tell I have three options (unless you can suggest something else).

Trekstor Vibez 12gb
+ Plays oggs
+ Decent battery
+ Album art
+ Works in Ubuntu
+ All that neat Karma stuff (DJ, etc)
- Small drive
- No idea about reliability
- Not great value
- Hard to find in UK

iPod (30 or 80gb afaik)
+ Looks nice
+ Big drives
+ Good value
+ Works in Ubuntu
+ Album art
- Need to re-rip
- Questionable build quality
- Short battery life
- Pretty sparse on features
- Don't appreciate the Apple attitude of releasing new iPods instead of new firmware

Sony NW-A3000 (20gb)
+ Looks cool
+ Easy to use
+ Very long battery life (35 hours!)
+ Have heard very good things
+ Nifty OLED screen
- Need to re-rip
- No album art
- Shoddy software
- Windows only

Have I missed anything in my research, and what do y'all reckon I should go for?

nudel 2006-12-02, 15:00 #2

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Battery life on the 60/80gig iPod is absolutely fine, IMO. I wouldn't let that put you off. (I think the 30gig model has less battery life. Not sure how much off the top of my head.)

I really wouldn't go near a Sony DAP. The software is a complete deal-breaker. We're not talking "slight hassle to use but works well enough" we're talking "constantly crashing and doesn't actually fucking work and makes you want to find the people responsible for it and hurt everyone they love" levels of crapness. Which is a real shame as Sony's DAP *hardware* is generally bloody good (as much as it pains me to say a good word about something made by those cocksuckers!).

If you re-rip to a lossless format, and then batch transcode to something else, then you won't be locked in to any particular vendor, which is good. This isn't possible with Sony, though, at least if you want gapless. Sony's crap software will only do a gapless rip from a CD (or virtually mounted CD .iso) so you have spend ages re-ripping into ATRAC, which nothing else can play, either from your original CDs or from ISOs made out of lossless files. (Either way it is a painful, time-consuming and manual process. There's no good way to automate it, either.)

With the Vibez or iPod, on the other hand, it's easy to batch transcode from any lossless format into whatever you need for the device, including gapless.

IMO the only really bad thing about the Vibez is the amount of storage space, while the only really bad thing about the iPod is the awful equaliser.

Oh, make sure that whatever you'd use in Ubuntu to put music on an iPod has been updated to write the gapless tags. If it hasn't then no gapless.

Bit the shed again. Typical.
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tom56

2006-12-02, 15:33 #3

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Thanks for the reply - really helpful. I must admit I've never quite understood how equalizers work and what they are supposed to achieve. Could you explain for me? Wikipedia was just confusing.

If that's the only issue with the iPod then that seems like the best choice. It's a shame not too have the smart playlisting of the Vibez, but it's not the end of the world. My gut instinct is against the iPod, but probably because I always found it crazy that it was so popular yet couldn't even play Abbey Road correctly. Now gapless works I don't really (as far as I know) have any reason to dislike it. Though it would be nice to have something different to everyone else.

Einkoro (Administrator) 2006-12-02, 16:31 #4

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In reply to post #2

Quote by nudel:
Battery life on the 60/80gig iPod is absolutely fine, IMO. I wouldn't let that put you off. (I think the 30gig model has less battery life. Not sure how much off the top of my head.)

The new 30 is 14hr and the 80 is 20hr. Gapless is great but unfortunately you have to use iTunes to sync the music to it or else no gapless.

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Toby 2006-12-02, 18:31 #5

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Quote by Ankle:
Gapless is great but unfortunately you have to use iTunes to sync the music to it or else no gapless.

Or WinAMP...or whoever updates their software to support it in the future (I doubt WinAMP's developers have any special access).

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nudel 2006-12-02, 19:20 #6

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In reply to post #3

Quote by tom56:
I must admit I've never quite understood how equalizers work and what they are supposed to achieve. Could you explain for me?

They let you boost or reduce different sound frequencies. For example, if you want more bass (e.g. because you're using small headphones) you might want to increase the low frequencies, or decrease the high and mid frequencies.

The problem with the iPod's EQ is it has been very badly implemented and does things in the wrong order, so if you boost frequencies you will get distortion. (Seems it's a software problem, not a hardware problem, too. Even more surprising that Apple haven't fixed it yet as I imagine the fix would be trivial.)

If you turn the EQ off (or set it to "Flat"), or if you only reduce frequencies, then the iPod sounds great. Only boosting causes the problem. Unfortunately, though, the iPod only offers EQ presets so you don't have a lot of control and I find that all of the presets either produce distortion or sound rubbish.

If you put the Rockbox 3rd party/open-source firmware on an iPod then the EQ is good, but Rockbox has pros and cons and should be investigated if good EQ is what you need. (Rockbox is great, but not for everyone. It also doesn't currently work on the new "5.5gen" iPods.)

It's a shame not too have the smart playlisting of the Vibez

The iPod does have smart playlists to a degree. (Well, depends exactly what you mean.) In iTunes you can create playlists based on rules, like "is from the 1970s and is rated 3/5 stars or higher and hasn't been listened to in 2 weeks or longer". The next time you sync your iPod those playlists are copied to the iPod as well, so you can use them on the move. I think it may copy the actual playlist, rather than the playlist rules, so it won't dynamically change until you resync, although I may be wrong; it's not something I've used.

Bit the shed again. Typical.
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fondy44 2006-12-03, 15:06 #7

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Actually, some of the iPod's smart playlists do change dynamically. I have one titled "unrated" that I use for new music. If I give a star rating to one of these songs (using the iPod), the song is removed the next time I access the playlist.

I agree about the iPod's EQ though. I can't use any of the presets without distortion unless I run MP3Gain on my song files first. I don't know why Apple won't add a simple 5-band EQ, but sadly it seems like the presets-only approach is becoming standard with other manufacturers too. Sandisk had a decent custom EQ in their M-series players, but later removed it on the E-series.

Riolist 2006-12-03, 16:38 #8

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Quote by fondy44:
sadly it seems like the presets-only approach is becoming standard with other manufacturers too. Sandisk had a decent custom EQ in their M-series players, but later removed it on the E-series.

Actually a recent firmware upgrade added custom EQ to the e200 series, and the new, Nov. 30 Samsung Z5 upgrade adds custom EQ to that model.

This post was edited on 2006-12-03, 16:40 by Riolist.

brez 2006-12-04, 04:45 #9

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Quote by Riolist:
and the new, Nov. 30 Samsung Z5 upgrade adds custom EQ to that model.

It should have had it since day one. It should have everything that the Vibez has, only with flash :nuts:

tom56

2006-12-04, 14:28 #10

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Thanks for the help everyone, I certainly feel much better informed! I'll let you know what happens. I am leaning towards getting the Vibez then cracking it open when a bigger drive comes out.

Cheers all!

tom56

2007-04-16, 12:38 #11

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I never actually got round to buying anything following this thread. I now have the money and am going to buy this week. Has there been any developments since I originally posted this (e.g. 20gb vibez, an ogg vorbis ipod)?

I'm now leaning towards the iAudio x5L and putting Rockbox on it (35 hours battery life! gapless oggs!). It would be nice to have something less brick-like but I hear the regular x5 only gets 5 or 6 hours with Rockbox which is nowhere near enough.

krazykit (Administrator) 2007-04-16, 12:46 #12

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Quote by tom56:
I never actually got round to buying anything following this thread. I now have the money and am going to buy this week. Has there been any developments since I originally posted this (e.g. 20gb vibez, an ogg vorbis ipod)?

I'm now leaning towards the iAudio x5L and putting Rockbox on it (35 hours battery life! gapless oggs!). It would be nice to have something less brick-like but I hear the regular x5 only gets 5 or 6 hours with Rockbox which is nowhere near enough.

Not really. The iAudio is probably a good bet. You missed the deal on the $100 40GB Toshiba Gigabeat (Rockboxable) though.

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tom56

2007-04-16, 12:58 #13

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Quote by krazykit:
You missed the deal on the $100 40GB Toshiba Gigabeat (Rockboxable) though.

I'm in the UK so that wouldn't have been available anyway

However this is - http://play.com/Electronics/Electronics/STTS4/3-/732042/So…

I'm bloody tempted but I can't put the worry about the software out of my mind (and having to re-rip my CDs). But part of me thinks you can't go wrong for £100. That's half the price of the iAudio, and twice as good-looking.

krazykit (Administrator) 2007-04-16, 19:15 #14

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Quote by tom56:
Quote by krazykit:
You missed the deal on the $100 40GB Toshiba Gigabeat (Rockboxable) though.

I'm in the UK so that wouldn't have been available anyway

However this is - http://play.com/Electronics/Electronics/STTS4/3-/732042/So…

I'm bloody tempted but I can't put the worry about the software out of my mind (and having to re-rip my CDs). But part of me thinks you can't go wrong for £100. That's half the price of the iAudio, and twice as good-looking.

And complete with really shitty software!

tom56

2007-04-25, 04:05 #15

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Well, I took the plunge and bought the iAudio X5L. I have to say it's a lot smaller than I thought it would be (its about the same size as a single cassette case) - it easily fits in my pocket (as long as there's nothing else in there) and I actually quite like the extra weight; it makes it feel more solid - and it could never be described as heavy. Loving the metal casing. I stuck rockbox on there straight away (mmm... gapless) and the battery life seems good. I reckon about 20 hrs when I'm messing with the settings all the time - would probably be longer under normal use. The only downsides so far are the "color sound" bit on the side of the screen and the fact that the name "iAudio" makes it sound like an iPod rip-off to the uneducated. And the little rubber bit that covers the docking port detaches completely so it could easily get lost if you're not careful. But that's it by way of issues. If I listed the pro's I'd be here all day.

In conclusion I'm beaming

Thanks for all the help guys