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Looking at MP3 players. Suggestions?

2K views 31 replies 21 participants last post by  Ryce Krysp 
#1 ·
I want to do the music-in-the-helmet thing during the coming summer months, especially for a planned 2,500 miles run.

Though I understand that earpiece selection is a thing in itself, my concern right now lies with the actual MP3 player.

I am looking at the Entempo ($100) as a cheap possibility but then I'm wondering about specific factors such as lousy weather capabilities as well as plug quality, etc...

Entempo link:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...50764-3938251?v=glance&s=electronics&n=507846

Any and all comments are welcome.

Thx
 
#2 ·
I was looking to do the same soon, I found the Samsung YP-T7X. It isn't too much more expensive than that Entempo thing, it's a brand name, has a full colour screen with photo/text viewing capabilities etc.

But if you're looking for a HDD player, it's not the one. I personally would prefer to use a flash player on a motorcycle, you do tend to bump around and vibrate a lot and it would be much sturdier over the long haul.

Besides, how many hours of music do you really need on you at any one time?
 
#3 ·
I also use the Samsung YP-T7X.

The earphones are good, the volume is loud enough.

Note, I think any player/earphone/helmet combination will work but only at city speeds. I found that on the highway, the ambient noise is so loud I can't hear the music.
 
#5 · (Edited)
I too vote IPod, its a little more $$$ up front but works great and battery life much better than any portable MP3 units I have had in the past and lots of storage even if you get one of there older models.
 
#6 · (Edited)
I read elsewhere on the boards somewhere that the high end Sony Fontopia earbuds are designed to be closed and therefore they act as earplugs blocking outside noise as well as earphones. I believe most earbuds are of an open design which means that they do not really block outside noise.

They're kind of pricy, though, but for this application may be well worth it.

I'm sure it also has a lot of bearing on the quality of your helmet, my Shoei is very quiet even at highway speeds I don't feel that I need earplugs.

skeleton said:
I also use the Samsung YP-T7X.

The earphones are good, the volume is loud enough.

Note, I think any player/earphone/helmet combination will work but only at city speeds. I found that on the highway, the ambient noise is so loud I can't hear the music.
 
#8 ·
I have a Dell DJ20. I got it for $200 and it came with a couple of accessories. The new Generation 2 DJ's came out so they were heavily discounting the Gen 1's. Normally would have cost $300 with the accessories they included for free. It was too good a price for a 20 GB mp3 player I couldnt pass it up. Every body says how good the Ipods are but they are a little more pricey. You probably are right about getting one with flash memory. The good thing about the hard drive ones is you can carry your whole music collection any where you go. Car, home, bike, etc. Also the small price difference between the hard drive and flash memory ones makes it easy to justify buying one with a hard drive. You get alot more bang for your $.
 
#10 ·
get an iPod photo. so so worth the money. hell i also use it as another hard drive. i wouldn't get a mini personally, they are only like $100 cheaper and have 10-15X less memory. i couldn't get an 8th of my music on one of those things. jbright44-- i think that will have to get me one of those remote controls. only question is what kind of damage it does to how long the battery will last before powering down?
 
#11 ·
Obviously it depends on the helmet (and your ears), but I didn't think the Sony headphones blocked enough noise. My Arai Signet GTR is pretty noisy, and I need some pretty serious noise reduction with it. Part of the problem is that the Sony headphones come with three different sizes of silicone earpieces, and I fit right between two of them. So neither is a perfect fit.

The only thing I'd avoid with any hard drive based player is mounting it directly to the bike. They're pretty suceptible to vibration, so keeping it in a pocket or tankbag works better.
 
#13 ·
Ok, my creative muvo may be inferior to some of the others listed here.. but for $79 its an mp3 player, radio tuner, voice recorder and a usb flash drive you plug right in.. no cables. Sounds great, runs on one aaa battery which I have yet to replace, has backlit screen. Works perfect for me.
 
#14 ·
Ok as if no one else has mentioned it but I vote for Ipod....I love it. It was truly the best investment that I ever made. I wear it when I am riding and with the remote I am able to control everything as I am riding... I have pics of that in this forum under the ear phones section. Pay the extra money and get the Ipod you will not be sorry that you did.
 
#15 ·
I'm about to order a Zen Micro, after a lot of research shopping this guy looks to be the best bet especially for the price. Many believe these best the iPods in every way. Truth be told I've never been a fan of the iPod design nor it's reliance on iTunes.
 
#16 ·
paxtang said:
Ok, my creative muvo may be inferior to some of the others listed here.. but for $79 its an mp3 player, radio tuner, voice recorder and a usb flash drive you plug right in.. no cables. Sounds great, runs on one aaa battery which I have yet to replace, has backlit screen. Works perfect for me.
I've got the Muvo Slim 256mb and it is awesome. That's a lot of space to store some tunes. It has all of the features listed above except no cables. I plug it in to recharge the batteries and swap my tunes around. Plus it made it through my crash and was still playing when the cut my jacket off in the emergency room.
 
#17 ·
In regards to the question about effectively cancelling out wind noise while riding, I discovered this product which looks VERY promising (though pricy). What do you guys think?

http://www.etymotic.com/ephp/er6i.asp
 
#18 ·
Hey, I use these earphones with pretty good results: Sony Fontopia on Amazon

I am sure they are not as good as the pricier Sony models, much less the custom-type in-ear models, but they work for me. And they don't cost a fortune. They fit in the ear and come with 3 sizes of silicone earbuds to fit them to your ear size. They fit pretty flush when you put them in the ear, so putting on the helmet doesn't rip them out every time. I am happy with them.
 
#19 ·
Pretender, I'm actually looking at the fontopia EX71SL on eBay, selling for about 11 USD + tax and I believe they're the next higher end model from the link you posted. Do your fontopias function enough as an earplug to block out wind noise?
 
#20 ·
I could be wrong but I think I read that foam plugs offer the best noise reduction. I have the koss plug earphones...but... throw away the foam plugs that come with it. get some good foam plugs and and punch a hole through them. try to use something hollow so it will actuall core the plug and you can leave them slightly longer than the little tubes of the earphones and they wont close shut at the end. it doesnt block as much as I want but its the best ive come up with so far. Of course im looking for total silence other than tunes, which may be impossible.
 
#21 · (Edited)
Binary Jay said:
Pretender, I'm actually looking at the fontopia EX71SL on eBay, selling for about 11 USD + tax and I believe they're the next higher end model from the link you posted. Do your fontopias function enough as an earplug to block out wind noise?
Yes, they do block out the wind noise. I can listen to my MP3 player comfortably at highway speeds (70+). They do not block as much noise as the regular foam type plugs (i.e. Hearos, etc). But they do work well enough to listen to music comfortably. Like I said, they probably don't work as well as the more expensive options, but I didn't want to pay that much. I am pleased with them and will get another pair if these wear out or get damaged. If you can get the next model up for $11, I think you will be quite pleased with them. That is a good deal.

Edit: I had to install the largest earbuds that came with them before they would stay in well and block all the wind noise. They worked much better once I did that. Changing the earbuds is really simple. Just pull the old ones off and press the new ones on.
 
#22 ·
General comments/suggestions: Hard disk based music players like the iPod are great if you want to backup or store a lot of data such as an entire music collection. Kind of bulky compared to flash-memory based music players. Flash memory music players are also cheaper but they don't have nearly as much storage capacity. Smaller form factors typical on the flash-memory players compared to the larger hard disk-based ones. Battery life is typically better on the flash ones too, but often times they don't use rechargable battery power which obviously is something you want to factor in on your decision.

I'm happy with my Sandisk, which holds 256MB, or about 4 hours of decent quality MP3 formatted music files. Can hold other data formats too. Battery life kind of sucks.

I'd only go with an iPod if I wanted that much storage. Hard disks break much more easily than something that is solid state in design. Those disks can spin pretty quick (4200RPMs to 7200RPMs typical on music players with disks) and we all know what can happen at high speeds... j/k.
 
#23 ·
#25 ·
An update on the MP3 player - the Zen Micro is absolutely awesome I would recommend it highly to anybody thinking about getting a player. The earbuds it comes with are pretty shitty for in-helmet use though because they protrude from the ear and cause problems getting the helmet on and off.

I'll report on the Shure e2c buds when they arrive.
 
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