New Ipod/ cleaning mp3s

[Fred Nerd]

I just bought my first Ipod. 120GB classic. I mean to fill it with my cd collection (ok, partly fill it ).
But I also have a bunch of random songs on my computer which come from questionable sources.
The question is: is there any danger in transferring these to the Ipod, and how can this be avoided? I was thinking of running them through a program like Super(c) and changing format to clean them of any other data, I don't know if this helps?

Also, what other sync programs do you reccommend? Or should just stick with Itunes? Usless 65.5MB download.....seriously, couldn't they put it on the ipod, or on a cd, or anything??????
I'm on a 500 a month plan, and what about people on dialup??????

I'll see how I like it when I finally get it down. But I don't hold much hope, I never did like apple, and I think this will just justify it.....

[kilele]

I use in my car a cheap pendrive of 4GB and '"synchronize" it by hand with this program
http://www.davewolf.net/software/products.php

[f0dder]

There shouldn't really be any harm in transferring MP3 files directly to the ipod - at least I haven't heard of any attacks coming that way (there's been some media player exploits, but can't remember if that was through MP3 or WMA). I wouldn't worry, really.

As for iTunes, yeah it's a big pile of junk. But you made a mistake in choosing an apple product - you will need to use a synchronization app that understands the iPod, and can't just copy your MP3 files directly to the device. There are alternatives to iJunk, though - iirc there's a winamp plugin, and I've heard people say good things about anapod (but have no experience with it myself).

Personally, I'm glad I got a sandisk sansa e280... 8gig built-in flash, and an added 8gig SD micro card. There's a long way to go to harddisk-sized capacity, but 16 gigs on the go is good enough for me, and I transfer files simply by copying via explorer

[Fred Nerd]

I've heard vague rumours of ipods bricking with some songs from Limewire, on some tech help website some people were wanting help with it, but I never found out if they really knew why it bricked.
So thats why I wanted to know.

I know I shouldn't have gone apple, but when you want to put 500+ cds on, and a few concert dvds, and still have room to play with, there's no other option. not in Australia anyway.

A bit of research has turned up a few other options which sound interesting.

I just really hate this piece of rotten apple.
WHERE IS THE SETTINGS SECTION?????????

the settings are not what I call settings, I want to be able to control folder view, the size of the font, why the screen is half taken by album cover art which it can never find so why have a blank half.......

And the scroll volume....... give me a break, if you think thats a good feature..... try changeing it with one finger like you can a nice 2 button volume. Oh and then you can't change the volume unless you are in the now playing section......

If anyone invents a windows or Linux or android based mp3 player with 120GB, they'll make a fortune.....
I don't know about Zune: we can't get it here.

Anyway, it will do me, but I'll never love it; my cheap digital camera has more, easy to use features.....

And do I get the impression that you need to have your entire collection on your computer to sync it to the ipod?
So, since I only only have a few GB free, I can't use most of the ipod, (except by using third party software)....

Apple = mad

Sorry about the rant, but $339 is a lot for a piece of **** in a shiny cover. (at least mine isn't that annoying old white :p)

[tomos]

And do I get the impression that you need to have your entire collection on your computer to sync it to the ipod?
So, since I only only have a few GB free, I can't use most of the ipod, (except by using third party software)....

I've heard that but from a friend of mine who isnt that familiar with the software (iTunes) and isnt really a check-out-all-the-options-type
-
is it true that you have to synch your full iTunes collection with the iPod - i.e. you cant have more in iTunes than you have in yer iPod (or the other way round) - or worse still you cant selectively select what goes on the iPod ??
if that's true Apple truly are mad as you say Fred lol

[Fred Nerd]

Haven't found out about syncing, but how's this for crazy...... to get cover art you need to have an iTunes account. To get an iTunes account you need to enter your credit card details before you even get there.
Get a life, apple. You're not getting my credit card number unless I want to buy something, and rest assured that I still want the hard copy cd. (lots more pictures to look at, lots more info and personal notes from the artists.... and NO DRM  )

I'll try winamp
I use it already, so it should do nicely.

[Daleus]

I know this is too late for Fred, but I wanted to echo the above stated satisfaction with the Sansa line of players.

I don't have the big fancy 8gigger with SD slot, but I do have the plain jane 2gig model.

Why did I go this way?

1. Uses just 1 standard AAA battery.  I can use a rechargable. I can actually change the dead battery myself!  What a concept. On top of this, the packaing claims 19 hours of contuous play from that AAA, and they are not lying!  I usually get about 19-20 hours of use.

2. Don't need no steenking synchro software.  Yes, syncing the files can be useful for 1001 reasons, but it's just not for me

3. Price.  I bought my first Sansa, a 1gig, for less than a hundred bucks.  I got just before a trip and during that trip the poor got smacked and the lcd panel was useless after that.  So I went to repalce it and discovered that over the holidays, the price had dropped by half and now I could afford the 2gig model for the same price.  I've been using it for just over a year now and have zero complaints.

4. It plays, it shows tags, it's got a fully functional am/fm radio in it and it will record voice memos with the built in mic.  No you won't get broadcast quality, but it's certainly as good as a cheap tape recorder.

Having said that, I will warn you that if you have old tired eyes like mine, you might find the smallish display a bit of a pain, but really, once yer listenin' to da tunez.....

[f0dder]

The e280 that I have uses a proprietary battery (looks like a typical cellphone one), but the nice thing is that you can replace it yourself. It's also a sturdy little beast, it's survived being dropped multiple times (including from a 40km/h bicycle), lying a couple of hours submerged in water (long story ), et cetera. It plays loud (drives my Sennheiser HD485 loud enough to cause ear damage), it plays well, and is generally lovely.

There's a few issues, though:

• It pops up as a disk drive (which I love), but that does mean it takes a lot of time to update it's database when you've copied new tracks to the device. Probably ~45 seconds when it's internal 8gig flash is full and it's also faced with a rather filled up 8gig SD card
• I've had it lock up a few times, not sure exactly what has triggered it - had to remove the four back screws and unplug the battery to "uncrash" it
• it seems to have a few issues with the 8gig SD card, perhaps either because of it's capacity or speed. Once in a while, it hangs while playing a track off the SD, and I have to eject+reinsert the card (causing database refresh) to unhang it. It probably doesn't do this with other SD brands (mine is a SDHC).

However, these are minor issues to me, the hangs are very infrequent (and as I fill up the SDHC micro card, the card related hangs seem to occur more and more infrequently). Based on functionality, price, ruggedness and design, I would definitely recommend this player over apple iCrap

[Fred Nerd]

You're all right: Ipod is probably the worst out there. BUT its the only with the space I wanted. I've got probably 500 cds to go on. And I want them in the highest possible MP3 quality. So I need my 120GB.
So far I've worked out that iTunes is good for ripping and retrieving album data (except artwork, bastards) and then I've loaded Floola onto it which make it transportable to any computer, and I can work with the songs inside the iPod.
I've also turned off syncing and transfer songs manually (drag from media library in itunes to the ipod icon on the side. It works smoothly.
Then I can delete the music from my hard drive to free up precious space.

Album cover art is still a problem. I've been trying out third party apps, but they aren't the best. Floola does a good job adding art when you manually find the pictures. Which might mean I'll end up with a scanner. On some I'll have to: I have cds which have no cover art anywhere on the net, and sell for over $100US because of how rare they are.

I'll soldier on, but its still CRAP, and apple is rotten to the core. 

Why can't I reformat and run Puppy Linux on it??????

[f0dder]

Why can't I reformat and run Puppy Linux on it??????

What good would that do you? I'd want a specifically tailored OS (and kernel) for such limited devices as MP3 players...

PS: http://www.rockbox.org/ is an interesting project, but because of the closedness of the various media players, their progress is slow

[Fred Nerd]

Because I want to be able to delete files when they are not meant to be on there without having to plug it into my computer.......

And a whole lot of other things that are missing.

A decent search feature from WITHIN a playlist. Make auto playlists from rules (e.g. all songs except those tagged with "too slow for at work")
And a tag on the fly system to go with it.

And lots more.

As I pointed out before: if my cheap digital camera can edit photos and videos on the fly, and reorder folders, etc; why can't the industry leading music player have any portable functionality at all?????????

The answer is a lemon an apple...

[Fred Nerd]

Rockbox is on the right track, but I still want features which don't exist.

Since even PC based media players never do what I want, I suppose I can't complain about iPod.

Does anyone else out there ever want features such as:
Some tracks listed as 'not to be played unless specified' (e.g. all the comedy tracks/outtakes etc)
The rest is a playlist which can be sorted by artist or album or shuffled at will.
Tracks can be found by searching or via artist/album/song, and after they play, it continues to the rest of the playlist.
1 or 2 tracks can be queued to play next, then resume the playlist......

I just want it to be always playing music, I don't want it to play some things unless specified, and I want to be able to play the song I want at the moment, then not have to go back to the original playlist when it stops after one song.

I've got many thousand songs here, so I don't really want to have to add all to a playlist, or scroll through them all just to find one particular one.

Maybe I'll have to write it myself. <pulls out Python for beginners and turns to page 1>

[kyrathaba]

I use Sharepod with my ipod Shuffle, and have been very pleased with its simplicity and ease of use.

[xtabber]

You can rip your CDs with another program and insert the metadata (including album covers), then import the MP3 files into iTunes. My favorite program for ripping and converting is Easy CD-DA Extractor from Poikosoft (http://www.poikosoft.com/ - 25 euros). If you are concerned about the quality of the MP3 files, Easy CD-DA or the free EAC ripper are both superior to iTunes anyway.

[Fred Nerd]

I'll have to look into that, I would like the best quality practical, and I still want them in a common format to make them transferable/shareable. Any recommendations for settings/ format?

[Lashiec]

I'll have to look into that, I would like the best quality practical, and I still want them in a common format to make them transferable/shareable. Any recommendations for settings/ format?

If you go lossy, MP3 would be the obvious option. AAC or Vorbis are other widely supported formats, although support in PMPs is more scarce (MP3 is simply ubiquitous). For lossless, it's either FLAC or WavPack. Or WAV, but it takes several more megabytes per file and it does not have tags.

[Edvard]

When I first saw your topic I thought you were posting about mp3s that clean your iPod.
Kinda like those cassette player head cleaners, but thinking along the lines of the DVD Rewinder.

Hey that gives me an idea...
Make an mp3 of some white noise and test tones and sell it as an "iPod Cleaner" file.

iPod losing it's hip-ness? Just play iClean.mp3 once a week and you'll be back in the fanboy line!

That's my next product after Exe Fluid

[Fred Nerd]

You could sell anything to an apple fanboy, so you'll probably do alright.

But I won't buy it: nothing could fix my rotten apple ijunk

PS, it is a stupid thread title

[Edvard]

Aw, don't be so hard on yourself.
It was my mis-reading that caused the cognitive dissonance...

P.S. Because you were the inspiration, when (if) I do it, you'll get a licensed copy free.