Recommended "MP3" player for prog use?

Asyte2c00 wrote: Progressive Rock is not about the songs, its about the albums.  More to the point, a true progger listens to an entire album, no a handful of songs withdrawn from an Lp.  Thats what compiliations are for.  Moreover, compilations [cds encompassing a bands studio out (I do realize live albums are compilations, but they are are placed into a different realm)] do not do justic to a band.  Imagine buying a Camel Greatest Hits? Its unheard of? Persoanlly to appreciate the virtues of an album, one must listen to an album in its entirety.

I disagree here. I can quite happily listen to one song from one album and then one song from another album. In fact I prefer it that way. It's more interesting when I don't know what's coming next. That's one of the great advantages of MP3 players. Of course, MP3 players also give you the option to listen to whole albums in order - it's up to you. That's the great thing about new technology - it gives you more options.

MP3 players have the advantage that they are small, which means that you can take them anywhere. They also have the advantage of storage capacity, which means that you can take a lot of music around with you.

My MP3 player has really improved my listening experience. I now listen to music all over the place. I also manage to listen to songs from ALL of my old CDs. That's something that was very difficult in the past unless you have the CDs in a pile and always take out the one from the bottom, a lot of of good albums will become forgotten and neglected.

Another advantage of MP3 is that you can delete songs you don't like. So if you have an album with just one or two good songs, you can still listen to them easily. In the past, I wouldn't want to root out a CD with just one or two good songs but those songs may be great ones.

Tony R wrote: I have a 20GB Creative Zen on which I have over 4500 prog songs. It sounds fine to me (I auditioned many including IPod but this sounds better) and although audiophiles will be disgusted,I find it the perfect solution to Prog On The Move!

Progressive Rock is not about the songs, its about the albums. 

No offense, considering your rank at this website, you, like me, have been acquainted with an array of progressive music. 

More to the point, a true progger listens to an entire album, no a handful of songs withdrawn from an Lp.  Thats what compiliations are for.  Moreover, compilations [cds encompassing a bands studio out (I do realize live albums are compilations, but they are are placed into a different realm)] do not do justic to a band.  Imagine buying a Camel Greatest Hits? Its unheard of?

Persoanlly to appreciate the virtues of an album, one must listen to an album in its entirety. 

However, unless you have 4500 prog songs that come from studio albums, that impressive. 

Prog on!

oliverstoned wrote: I'm not opposed to technological progress, but to technological regression...

Maybe you're also opposed to facts.

oliverstoned wrote: MP3 is the WORST sound format ever created, so it means a regression, as CD was already a regression compared to vynil.

MP3 is neither good nor bad ... it was never meant to sound as good as CD or vinyl. It was designed to offer compact storage of audio data. Of course the quality suffers, but I'm willing to make that tradeoff if it allows me to listen to music using compact, robust mobile devices.

oliverstoned wrote: Remember how marketers said CD was absolutely perfect, and now they admit that the performances are not good and that 24 bits will solve that (which is not true).

wow, three different opinions in one sentence. I never believed that CD was absolutely perfect ... neither is vinyl or any other method of storing audio. But I believe that CD quality is absolutely sufficient for most audio sources and the little advantage that 24 bit bring is only minor. The biggest advantage of post-CD digital storage formats is that they offer multi-channel audio (surround sound) in decent quality.

MikeEnRegalia wrote: It IS better, CD quality audio will always be superior to any mp3 format. But 192kbps mp3/WMA is not as bad as you suggest IMO. If you made a poll, I bet that the vast majority would say that the difference in quality is negligible, especially in a subway/train situation with non-hifi headphones. Honestly, you don't want to walk around with hifi headphones ...

I encode at 128kbps and play the MP3 player (Creative MuVo 512MB) through big speakers and it sounds great. The only trouble is that the MP3 player just broke.  I am back on my Walkman cassette player for the time being. Well at least I'm getting the chance to listen to some classic old albums.  I'll have to get my MP3 player fixed soon or get a new one (maybe a cheap 256MB one would be OK as storage capacity is not that important because I keep loading new albums on there anyway). I can't live without my MP3 player.