Do you still use Ipods/MP3 player/Walkman etc

Psychlops

I have & still use an Ipod shuffle, I fondly remember using the Walkman in bed listening to Oasis around that era (Im 38) & then the jump from that to a Sony Discman!


The joys of the discman until maybe one day you dropped or bumped it off something & from that day forth it would skip.


Remember I used to walk around Galway City & if I put one foot wrong it would skip :mad::pac:


On the Ipod shuffle I still have all my old stuff, Oasis,Pulp mixed in with the Strokes/Metallica & some rap, new music is no good these days.

Tony EH

I'm still using one of these.

Sheep Shagger

Livewire anyone?

PTH2009

Sheep Shagger wrote: »

Livewire anyone?

Limewire

jesus those were the days, remember another service starting with a K (cant think of the name). Some stressful time putting artwork/sorting tracks and then the bloody computer viruses

Nigel Fairservice

Sheep Shagger wrote: »

Livewire anyone?

My oldest mp3s are from Napster and Limewire. I think some of my older mp3s have been on the go since 2000. Still have some of them on my phone.

NewbridgeIR

Strumms wrote: »

The vinyl junkie is ok, but the vinyl snob like the one you mention is a weird dickhead specimen.. they think they are some hard boiled muso.... and everything and everyone is wrong for playing CD’s and listening to Spotify... :rolleyes:

A fella I worked with years ago was one.. a total zzzzzzzz with him. A borefest of a human, they all are.

Yeah, vinyl junkies are fine; I am one. It’s the new breed of snob I can’t figure out. It’s like they’re over compensating for not buying records in the lean years. To them, it’s actually all about the format, not the music.

BobbyMalone

Still use an iPod, having migrated from Creative Zen in the day (and from minidiscs before that). When my last iPod bit the dust, I went with Spotify, but it didn't really suit. Was paying the subscription to listen to stuff I already owned, as well as finding it annoying when the WiFi went down, or a song/album was withdrawn from the service (or was never put up there in the first place). I still use it to check out new music though, it's handy enough for that.

Tork

sxt wrote: »

Your (sic) not a music fan if your best source of listening to music is a phone and phone earphones

That isn't what this thread is about. It was asking if anyone still uses an MP3 player. Portable audio when you're out and about isn't the same as what you'll use at home.

Tork

Tony EH wrote: »

I'm still using one of these.

I had one like that and it was a great little player until I left it behind me in the college library. Never saw it again.

Tony EH

Tork wrote: »

I had one like that and it was a great little player until I left it behind me in the college library. Never saw it again.

I still find it great. I use a different firmware on it called Rockbox. It allows for a much better range on the GQ and gives me the ability to create the kind of sound I want. I tend to prefer a warm, full, sound with a lot of bottom end to it and I've never been able to get another player that has equalled it. They're nearly all mostly mid range and treble orientated and I hate that.

TBH, I can't imagine being without it. I might get another one off eBay, just to have a spare when the current one croaks it.

I honestly cannot even contemplate walking around listening to music on my phone. The battery would be dead in an hour.

Tork

I put Rockbox on mine and didn't like it so I switched back. Why would your phone's battery be dead in an hour if you listened to music on it?

wally1990

Genuine question

Is it true that mp3 format is 'worse' sound quality than CDs disk ?

I remember that being said when mp3 starting becoming a thing

I personally don't even notice a difference(but I'm not a expert by any means on sound quality )

but a good quality pair of over the ear headphones v cheaper in ear or cheaper headphones is the world of difference

retalivity

PTH2009 wrote: »

Limewire

jesus those were the days, remember another service starting with a K (cant think of the name). Some stressful time putting artwork/sorting tracks and then the bloody computer viruses

Kazaa

cena

Yes. I have an ipod. Love the thing. I am not a fan of putting music on m phone taking up space

Tork

wally1990 wrote: »

Genuine question

Is it true that mp3 format is 'worse' sound quality than CDs disk ?

I remember that being said when mp3 starting becoming a thing

I personally don't even notice a difference(but I'm not a expert by any means on sound quality )

but a good quality pair of over the ear headphones v cheaper in ear or cheaper headphones is the world of difference

Yes. If you were to take out a CD and rip a song from it as a wav file (which is lossless), you'd be looking at a file that could be 40-50MB in size. As a rule of thumb, a minute of music is about 10MB. That is why mp3s came to exist. They are much smaller because a load of audio data is stripped out of the files when an mp3 is being made. In theory, most of this is at frequencies that the human ear can't hear anyway but there are times when the limitations come to the fore. Play mp3s on better audio equipment or turn the music up high and you'll hear the difference. For want of a better description, the music will sound a bit buzzy and kind of unclear. The bitrates that the mp3s were ripped at make a difference too. Music ripped at low bitrates (i.e. 96/128kbps) sounds fecking awful.

machiavellianme

I still use my Sony NW-HD5 daily since 2004. I have upgraded it a little over the years from the meagre 20GB it started out with, but I have no intention of letting it go. If anything ever happened to it, I've picked up 3 spares from ebay and a host of parts.

Yes it's an MP3 player and yes it's ancient, just like me, but I'm pretty sure that the tech hit a peak around that time and little has progressed since.

NewbridgeIR

wally1990 wrote: »

Genuine question

Is it true that mp3 format is 'worse' sound quality than CDs disk ?

I remember that being said when mp3 starting becoming a thing

I personally don't even notice a difference(but I'm not a expert by any means on sound quality )

but a good quality pair of over the ear headphones v cheaper in ear or cheaper headphones is the world of difference

Definitely

I rip to iTunes at 320 kbps purely because of file size. They sound fine in headphones while walking but if I rip those MP3s to a CDR and play it on my stereo, then the difference is noticeable.

DJs who play MP3s over a club system are short-changing punters - it's very evident then.

scruff monkey

still have multiple iPods on the go.

1. 256Gb iPod touch lives on home office desk
2. iPod nano (3rd gen fatty) for the car, still going strong
3. 160Gb iPod Classic (6th Gen) which gets used occasionally and is going strong
4. 7th Gen iPod nano which used to be my gym buddy, likely to be retired from there as have moved to apple watch for podcasts

I don't subscribe to streaming services, still prefer to buy my music, I store it all as apple lossless (or flac if I get it from bandcamp) and then transcode it to 320 kbps vbr aac, been buying music for 35+ years, i want to hear it in decent quality without adverts hence sticking with the puppies above.

(I do also have a borked and non borked pair of 4th or 5 gen iPod classics which i really should convert to solid state and my firewire based 3nd Gen still works (doesn't hold a charge worth a flying fcuk but still works fine))


3rd gen image for those who cannot remember them




(forgot to mention that i've also tarted about with a Sony digital walkman and a Fiio high res player, both were ... meh ..., sounded great but the UI was super sluggish and annoying on them)

Extra user.

machiavellianme wrote: »

I still use my Sony NW-HD5 daily since 2004. I have upgraded it a little over the years from the meagre 20GB it started out with, but I have no intention of letting it go. If anything ever happened to it, I've picked up 3 spares from ebay and a host of parts.

Yes it's an MP3 player and yes it's ancient, just like me, but I'm pretty sure that the tech hit a peak around that time and little has progressed since.

Hmm.. when you say a host of parts

What are we talking lol

murpho999

sxt wrote: »

Your not a music fan if your best source of listening to music is a phone and phone earphones

Total elitist statement and ignores people circumstances.

I have to admit I find audiophiles to be a very annoying bunch who just stick to a certain mantra and that's it.

As for me I use Apple Music for streaming, great for in the car with Car Play and when at home I use Amazon Echo speakers paired for stereo or Sony MX1000xm3 headphones for a very good experience.

No interest in going back to having piles of vinyls or Cds around for ridiculous costs and lack of options.

I just love the idea of streaming of having the whole world of music at your fingertips.

Tork

Apparently, it isn't possible to enjoy listening to music on nice equipment at home and to use mp3s/streaming audio when you're out and about.

Tony EH

Tork wrote: »

I put Rockbox on mine and didn't like it so I switched back. Why would your phone's battery be dead in an hour if you listened to music on it?

The batteries on phones are generally shite.

Tony EH

wally1990 wrote: »

Genuine question

Is it true that mp3 format is 'worse' sound quality than CDs disk ?

It depends on what bitrate you use in the MP3. At a high enough bitrate, you won't notice the difference.

Tork

Tony EH wrote: »

The batteries on phones are generally shite.

Not on modern day phones. The battery life is pretty decent on newer phones.

NewbridgeIR

murpho999 wrote: »

Total elitist statement and ignores people circumstances.

I have to admit I find audiophiles to be a very annoying bunch who just stick to a certain mantra and that's it.

As for me I use Apple Music for streaming, great for in the car with Car Play and when at home I use Amazon Echo speakers paired for stereo or Sony MX1000xm3 headphones for a very good experience.

No interest in going back to having piles of vinyls or Cds around for ridiculous costs and lack of options.

I just love the idea of streaming of having the whole world of music at your fingertips.

There's a happy medium and it isn't either / or. Streaming is fine when I am walking, commuting etc. Or if I am in kitchen, upstairs or at my parents house.

It's great for accessing a wide range but to me, it feels like renting and it doesn't have everything - and some very common tracks have slipped through the cracks. For example, the single mix of David Gray's Babylon - that was played everywhere in 1999/2000. But it's nowhere to be found on Spotify and the White Ladder 20th anniversary set ignored it and quite a few other B-sides, remixes etc. The album version is lot sparser and lacks something. So if I want to hear that single mix, I have to dig out the CD single or stick on Now 47.

It's also annoying the way certain tracks come and go on Spotify while there are swathes of Irish artists not represented (and that's not always down to the Big Bad Record Companies). So for me, having a collection of records and CDs is great and they get used every day.

Gremlinertia

Still use a sony 'digital media player' NWZ-X1060
Yes i had to read that off the back of it.. I just like my seperates to be seperate

Extra user.

Gremlinertia wrote: »

Still use a sony 'digital media player' NWZ-X1060
Yes i had to read that off the back of it.. I just like my seperates to be seperate

I've said this myself many times

In the electrical field I work in and many areas ,separates is usually better

riclad

I still use an mp3 player , the battery lasts about 10 hours,
It has an fm tuner.
Re sound quality it depends on the encoding rate,
Eg you can get music encoded 320 or 128k bitrate
High bitrate equals more storage space
And I just charge it by using a USB cable plugged into
a pc

My phone lasts about one day if I leave it on
Depends on the battery mode
I think cd is maybe better than most mp3s but I never
tested it
I mostly listen to podcasts or the radio
Who plays cds anymore
As you can rip em once put songs on an sdcard
or mp3 player
If you are only getting 3 hours battery life than you need
to buy a new phone
I think most people rip cds once and put em in a drawer
Do young people still buy cds anymore
There's maybe 20 year old music fans who have never
bought a Cd disc maybe just used online files maybe itunes
or spotify

jimbobaloobob

I still use an ipod nano and a sony minidisc regularly

Kopparberg Strawberry and Lime

I've a phone that has no Aux jack. But my car has Aux input.

So I bought one of those things off amazon that splits the usb c port to both usb c and Aux.. it lasted just over a month before breaking.

So I grabbed one of my old phones that still works perfectly with an Aux port. Formatted it, reset it and downloaded a tonne of music into it. It's plugged into the car permanently and rarely needs charging. And when it does it's usb c too so there's a car charger for it !

Unfortunate the car doesn't have bluetooth and unfortunate my everyday phone has no 3.5mm jack !

machiavellianme

Extra user. wrote: »

Hmm.. when you say a host of parts

What are we talking lol

Let's just say I've the makings of about 10 MP3 players. The irony is that apart from swapping out the hard drives for bigger capacity and replacing the battery once, nothing has failed in 16 years despite numerous drops. This MP3 player will out live me.

NewbridgeIR

riclad wrote: »

I still use an mp3 player , the battery lasts about 10 hours,
It has an fm tuner.
Re sound quality it depends on the encoding rate,
Eg you can get music encoded 320 or 128k bitrate
High bitrate equals more storage space
And I just charge it by using a USB cable plugged into
a pc

My phone lasts about one day if I leave it on
Depends on the battery mode
I think cd is maybe better than most mp3s but I never
tested it
I mostly listen to podcasts or the radio
Who plays cds anymore
As you can rip em once put songs on an sdcard
or mp3 player
If you are only getting 3 hours battery life than you need
to buy a new phone
I think most people rip cds once and put em in a drawer
Do young people still buy cds anymore
There's maybe 20 year old music fans who have never
bought a Cd disc maybe just used online files maybe itunes
or spotify

In terms of sales, here are the 2020 figures
UK
Vinyl : 4.8 million units generating £110 million. 17% share.
CDs : 23.5 million units generating £156.2 million. 83% share.

US
Vinyl: 22.9 million units generating $619.6 million. 42% share.
CDs: 31.6 million units generating $483.3 million. 58% share.

Share refers to percentage of total unit sales.

The US vinyl sales are impressive when compared with 1993 figures (the format's lowest ebb) - back then 300,000 new LPs were sold.

sydthebeat

My best present ever was an 80gd ipod back about 14 years ago.

For 10 years it was always with me, and held my whole music collection.

Nowadays though with BT ear buds, streaming etc, it's not used as much, but I'll never get rid of it

jester77

Still have my mixed tapes, Atlantic 252 on one side and 2FM on the other, with DJs talking over the start and ends of the songs and last 30 seconds missing on others.

jester77

wally1990 wrote: »

Genuine question

Is it true that mp3 format is 'worse' sound quality than CDs disk ?

I remember that being said when mp3 starting becoming a thing

I personally don't even notice a difference(but I'm not a expert by any means on sound quality )

but a good quality pair of over the ear headphones v cheaper in ear or cheaper headphones is the world of difference

Yes and no. Technically yes, the quality is better being lossless. But 99% of people won't notice the difference between lossless and 320 kbps encodings (what most services that stream music offer) given their hearing and the equipment they use for listening. You can do a test here and see how far you get: https://abx.digitalfeed.net/spotify-hq.html

murpho999

NewbridgeIR wrote: »

There's a happy medium and it isn't either / or. Streaming is fine when I am walking, commuting etc. Or if I am in kitchen, upstairs or at my parents house.

It's great for accessing a wide range but to me, it feels like renting and it doesn't have everything - and some very common tracks have slipped through the cracks. For example, the single mix of David Gray's Babylon - that was played everywhere in 1999/2000. But it's nowhere to be found on Spotify and the White Ladder 20th anniversary set ignored it and quite a few other B-sides, remixes etc. The album version is lot sparser and lacks something. So if I want to hear that single mix, I have to dig out the CD single or stick on Now 47.

It's also annoying the way certain tracks come and go on Spotify while there are swathes of Irish artists not represented (and that's not always down to the Big Bad Record Companies). So for me, having a collection of records and CDs is great and they get used every day.

You know there's more than streaming service that compete with Spotify?
Apple Music, Deezer, Tidal? May have what you're looking for.

Also, streaming is a service, if you want to own the music you talk about it you can still buy it off the likes of Itunes and other sites, legally, you own it and you can add to your library.
So you don't need to have a CD or record.

I know vinyl is popular but I much prefer the convenience of digital and being able to access playlists or create your own, depending on the mood you're in which you just can't do with physical media.

NewbridgeIR

murpho999 wrote: »

You know there's more than streaming service that compete with Spotify?
Apple Music, Deezer, Tidal? May have what you're looking for.

Also, streaming is a service, if you want to own the music you talk about it you can still buy it off the likes of Itunes and other sites, legally, you own it and you can add to your library.
So you don't need to have a CD or record.

I know vinyl is popular but I much prefer the convenience of digital and being able to access playlists or create your own, depending on the mood you're in which you just can't do with physical media.

I am happy to pay for Spotify and it’s fine; I create plenty of my own playlists. Have looked at Tidal and Deezer too but one streaming service is enough for me when it’s not my preferred way of listening.

Missing artists and lack of certain single versions is a common problem across streaming & download platforms.

That’s why it’s handy to have physical media to fall back on. I grew up buying vinyl and CDs; I like the look of them on the shelves. Occasionally I will buy downloads but it’s the exception.

scruff monkey

murpho999 wrote: »

You know there's more than streaming service that compete with Spotify?
Apple Music, Deezer, Tidal? May have what you're looking for.

There's a lot of choice or you can pay for what you want once and it's there for ever.
The streaming services for music are getting as bad as the movie/tv streaming services, they're like bloody pokemon at this point (gotta catchem all etc...)

murpho999 wrote: »

I know vinyl is popular but I much prefer the convenience of digital and being able to access playlists or create your own

The great thing now is pretty much all the vinyl I've bought over the last few years has come with a digital download of the album in pretty reasonable quality (usually 320kb mp3 or lossless from bandcamp purchases).

Neames

Back in the day I spent €200 on a dock for my Creative mp3.

Now everything is on my phone with Spotify and apart from a Sonos speaker...echo dots provide the sound around the house now.

beauf

We use our old MP3 players for audio books for the kids. Switched to a family streaming service for music.

Still have a couple of iPod shuffles because I love the sound quality. Still use a lot of mp3s on my phone.

Capt'n Midnight

Tork wrote: »

Yes. If you were to take out a CD and rip a song from it as a wav file (which is lossless), you'd be looking at a file that could be 40-50MB in size. As a rule of thumb, a minute of music is about 10MB. That is why mp3s came to exist.

There are plenty of lossless compressed formats out there like Flac and the Apple one and my phone has nearly 20Gb free space and an empty SD slot so there's no need for MP3's. Just remember to set your itunes to the highest quality and auto eject and auto everthing if ripping CD's and you only have to do it once.

Out and about headphones, casual use bluetooth speakers, comfy over ear speakers for comfort.

Never used the media players I got. Phone gets used as a torch, camera, calculator, FM radio, TV remote control, news paper and media player.

It's getting to the stage where I'm considering two phones, with the second one only for dodgy apps that scrape too much data like Shazam.

Capt'n Midnight

NewbridgeIR wrote: »

In terms of sales, here are the 2020 figures
...
US
Vinyl: 22.9 million units generating $619.6 million. 42% share.
CDs: 31.6 million units generating $483.3 million. 58% share.

Share refers to percentage of total unit sales.

The US vinyl sales are impressive when compared with 1993 figures (the format's lowest ebb) - back then 300,000 new LPs were sold.

Vinyl sales in the US in 1977 were 344 million units, when the population was only 2/3rds of what it is now.
In 2000 CD sales were 942 million units.

It's niche and AFAIK is mostly done with old equipment that isn't being replaced. I'd nearly bet that wax cylinders would sell in some markets.

the14thwarrior

my first MP was a rio and held a whopping 21 songs

i upgraded to creative zen, legend but the battery is broken
tried micro zen and still use it

and have a philips go gear, still going strong

and my vinyls.

and my phone

mostly use my philips

beauf

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

There are plenty of lossless compressed formats out there like Flac and the Apple one and my phone has nearly 20Gb free space and an empty SD slot so there's no need for MP3's....

When I ripped my CDs I just couldn't hear any difference over 320 with my ears and equipment. It's not going to improve with age either.

Capt'n Midnight

One advantage of vinyl is that the original recordings may not have been subjected to Loudness War mixing.

Early CD's were mixed differently so that the punters could hear the difference :rolleyes:

Capt'n Midnight

beauf wrote: »

When I ripped my CDs I just couldn't hear any difference over 320 with my ears and equipment. It's not going to improve with age either.

I don't doubt that

But lossless formats mean you keep everything and storage just keeps getting cheaper so there is really no need for lossy audio compression anymore for local storage.

passatman86

I sometimes look through the €1.50 cds for sale in dealz hoping to find something from the 90's or 00's so i can drive home and put a cd on in my car for a change.....But if i dont find anything i just watch youtube videos on my phone while i drive home.. Its great the technology we have now

AllGunsBlazing

I was always into personal music players. Went from a walkman to a discman then to dedicated mp3 devices and ultimately the phone. Every single one that I owned is stuffed in a drawer.

Never owned a proper hifi system or even a ghetto blaster. Always had to be handheld for me.

for jogging the clip-on bluetooth mp3 players are handy as they are really small, super light and clip onto your running gear

load up a load of trance and other good running tunes and you're set to go

no need to look like one of those hapless spanners lurching along with their phone clutched in one of their sweaty hands poised to smash on the road/path or perhaps worse with one of those phone strap-on device jobs on their arm which is the exercise equivalent of a phone belt-holder which rivals only a "fanny pack" in pure puke value :eek:



https://www.amazon.co.uk/Victure-Bluetooth-Portable-Lossless-Headphone-Black/dp/B07XD47QY7/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?dchild=1&keywords=mp3+player+clip&qid=1618961190&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzVVo4Qk5ZWkxHVkNMJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNTAxNzQ4M1NPOUVVS1owUDRIVCZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwMjQ1NzIwMkk5QU5UUjBBQlNaViZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=

Sam Hain

glasso wrote: »

for jogging the clip-on bluetooth mp3 players are handy as they are really small, super light and clip onto your running gear

load up a load of trance and other good running tunes and you're set to go

no need to look like one of those hapless spanners lurching along with their phone clutched in one of their sweaty hands poised to smash on the road/path or perhaps worse with one of those phone strap-on device jobs on their arm which is the exercise equivalent of a phone belt-holder which rivals only a "fanny pack" in pure puke value :eek:



https://www.amazon.co.uk/Victure-Bluetooth-Portable-Lossless-Headphone-Black/dp/B07XD47QY7/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?dchild=1&keywords=mp3+player+clip&qid=1618961190&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzVVo4Qk5ZWkxHVkNMJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNTAxNzQ4M1NPOUVVS1owUDRIVCZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwMjQ1NzIwMkk5QU5UUjBBQlNaViZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=

Wow, that clip on yoke is worst than any of the alternative's you slandered. Where exactly do you clip it that doesn't make you look slightly odd.
And as for the jogging to trance, ermm probably fits the whole image, maybe try running.