Comment by phire
4 days ago
I guess there just is no room in the current market for a mid-ranged product.
The segment is being squeezed on at least five sides (probably more):
- Cheap low-end no-name players;
- Audiophile products like the Sony walkman stuff;
- People who are happy using their phones;
- (for the exercise "phone too heavy" use case) A smart watch, paired to bluetooth headphones;
- Second hand iPods from the 2000s, often refurbished and/or modded;
Maybe one of the low-end no-name players meets your needs... But how could you find it wading through the crap?
I had an ipod, but the battery is dead, and it still had a rotating hd, so I thought: I liked Sony Discman, back in the day, this new player must be good. I was wrong. It sucks in many different ways. I've described some of the problems before and copied them here:
My iPod Classic was in a terminal phase, and since I like to carry my music around instead of streaming arbitrary stuff, I bought a Sony Walkman mp3 (+ other formats) player. It's bad. It takes a long time to boot, the battery life is mediocre, the UI is mainly lists of things, searching always misses tracks or albums, the volume defaults to a pretty low level, and when you increase it, it interrupts you asking if you're sure.
And when I started copying my itunes collection to the "walkman" (it is branded Walkman, but not worthy of the name), it would constantly stop copying. The included software was useless, and wouldn't copy a single track, giving up after 5 to 10 minutes of scanning. I had to write a Python script to overcome problems with long directory and file names and copy them to the proper directory.
Worst of all: there's a very loud click when you stop a track (using wired headphones). It's as if they never even used it.
Refurbished iPod is the way try go, I have a 2006 model with new battery and 128GB flash memory, it’s great for leaving plugged in in the car
Probably have the same model - what battery did you use ?
There are so many 3rd party parts available for iPods.
Pry it open, replace the battery, swap the HDD for something like the iFlash.
Are they useable on Windows for loading music?
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I just thought that maybe this is something for a personal Pi 0 project. DAC + microSD card + off the shelf display + 3D printed case + battery.
Or even the Pi Pico.
You really don't need that much processing power to decode mp3s and FLACs.
I was looking at the Pico first when writing that, but you would need a SD card header. Small issue - I use one for my Dreamcast controller Maple>USB bus.
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