Apple are great designed products but it is all closed software, even worse then MS, overpriced and underspec'd for what you get. Using the latest version of Canola along with a good sized memory card or two and you have a more functional device than an ipod touch with much more memory... Sure its a little larger as it has speakers but its not bad! BTW you can get a 16GB SDHC card from newegg at the minute for all of $70!
Umm, the Touch is 32GB now. N800 - $250 , 2x16GB SDs = $140, that gives you $390 vs $499, or roughly $110 difference. And that's with the N800 using questionable flash memory. Buy some SDs that use Samsung flash in them, and I'm sure that gap would close up.
I wouldn't call that particularly overpriced, given that the touch does have a few hardware differences over the N800, such as graphics acceleration, a 624MHZ CPU, and a tiny size (small costs more).
I got my N800 for $179, added a couple of memory cards and never really considered the Ipod Touch after playing with it. Very slick but not the best internet machine for me - and I don't have lots and lots of music.
On the other hand - No one gives Tiger Woods any crap for having more than one golf club - if you want both, get both. Who cares what anyone else thinks
I got my N800 for $179, added a couple of memory cards and never really considered the Ipod Touch after playing with it. Very slick but not the best internet machine for me - and I don't have lots and lots of music.
On the other hand - No one gives Tiger Woods any crap for having more than one golf club - if you want both, get both. Who cares what anyone else thinks
I might as well add my further two cents (metaphorically, but certainly not financially, speaking): In media, I'm only interested in audio (music and books) not video playback. While I have used my various Nokia tablets over the years for this purpose, I have recently fallen back on my old Dell DJ which has a 20GB hard drive and excellent music reproduction (and with Deubox software lends itself to great cataloging). I've even paired it with a small Headroom amplifier and signal processor designed for use with mp3-type players. However, the Dell is a bit clunky and only plays mp3, whereas I now want to switch to ogg for better quality reproduction using less storage space.
So, I've researched and ordered myself an 8GB Cowon iAudio 7, which handles not only mp3 but also ogg and flac files, and is very small, and permits file cataloging as an option to id tags. And the price at NewEgg, for example is only(!) $149 including free shipping.
I have an older iPod Shuffle that i use for podcasts. I have a Radio Shack mp3 player too. Both units mount as disks via USB. With the Shuffle, i need to use special software to load new stuff. So i have scripts that find, add, and delete files. The scripts modify the file names, and squirrel the files into random folders. An index file preserves file order - you listen to them in the order that you add them to the unit. With the RS unit, you copy files there, and that's it. You can create subdirectories. The unit plays files in directory order. So if you have a book with ten chapters, it isn't enough to have them named alphabetically, you must actually create a new directory and copy them in order. That's easy enough.
After a couple years of use, i've found that the Shuffle makes mistakes. Sometimes the catalog gets updated for a delete, but the actual file isn't deleted. The orphaned file can't be played, but it does take up space. Since the files are renamed, it can be hard to track them down. Every now and then, the Shuffle gets wedged with filesystem corruption, and i need to blast a new FS to it. I keep an archive of the original image, and do this from time to time. It can be a pain to figure out which files were on it before damage happens, even if it's accessible. The files were renamed... In summary, the RS unit was cheaper, and in the long run, easier to manage. When the internal non-replacable battery in the iPod dies, i'll use the RS mp3 player forever. It uses a AAA, which i can get anywhere.
The main reason i didn't use my 770 for podcasts is that my 2 GB Kingston MMC card was really slow, and i didn't have the new, fast driver. Reflashing the 770 to get the new driver killed it - WSOD. My N800 has a 1 GB SD card, and it could be used. It's fast and reliable. And i could use it for podcasts going to work. The sound quality is good, and the battery will last well more than an hour. But my iPod has buttons that i can work with one hand while driving without looking at them. And, besides, i have momentum with the unit.
My iPod Shuffle is 512 MB. The RS mp3 player is 1 GB. I guess i could get twin 16 GB SD cards for the N800. But the N800 runs 'flite' (text to speech), and a GB of text goes a long way.
Is there a MIDI or ABC music file player for the Nokia yet? That's the moral equivalent to text->speech for lyric-free music.
I have an older iPod Shuffle that i use for podcasts. I have a Radio Shack mp3 player too. Both units mount as disks via USB. With the Shuffle, i need to use special software to load new stuff. So i have scripts that find, add, and delete files. The scripts modify the file names, and squirrel the files into random folders. An index file preserves file order - you listen to them in the order that you add them to the unit. With the RS unit, you copy files there, and that's it. You can create subdirectories. The unit plays files in directory order. So if you have a book with ten chapters, it isn't enough to have them named alphabetically, you must actually create a new directory and copy them in order. That's easy enough.
After a couple years of use, i've found that the Shuffle makes mistakes. Sometimes the catalog gets updated for a delete, but the actual file isn't deleted. The orphaned file can't be played, but it does take up space. Since the files are renamed, it can be hard to track them down. Every now and then, the Shuffle gets wedged with filesystem corruption, and i need to blast a new FS to it. I keep an archive of the original image, and do this from time to time. It can be a pain to figure out which files were on it before damage happens, even if it's accessible. The files were renamed... In summary, the RS unit was cheaper, and in the long run, easier to manage. When the internal non-replacable battery in the iPod dies, i'll use the RS mp3 player forever. It uses a AAA, which i can get anywhere.
The main reason i didn't use my 770 for podcasts is that my 2 GB Kingston MMC card was really slow, and i didn't have the new, fast driver. Reflashing the 770 to get the new driver killed it - WSOD. My N800 has a 1 GB SD card, and it could be used. It's fast and reliable. And i could use it for podcasts going to work. The sound quality is good, and the battery will last well more than an hour. But my iPod has buttons that i can work with one hand while driving without looking at them. And, besides, i have momentum with the unit.
My iPod Shuffle is 512 MB. The RS mp3 player is 1 GB. I guess i could get twin 16 GB SD cards for the N800. But the N800 runs 'flite' (text to speech), and a GB of text goes a long way.
Is there a MIDI or ABC music file player for the Nokia yet? That's the moral equivalent to text->speech for lyric-free music.
I envy your simplicity. I have become such a gadget whore and feel this need to buy new products even though I already own stuff that fills my requirements.
Currently I pocket my iPhone for online stuff and music, and an Archos 605 for video. Though I expect with the release of new intel MIDs I'm going to be whoring myself out to yet another product. How do you keep yourself from buying all the new junk!?
