Trumblog

A few years back I had some disposable income and bought myself an mp3 player. Note that I did not say an iPod.  An iPod was the last thing that I wanted. I didn’t want to be locked into iTunes. I didn’t want what everyone else had.  I wanted something cooler, something better. And I found it.

Sort of…

Rio Karma

The Rio Karma rocked! It held 20GB, it supported Ogg Vorbis and FLAC, it had an equalizer, it had a cool scroll wheel AND a control button, you could make playlists on the fly, it had a sweet blue glow and it was actually less expensive than an iPod. I wasn’t the only one who thought the Karma was cool. There were tons of forums and fan websites raving about the cool features, frequent firmware updates, and reasons why you could feel superior for having a Karma instead of an iPod This was exactly what I wanted. Problem was that it barely worked.

The Karma froze so much that I took to carrying a paper clip around with me at all times so that I could reset it using the handy little hole in the side. If you played it in the car it froze, if you played it while walking it froze, if you played the wrong song it froze. Sometimes it froze and I could reset it. Other times there was no saving the thing. I went through 3 before calling it quits. I really loved that little guy, but it just wasn’t meant to be. Rio is still around, but the Karma is out of production.

Samsung YH-920GS and YH-925GS

I’d heard that the battery in an iPod would go in a year or two and that replacing/ repairing it really wasn’t an option so when I bought the Rio Karma I picked up an extended warranty. This came in handy when I decided that the Karma was a lemon. Still trying to avoid an iPod I picked up the Samsung YH-920GS. It was functional, looked like a silver iPod, stored 20GB of music, had an FM radio (that I never used), equalizer presets, voice recording and a remote control (which I also never used). Maybe it’s just me, but does a device that is smaller than most remote controls need an even smaller remote control of it’s own?  Perhaps, but Samsung should have put the development budget for the remote into the user interface and features.

As I said the thing was functional.  Basic interface, basic functionality.  Nothing to love, but not much to really complain about.  The biggest gaffe that I remember is that albums played in the alphabetical order of the tracks not the album order; so I had to create playlists for each album, which was just a stupid oversight by the developers and a pain in the ass for me. The player lasted about nine months and died. So I was back to the store for the upgrade to the 920GS which was the YH-925GS.

The YH-925GS had a color screen and showed small grainy color pictures. This was a novelty at first, but quickly wore off and stopped seeming like much of a feature when another plater was showing off album art. The 925GS got rid of the radio feature from the earlier model and didn’t include the charging/ syncing cradle either. The worst part was that it took forever to sync. I mean hours. It wasn’t so bad to begin with when I first had a gig or two of music on it, but once I had over 10GB it crawled. Quitting out of a sync at the end of the day when you wanted to go home wasn’t easy and the device required that you safely disconnect the hardware making it even less convenient.

A combination of not waiting for synchronization to end and disconnecting the player prematurely a few times led to some file corruption issues and eventually the thing died. I can’t say that I was too sorry about it because I never felt as attached to the Samsungs as I did with the Karma. Like I said there was nothing to love within those cold silver shells. The functionality never made me feel superior to the iPod owners just a wannabe at a lower price point and a lot of limitations. I was ready to try something new.

Zune 30GB

The timing of my Samsung’s death and the release of the Zune was pretty close, so was one of the first folks with one. Laugh about the Zune all you want, but I really liked it. I got the black one, not the brown, which might have been cool for awhile, but would have soured quickly.

The Zune has radio, video, album art, wifi and the support of MicroSoft for software and updates. The interface and functionality is pretty slick and my wife, who has an iPod and has only owned Macs thinks that the Zune interface is better. The animation is smooth and the background is customizable. Sure the benefits of wifi community and sharing songs isn’t much of a benefit considering I’ve seen only 2 other Zune owners out in the wild and I can’t seem to get wireless syncing to work, but give it time and it will be there.  There’s no equalizer, but there are presets, and the audio quality is pretty damn good as is the image quality. You can’t make playlists on the fly, but there is the Quicklist, which is on playlist that you can add tracks to on the fly, which is perfect for when my wife is playing DJ in the car.  You can keep the list as long as you like, but can’t export it or have multiple quicklists. Oh, and I don’t use the radio on this player either.

While I’d hoped that the Zune would work with Windows Media Player the proprietary software does provide access to the Zune store. I’ve never bought anything from Zune Marketplace and haven’t signed up for the subscription plan, but I love the way that it has helped me find and manage audio and video podcasts.

Zune’s working on the social component of the zune and who knows if they will ever get it right or it will take off, but you cannot disagree that Zune Social is the right direction. I can share music tracks that I like and listen to and find people with similar tastes and sample their music. Of course it’s all within the Zune walled garden, but there are ways of getting your own data out.

The software has its issues, like making my computer pretty sluggish especially during podcast downloads and syncing, but the updates are a big plus for both the device and the software. The first update enhanced the device interface, despite removing the equalizer presets, and really expanded the software including the addition of dynamic playlists. The second update, due today, promises games, audio book support, wifi purchasing, enhanced community, better library management as well as software updates.

I switched from the 30GB the Zune 80GB a while back and I am very happy with it.  I may not feel superior to other MP3 player owners like I did with the Karma, but I sure don’t have iPod envy like I did when I had those awful Samsung players.  Zune looks good, works well, has a future and I have all the same features as iPod users without having given in to that cult.  That was all I ever wanted.