Looking for an MP3 Player Suitable for Travelling

[GraemePaul]

Hi there.

I am going backpacking in the summer to India Thailand etc and I am looking for an MP3 player that is up to the job.

I want a built in radio, Lithium Ion Battery, Large Storage capacity as I intend to copy to it my entire CD collection (up to 20gig). as it is going to be a 20 gig MP3 player I will need it to be a HDD player. It must be durable and be able to last a year on the road without dying on me.

I used to own a Rio Karma but that died when I accidently dropped it. As a result my entire music collection is stored as FLAC files as I am a bit of an Audiophile and the FLAC support was the reason I brought the Karma.

I am willing to convert this to either MP3, Ogg Vorbis or WMA so FLAC is not a requirement. Good sound quality for a portable is though. I intend to charge the MP3 player off the mains supply in the countries I am visiting and will be getting a multi region power adapter for the purpose but this means I will not be able to use any docking cradles, the player needs to be charged directly from the mains. In fact are there any players out there that take the same type of Lithium Ion Batteries as many cameras do these days as I could use the same charger.

I am not concerned about colour screens or the ability to view photo's on the MP3 player and would like it to be a pure music device.

Thanks for your help

Graeme

 

[GraemePaul]

Ive been doing some thinking. If I find my broken Rio and replace the HDD it may work again. Ive been looking on the Rio fansite www.Riovolution.com and they have some really helpful guides and advice on how to do this. Even if fixing my old Rio Karma does not work I could get a second hand one from Ebay and do the same mod.

The more I have thought about it the more I realise I was spoilt with my Original DAP as now everything else I look at seems inferior.

The Iaudio X5L is not good enough because of the lack of ID3 tag support and TBH I want a dedicated MP3 player. I have no need to look at photo's or watch video on it.

The kenwood HD20GA7 looks ok but it is not readily avalible in the UK and again does not support the music formats I want as well as not having a very large HDD (20GB).

The Ipod with RockBox looks promising but I really do not want to purchase an I Pod. I like my individuality.

While I am on the subject. Is there a 1.8" HDD that is 7mm thick with a single 40GB platter and has a IDE connection?