Who owns an iPod alternative?

I use a Creative Zen X-Fi 2, bought the 16gb one when it was first released. I originally bought it to replace my old Zen which had a broken hard drive - that one had lasted my a long time (don't remember exactly how long), was cheap and had good sound quality so I stuck to Creative in true consumer-loyalty fashion!
 
Anyway I have a Samsung Galaxy with Poweramp and Voodoo Control.

Same, didnt really want to root my phone but I needed the volume boost more than anything and it serves me perfectly well. I've always used my phone for listening to music ever since you could get sd cards with a decent amount of storage for cheap.

I suppose someone is going to tell me i didnt have to root it, its done now though :p
 
I've had an 8gb Sansa Fuze for the past few years, it does everything I want it to do (play music!), has a good battery life, is reasonably small, has been dropped/sat on/stuff dropped on it many times and works fine.

I went for it because it could deal with drag and drop (no faffing with proprietary software), was much cheaper than the equivalent Ipod, and had a micro SD slot so if I wanted more storage I could increase it without having to buy a new player...(In fact i've got a couple of micros SD cards with different stuff on them).
 
Nice earphones. I have the se535's with custom moulds have tried them how do they compare to those if so? Does the amp make a significant difference? I've got all my music uncompressed noticed a difference from the standard compression rate of 192kps but im sure there is much more to be heard though does it bring a superior amount of detail?

I've not actually tried any Shure IEMs as the sonic signatures generally didn't seem to fit my tastes.

As for the amp, it does add a bit of overall refinement compared to the internal ipod amp (for example tighter bass, wider soundstage etc) but really it will depend on your earphones/headphones. Really sensitive ones will benefit less. Amping is more for giving power to headphones if the DAP is lacking. Ideally for maximum SQ you'd need to bypass the internal DAC also, but that'd just result in too much to carry. All portable audio is a compromise really. Isolation is the number one thing I'd say as there's no point in having an awesome sounding DAP and earphones/headphones if you can't hear the extra sound quality over the ambient noise around you. This is where custom IEMs excel as you get usually -26dB of noise reduction.

I really like the Arrow though, it has a 2-stage bass boost, rechargeable battery, auto on/off function and can power almost any headphone up to 600ohms.
 
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I've had an 8gb Sansa Fuze for the past few years, it does everything I want it to do (play music!), has a good battery life, is reasonably small, has been dropped/sat on/stuff dropped on it many times and works fine.

I went for it because it could deal with drag and drop (no faffing with proprietary software), was much cheaper than the equivalent Ipod, and had a micro SD slot so if I wanted more storage I could increase it without having to buy a new player...(In fact i've got a couple of micros SD cards with different stuff on them).

thats why i went for mine - i love it.
i've got a 16gb sd card but once the 32gb cards come down in price i'll be getting one those.
 
I use a little 16gb sony walkman, Battery lasts for ever, was good value, sounds great and I can DRAG AND DROP!!!

I do have an Iphone 4, But don't use that for listening to music all that much.
 
32gb iPod touch, Got used to iTunes when I got an iPod Mini, so have just stuck with it, not to fussed about price considering how little I need to upgrade them, only had three over a fair few years.
 
Red wine imodded possibly 4th gen ipod using an ALO line out dock.

http://redwineaudio.com/imod

Bottom is a corda2 move usb/dac amp reportedly one of the best i think

Middle one is an ibasso d12 and the next one a fostex HP-P1

I think that covers it.

maybe it is an imod but there would be no point in this set up (would there?),the fostex in this case is just acting as a digital transport device and bypassing the ipods dac ,the imod uses the ipod dac hence they insist on a model with a wolfson dac (my sflo has got 2). i am assuming the fostex is then sending the signal through digital out at the back of the unit to the dac section of the ibasso d12 ,its then going on to what i see as the meier stepdance (amp only) ,dosnt have the rounder edges of the 2stepdance .
the fostex on its own would do all the functions and is getting some amazing reveiws as with the algorythm solo it allows a dac bypass but also has its own dac and amp section
suppose you could swap the top units with an iriver h... with digital out and have the same effect cheaper
 
Did you think that perhaps they're just using it for an amp section, and put it through a lappy when they require a dac. ;)

Besides there's three of the things there, so id assume it done more for review purposes.

Also some folk might not be keen on the wolfson dac, and want a sound more to their tastes. Folk do buy different amps for different music, plus they just like new toys anyway.
 
I use my HTC Desire. Better than an iPod and saves me carrying 2 devices.

There's a reason why iPod and other MP3 player sales are falling - you just don't need one any more!
 
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