Trend Victim

I hate to be an asshole, but I told you so. Ipod did that to me as well whe n Igot it.

When Jacob (Corn) installed iTunes it didn't delete his gigs and gigs of music, it instead moved it all into a single flat directory, thereby sacrificing every piece of information about each song besides it's song name (e.g. aritst, album). That was also a sad day.

I haven't had any problems like tha. However, when I first got it, when I went to delete things from my music library it would ask me if I wanted to "remove the files" as well. I didn't read the question carefully the first time it appeared and I accidently deleted all of "Billy Breathes" from my computer. I've since disabled that message... I think just by clicking the thing that says "Never ever ask me that again."

"keep in mind that Apple does not support and has never announced the intention to support moving files from the iPod to anywhere else (including your PC/iMac/iBook/Powerbook)."

Which doesn't stop there from being half a dozen convienent ways to do this using a variety of free 3d party apps.

The motherboard in Kim's Toshiba laptop failed, and instead of just swapping out the parts, they gave her a whole new laptop, meaning that she lost all her music. Luckily, all her music was on her iPod, so we tried a number of third-party apps to get her music off of there. I spent hours on it. None of them worked as they should have. In the end, she was left with maybe a tenth of her library still intact (everything else had been mangled by the third-party apps and by Apple's frequent attempts to sync the ipod library with the laptop's library [I was eventually able to stop the auto-syncing, but not before it deleted a good portion of her music]) and her iPod stopped communicating with the computer altogether. Eventually, a firmware update made it so that she can connect her iPod to her laptop again, but the whole incident soured me on iPods.

Enjoy your iPod. If it's not too late, return it and go with something else.

Yeah, turning off the auto-syncing is a good idea if you plan on hooking your iPod up to an iTunes library that doesn't match what you want on your iPod. Since I've had mine, I only ever hook it up to my laptop which has my iTunes library file, but my actual music folder is on Aaron's computer, which I can access over the wireless. So, we rip CD's (yes, I actually own the vast majority of the music on my iPod) to Aaron's computer, then I load them to my iTunes library (through a shared directory), then I hook up my iPod and allow it to auto-sync. Sounds like a pain, but it's really not... and I've never lost anything.

Pretty much any mp3 player you get won't allow you do transfer music from the unit to your computer. I think that's a pretty standard feature to discourage music sharing, although I think it's ridiculous because it obviously doesn't prevent music sharing. People who have mp3's on their computer can directly share them with others, as Aaron and I do, or can simply burn them onto a data disk.

I'm in love with my iPod. I don't think user-error mishaps when you first get a new gadget is a reason to totally dump on it. It's got a very long battery life, an IMMENSE amount of storage space, it's easy to operate, the "smart" playlists feature is the most useful thing ever and their customer service is actually helpful. Sorry for the commercial... but it really is the best Christmas present of all time. Thanks, Aaron.

"Pretty much any mp3 player you get won't allow you do transfer music from the unit to your computer."
Not true of any of Creative's products, including the Zen. Using the software that comes with the Zen, music can be transferred to and from the player with the same amount of ease.

Comparing the 20GB iPod and the 60GB Zen Xtra, which are both currently retailed just under $300:

"It's got a very long battery life"
iPod: 12 hours
Zen: 14 hours

"an IMMENSE amount of storage space"
iPod: 20GB (about $15/GB)
Zen: 60GB (about $5/GB)

"it's easy to operate"
Not really quantifiable, but I've used both and find that I can adapt to either without any problems.

"the 'smart' playlists feature is the most useful thing ever"
Creative offers very similar playlist creation, which they also call "smart playlists" (who'da thunk it?). I've found it just as useful.

"and their customer service is actually helpful."
Couldn't tell you. I've never had to call. I've been to Creative's website for firmware updates and I've noticed that some of these updates give my music player features that it did not have when I bought it. I like having active development on software I use.

All that said, the Zen is heavier than the iPod, and it's not made by Apple, and thus doesn't have the cultish following. If someone tried to tell me that Colibri lighters were cheaper, more efficient lighters than Zippos, I'd politely tell them to eat dirt. Nothing matches the nostalgia of a well-worn, dented Zippo. I also think that Moleskine notebooks are superior to every other travel journal on the market, even though the back pocket is just small enough to not fit my passport.

Matt: Sorry about going nuts with my diatribe here. I like to hypocritically condemn brand loyalty.

I had one of the first Creative Jukeboxs. After a little over a year, it was no longer "portable" because it didn't charge anymore. After little over a year, it completely stopped working with its software. Both the unit and my computer would freeze when they were connected, but both would go right back to working once I unhooked them. We tried reinstalling the software and a total Windows re-install. Their customer service gave me the run-around forever and ever, and seemed to want to do anything to avoid me sending in the unit even for assessment. I had trouble getting them on the phone (I kept getting dropped while holding) and it took several emails at each step of the way to get a reply, just to be told to try something else that didn't work. A little under 2 years after I got it, it finally totally self-destructed when the power supply got so hot that it burned a hole through the case so that the plastic was bubbling and steaming. I went without an mp3 player for a little over a year when Aaron got me the iPod. We went with the iPod despite it's being more expensive and more "trendy" because there's a good reason Creative's products are so much cheaper: they're crap.

Fight! Fight! Fight!

"I don't think user-error mishaps when you first get a new gadget is a reason to totally dump on it."

(just kidding...haha)

I thought it was entertaining accidently deleting 70
gigs of my hard worked for and downloaded music =P

Aaron sent this link to me this morning. This one's for you, Danny. :)

http://www.jwz.org/images/iProduct.gif