Yeah, there's plenty of reasons one might want a dedicated mp3 player in 2017. A job restricting the use of cell phones in the work place, or not wanting to carry a cell while cutting the grass (or other such activities) are great reasons. One reason I liked to use a dedicated mp3 player at work was battery life. My mp3 player battery will last all week, but you might kill your cell phone's battery too quickly if you're listening to music for ~8 hours a day (especially on top of other cell phone usage).Jagosaurus wrote:I've actually thought of this as well bc I don't want my expensive phone in my pocket when I'm mowing grass or working out. I had a simple Phillips back in the day, but use my phone now (mostly podcast).
I have a SanDisk Sansa e250. Sadly, they're not made anymore. But if anyone is on a budget, I say get one used off eBay. They're very robust, so you don't have to be overly cautious when buying used. They're built like tanks, I had no worries keeping this thing in my pocket all day at work. They're small, but not micro small. FM tuner is great. Battery life is fantastic. A single charge could last me all week (5-8 hours a day, 5 or 6 days a week) without dying. Still to this day, the battery still holds a charge. And the battery is replacement, since it uses a common type. You can load Rockbox custom firmware for some added functionality (in addition to stock firmware, not in place of, so you can boot up either at will). Nowadays, you might complain about the limited internal memory, but they all take micro SD cards. The only downside is that the version 1 hardware is limited to 2GB cards or less (non-SDHC), but Rockbox adds the ability to use SDHC. So just be sure to get version 2 hardware if that bothers you. My only major complaint is that they use a proprietary USB cable. These days we like to use a single type of USB cable for everything.
Anyway, SanDisk still makes mp3 players, but they're those micro ones that are typically associated with jogging. Maybe this size mp3 player is right for some of you, but I prefer something just a little larger. And I have no clue if they're as robust as the Sansa mp3 players I'm used to.
I had no clue Sony had a line of Walkman mp3 players. That's awesome that the Walkman name can live on. I'd be really interested to check one out, but honestly, my SanDisk Sansa is still working flawlessly.
