Advice on picking a new player

[siber_cat314]

I have decided that I need another Rockbox target, since my Sansa c200 has had a broken headphone jack since I got it. I'm leaning toward a Gigabeat, since it's a bit of a powerhouse, but I'd like some advice from more experienced Rockbox users.

[Llorean]

Before anyone can give you advice, they'd probably have to know your wants and needs regarding a new player.


Edited by GodEater to fix Llorean's lousy spelling

[Phalangees]

Plus, gigabeats are fairly difficult to get your hands on at this point.

[gnu]

> Do you want a small player -> flash ?
> Do you want lots of storage capacity -> HDD ?
> Do you need long battery runtime?
> Do you need recording abilities?
> ...

[pixelma]

The Buyer's Guide in the wiki might be a good start...

[siber_cat314]

Well, I'm looking for a target that can play both MIDIs and videos well, preferably with a crisp display. Looking at both the buyer's guide and the device chart, I'm really leaning toward the Gigabeat X, since it is lighter with better storage.

[GodEater]

Good luck finding an X - they're rare as hen's teeth.

[MoRtY]

id' say go with with a 5.5g Ipod off ebay if you can find one, i havent tested
the video playback within rockbox yet but it plays video via the original firmware (which
you can still boot into even with rockbox installed). Its an awesome sounding player
under rockbox, and as long as you tweak settings under rockbox, ie. Load database to RAM,
cache the directory, plus buffer and diskspin down (not sure if that helps) you can
get it to be as responsive as original firmware when navigating your music. Ive heard
the 5.5g's are better sounding players then even the new ipod classic as well. Im not sure
about the normal 5g ipod, im sure it would be an alternative choice if you couldnt get your hands
on a 5.5g. It seems as if apple has dominated the market when it comes to 30gb+
hdd players, seems it will be all flash soon anyway.

[AlexP]

id' say go with with a 5.5g Ipod off ebay if you can find one,

I would steer well clear of iPods and other PortalPlayer based devices.  Whilst they run Rockbox well, they are the worst supported targets, and the others are all better (all IMO of course).  If recording and FM are not important to you, I would recommend the gigabeat F.

[siber_cat314]

GodEater, you're right. I haven't seen even one Gigabeat X, but I am keeping my eye on a couple F series at the moment. Thank's for the advice everyone.

[MoRtY]

This is a bit off topic but since you mentioned portalplayer above i was wondering
if rockbox uses both cores in the portalplayer chip in the ipod yet (5g/5.5g?), as i read somewhere
that it only uses one at the moment, and that using two was still being implemented.

[GodEater]

The 'kernel' part of Rockbox has the ability to use both cores - the problem is that a lot of the applications still don't.