Recommend me a new MP3 player

[Captain Starfish]

For the last couple years I've been loving my iRiver H340 - done everything I wanted it to do. Recently it's been playing up (ie switching itself off randomly) and I think, after a vague process of elimination, it's probably the battery pack inside the unit. So I've gone and bought a new battery, but just in case...

Anyone want to recommend me a new unit? I am fussy, requirements:

1. Plays MP3s, etc.
2. 40GB+ capacity
3. USB 2.0 slave, exposes on PC as another hard disk (no shitty interface software please).
4. USB1.1 host minimum, for uploading photos from my camera or CF2 cards when I have no PC about.
5. Decent playlist functions
6. Decent random function
7. Reasonably rugged construction
8. Line out
9. Decent codec chips

Now the "wants":
1. Corded remote control would be nice, so I can leave the player in my pocket and have the control on my sleeve.
2. USB charging
3. Radio
4. Video

Final note - after trying to fix a few iPods and iPod Minis for mates over the years, you are going to have to be really convincing for me to consider one of these very trendy and overpriced heaps of shit.

Bring it on, please!!!!

[kwakas]

do not buy an ipod. I had a toshiba gigabeat, that was pretty good and really easy to use. Push 1 single button on the side of the cradle and it downloads all the music to it. No syncing or any shit like that required. The unit I had was a bit big, but they've reduced in size now.

[Pkunk]

Final note - after trying to fix a few iPods and iPod Minis for mates over the years, you are going to have to be really convincing for me to consider one of these very trendy and overpriced heaps of shit.

Go play with an iPod touch, its gold. Albiet only 8 or 16gb in size

[Jonchilds]

I had a Gigabeat (S70) and they only had 4h battery life, and file organisation was horrible (40Gb of files needed ID3 tags tidied up)
Also had horrible impact resistance. It shattered when it fell out of my pocket at 80kph on the freeway.

[Semi]

Go play with an iPod touch, its gold. Albiet only 8 or 16gb in size

does it still have the retarded itunes crap?

[taint]

I had a Gigabeat (S70) and they only had 4h battery life, and file organisation was horrible (40Gb of files needed ID3 tags tidied up)
Also had horrible impact resistance. It shattered when it fell out of my pocket at 80kph on the freeway.

bloody freeways

Clicky for image

[Jonchilds]

Haha.

I never did recover mine, but have chosen more secure pockets to store things in.

[Deej]

MP3 Player Reviews, Price Comparisons, MP3 Players Forum

[matt fathers]

i have a toshiba gigabeat, no problems with it, easy to use, comes with a remote with a little clip on it that i use to attach to my screen when im riding.No radio.

[likefry]

i'd say go a creative zen vision:m

my g/f just got one.

i got an iriver h320 and i love it but after seeing hers its pretty awesome.

has everything that my iriver H320 has but its 80GB.

ZEN Vision:M - Best of CES 2006 award winning features in both 30GB and 60GB; up to 15,000 songs, 240 hours of video and ten of thousands of photos.

[Captain Starfish]

Thanks, likefry.

Mine just started switching itself off randomly unless it was plugged into the mains. I tried to run it off the AA batterypack but that didn't help, until today when I removed the internal battery and THEN ran it off AAs no worries. Have ordered new internal battery and will see how it fares - but will check out the vision:m if this doesn't work.

Cheers!

[likefry]

Apparently you can put one of the late model ipoo batteries into them and coz apple spent so much time developing the battery from the first model they can run like 20 hours or something of video.

[carz_04]

i've had an ipod and a giga beat.. and i would recommend the giga beat over the ipod.
My ipod broke after 2 months.. was very mad! So i went with the gigabeat, and have had it for over a year now, and it is awesome.

[Captain Starfish]

Looks like the hassles with my iRiver were all battery related.

New battery, it's working like a dream. I still haven't seen anything that comes close to this old warhorse in terms of suitability for my needs.

Just installed RockBox too - be interesting to see how it goes

Thanks for suggestions, all.