Music For The Road
By Daniel Dubno
RIO RIOT Sonic Blue Digital Audio Player
Everything about this $349 bad-boy is solid: Huge storage; sturdy frame, tough headphones. Its 20 gigabyte hard drive holds 400 complete albums. It also has a built in FM tuner. The Riot runs for about 10 hours with a rechargeable lithium ion battery. Best of all, it plays music in a variety of formats: MP3s, Realplayer, Windows Media, and is compatible with Apple's iTunes software. It weighs a ton and appears really big, especially now that the sleek and slender Apple iPod now is also available in a 20 gig flavor.
Sony is still pushing their proprietary MiniDisc format with the Net MD MZN1
The Net MD Walkman is the Ferrari of audio player/recorders and sure is pricey at $349.95. But you can record 320 minutes on swappable, hearty, and fairly inexpensive minidisks. The Net MD works with a variety of music formats: MP3, WMA, WAV, etc. You can quickly rip MP3s or CDs at up to 32X speed and you do get 110 hours of music playback on a single battery charge.
iRock Wireless Adapter
Last time, we raved about the new iPod from Apple. The one thing that can make it better (or improve any portable music player for that matter) is linking it to iRock's wireless music adapter. This tiny, clever unit wirelessly links your music (broadcasting to an unused FM channel) to your car or home stereo. It's an ideal and inexpensive way to share your MP3 playlists, or handheld CD or tape players playing on that long car trip with the kids. The AAA batteries go after about 20 hours of use. Best of all... this ingenious device costs only about $30.
DUO-DX player from Digisette
I loved this as soon as I saw it, because it's cool. It looks like a high-tech metal audio tape… but it can directly download and convert audio to MP3 format and play them back without using a computer. Connect its headset or shove it into standard cassette deck or car audio system. Come with a 96 MB on board memory that can be - read that as "should be" - expanded with a removable memory card to hold 160 MB of audio. $199. Available only at RadioShack.
Casio Exilim Camera/MP3 Player
Though I showed the Casio Exilim before it was released... now this credit card 1.2 mega pixel card camera is on the shelves in a deluxe version with an MP3 player as well. These can barely hold enough music for me (even with the biggest SD Card you can find) but I just love being able to have a portable entertainment system and camera system slightly bigger than a credit card, which you'll need to afford its $399 price tag.
Kyocera 7135
Kyocera's hottest new "3G" smartphone is fully loaded. Using the solid Palm OS, it is a robust organizer and a complete wireless solution. So now you have a phone, a PDA, a portable computer and an "entertainment center, all in one." With a 65,000+ color high-resolution screen, you can download pictures and video clips or play games. But we're talking about music players, so what's great about this new phone is that it also lets you listen to MP3s.
Sony ZS-X3CP CD/MP3 Boom Box
Challenge yourself to sports with the Box that Booms with a Mega Bass® Sound System and glows with Sony's radical new Ergonomic Design. Sony's ZS-X3CP S2 Sports™ CD/Radio Tuner was made to match your action packed lifestyle. Its form factor makes you just want to grab it and run to the beach. And its ability to play standard CDs, MP3s and both CD-R and CD-RW discs make this perfect for any computer-based music collector. At $149.95, it's pretty affordable, too.