What is the difference between an mp3 player and an i pod?

[brlara]

i am looking at buying one for my 10 yr old and would like some one to
explain it to me. is there a difference and which is better also how do
you fill it with music and is it very complicated.

[Amy]

An iPod is a brand name of an mp3 player. There are many mp3 players to choose from, but iPod (by Apple) is by far the most widely used.

You typically connect the mp3 player to a computer to load music on it. It will vary how to do this a little by model. They should come with instructions.

Good luck!

[tromprof]

To quote Wikipedia: "MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer 3 (or III),[4] more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression. It is a common audio format for consumer audio storage, as well as a de facto standard of digital audio compression for the transfer and playback of music on digital audio players." The iPod as mentioned above is just a MP3 player. The iPod is a "i gotta have it" item for kids (my kids really want one but I am a luddite and so the answer is NO). If you get him one it will be a hit and from those I know who have it it is very user friendly.

[sebrof]

An iPod is what your kid wants you to give him so he can play music and be cool.

An mp3 player is something your kid keeps in his pocket so nobody sees that he doesn't have an iPod.

[JohnA]

All well answered above. My $70 Sansa sounds indistinguishable from my sister's iPod using my Grado headphones and the same song. I chose the Sansa because it can accept SD cards giving nearly unlimited storage.

iPods are OK, they will play MP3s without DRM, but you just about HAVE to use Apple's iTunes software. Music bought through iTunes is proected and can only be saved to a limited number of iPods and won't play on anything else. The expensive ones can access WiFi and surf the internet.

[JetSnake]

In addition, I find iTunes very easy to use, music bought on iTunes can also be burned to a disk, and you can also load music to iTunes from a CD or any music that has been down loaded from a web site.

Check out the iTune Nano.

[jacksonbart]

about $250.00

[jtnfoley]

about $250.00

True, dat.

To quote Mel Brooks as Master Yogurt from SpaceBalls... "Moichendising! Moichendising! Moichendising"

Apple has put together the most comprehensive ecosystem of hardware, software, and supporting services (the iTunes Store for example.)

The hardware is proprietary but generally considered to be of high quality, normal human beings must use the PC- or MAC-based iTunes software suite for managing content on the player, and Apple makes a bloody fortune selling songs for a buck a pop via their Internet-based iTunes Store.

Of course, you can extract music from CD and play on an iPod just as you would with a generic MP3 player... You are not forced to buy music from Apple.

Common complaints are alluded to above: Notably, DRM (digital rights management) can be a pain in the butt if you get out of sync or replace/upgrade the player, you are pretty much tied into iTunes which is bloated and slow, and Apple does not support "open" lossless compression such as FLAC (may be a concern with this crowd.)

[Rivernuggets]

Copy Trans Manager is freeware allowing the transfer of MP3s to an iPod. This download is for a suite of programs, with Copy Trans Manager being the only free one. This will avoid BLOATWARE that is iTunes.

[michael hurd]

I refuse to own an Ipod, but I do have a Sansa Fuse MP3 player. I have the 8gb model with an extra 8GB Micro SD card, for a total capacity of 16GB. To add files, you connect it with the cable to your computer and then drag and drop files on it much like a USB flash drive or an external HDD.

The sound quality is quite good, as well as the included headphones are decent quality.Total cost with the extra card was about $ 80 when I purchased it last april. I found a refurbished model at TigerDirect, often times they do have them on sale.

[Rivernuggets]

Only good thing about iPods is their interface - easy to navigate through the menu system. That's about it. Never owned one and don't plan on it. Just helped my mother in law get set up with hers.

I use a Creative Zen Vision M for video and some music. For music only I use a Rio Karma. Discontinued, but a very sweet player. Gapless playback(nice for Dark Side, etc.), Flac, Wav, Ogg Vorbis compatiple. One con: 20 Gigs was great in 2003........

[mowntnbkr]

The thing I like about the iPod is the fact that I can plug it into my Wadia 170i and play uncompressed audio. Wadia, last I heard is the only company that Apple has allowed to offer a product to bypass the built in DAC. I route it to a highly modified PS Audio DAC and I have audiophile quality music all day. The thing I like the most is that I have a Ipod for every genre I like and one that is a mixture. I plug it in and listen to music for hours and hours without having to mess with anything.

[garymd]

My wife bought me an IPod Touch for our anniversary last month. Not only can you play MP3s but you can also download and watch movies, use it as a 2-way camera, take pictures or video. I would never have bought it for myself but have been enjoying it while cutting the lawn or waiting at the Drs. office. IITunes is very easy to use as others have said.

Although I've had mine over a month now and have filled it with music from my own CD library (haven't purchased anything from ITunes), I've only used it 3 times, maybe 4. I don't know anything about other players but it sounds like they're probably all about the same with the exception of the software used to load it with "stuff." The IPod Touch (4th generation) gives you a full screen, internet and a camera on each side so others can see you and/or what you're looking at while you're texting each other (a feature I'll never use), all for about $250 or a little less. There are also a gazzillion applications you can purchase.

[Frank1938]

is there a difference

The I Pod uses MP4 files rather than MP3 but both are 256 kbps whether purchased from Apple or Napster and Rhapsody. Both have their afficionados. My son prefers the I Pod and I use Napster with Creative Zen for the gym.

Frank