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Does anyone know of an MP3 player that holds at least 20GB, that uses AA or AAA batteries?

Most good, major MP3 players come with at least 30 gigs nowadays. As far as AA batteries go, why in the world would you want one that uses them? They're a horribly weak power source compared to the rechargeables in most players. iPods, Archos Jukeboxes, Creative Zen all offer players with 30gb or more.

The main reason for wanting an MP3 players that takes AA or AAA batteries is because I like the convenience of being able to simply change the battery if it happens to die during the day. The cost of constantly buying new batteries would be easily averted by buying rechargables.

Given the crap life you get out of AAs in smaller, flash MP3 players, I assume the larger HDD-based ones would flatten batteries in merely a few hours. All the major 20/30Gb MP3 players last at least 12 hours (often 16 or more these days). It's never going to die during the day.

I might not have a choice in the matter, as I can't seem to find any HDD MP3 players that take normal batteries.

Aren't those life spans for if you're playing music with a data rate of 64/128 kbps? I listen to a lot of orchestral music, so I usually encode it at 256-320 kbps. How does this affect battery life?

I don't know: all my music is 196 and up and I get 13-14 hours out of my old 20G iPod which is rated for 12 hours. I'm not certain higher bitrates affect battery life, but if it does just change them to a not-MP3 format - most of which give better quality/bitrate.

It doesn't surprise me no HDD players use batteries - this is probably due to the sucktacular nature of the regular batteries that could be made to fit - remember, even a AA is thicker than an iPod. Even *if* they could run the hardware for more than an hour or so, it'd make them too big.

Good to know. If it would indeed eat batteries up that quickly, then I suppose that even if they do exist, they'd be annoying.

One more question-

Do MP3 players that play video generally have an out port that you can connect to a TV, so as to watch the videos on a decent sized screen, if one is around? Or has no company made that innovation yet?

observer_20000 wrote:The main reason for wanting an MP3 players that takes AA or AAA batteries is because I like the convenience of being able to simply change the battery if it happens to die during the day. The cost of constantly buying new batteries would be easily averted by buying rechargables.

Firstly, AA or AAA batteries will double or triple the size of the player. Secondly, they'll only last a couple of hours; an iPod lasts 20.

I'd much rather have a battery that lasts all day than be switching batteries constantly.

Do MP3 players that play video generally have an out port that you can connect to a TV, so as to watch the videos on a decent sized screen, if one is around? Or has no company made that innovation yet?

You can buy a video out cable for iPods for $15 at CompUSA or Best Buy. I've got one.

Alternatively, Apple sells a kit; a docking station/remote control receiver with composite and S-video out, plus cables and a remote control and extra iPod US cables, for $99.

I hook my iPod up all the time to the TV. It's handy to have my whole library in my pocket.

observer_20000 wrote:The main reason for wanting an MP3 players that takes AA or AAA batteries is because I like the convenience of being able to simply change the battery if it happens to die during the day. The cost of constantly buying new batteries would be easily averted by buying rechargables.

The Creative Vision allows you to replace the rechargable battery with another one. You can buy extras from Creative's own webstore for USD$20 each as well as a bigger version for USD$50 or so.

Edit: Added "USD" for the Canadian.

observer_20000 wrote:Good to know. If it would indeed eat batteries up that quickly, then I suppose that even if they do exist, they'd be annoying.

One more question-

Do MP3 players that play video generally have an out port that you can connect to a TV, so as to watch the videos on a decent sized screen, if one is around? Or has no company made that innovation yet?

Both the creative Zen and the iPod video have support for connecting to a TV. Although the Zen has 262k colors, vs the iPod's 64k color display

General Zod wrote:

observer_20000 wrote:Good to know. If it would indeed eat batteries up that quickly, then I suppose that even if they do exist, they'd be annoying.

One more question-

Do MP3 players that play video generally have an out port that you can connect to a TV, so as to watch the videos on a decent sized screen, if one is around? Or has no company made that innovation yet?

Both the creative Zen and the iPod video have support for connecting to a TV. Although the Zen has 262k colors, vs the iPod's 64k color display

Hmmm, am I reading this wrong, or does the Zen also have a removable battery pack, meaning that I could simply buy 2 or 3, and use them as needed, if one happens to die during the day? If so, what do the battery packs generally go for?

That, and the fact that it can be connected to a TV would make it everything I'm looking for. The only minor flaw I can see is that it doesn't appear to support .mov. Is there a workaround for this?

EDIT: One more issue. Is it really only compatible with WinXP, or is that just the upload software? Do I have to use the software to upload to it, or can I simply upload to it as an external hard drive?

observer_20000 wrote:Hmmm, am I reading this wrong, or does the Zen also have a removable battery pack, meaning that I could simply buy 2 or 3, and use them as needed, if one happens to die during the day? If so, what do the battery packs generally go for?

The Vision M does not allow for battery exchange but the Vision W or just Vision do as I had pointed out earlier before Zod's post.

observer_20000 wrote:
EDIT: One more issue. Is it really only compatible with WinXP, or is that just the upload software? Do I have to use the software to upload to it, or can I simply upload to it as an external hard drive?

It might work on Windows 2k, but I've only ever used it on XP, so it's never been an issue for me.

Thanks a lot for all the help, guys. I'm still torn between the Vision M and Vision W, but it'll most definitely be one of those two.

Again, you guys have my thanks.

observer_20000 wrote:Thanks a lot for all the help, guys. I'm still torn between the Vision M and Vision W, but it'll most definitely be one of those two.
Again, you guys have my thanks.

I want to note that the Vision W's battery costs somewhere around $55-60 CDN given what I've seen on some of the Canadian webstores I've browsed. So if you're planning to buy an extra or two for the Vision W, I'd keep that in mind when choosing.

Stark wrote:Given the crap life you get out of AAs in smaller, flash MP3 players, I assume the larger HDD-based ones would flatten batteries in merely a few hours. All the major 20/30Gb MP3 players last at least 12 hours (often 16 or more these days). It's never going to die during the day.

And there are a bunch of things you can get to keep up the battery going through out your day. I got a wall charger for my ipod (just the plug with a USB port for your cable.) for less than $10 USD. And my gf got a pretty nice kit that has the transmitter for the car that keeps in charging and the wall plug. If you do get an mp3 player, it is going to grow on you and having a few things to keep it charged is going to be easier and cheaper than buying more and more batteries. Like Stark said, those rechargeable batteries work wonders.