ipod Shuffle alternative recommendations

[David W Jackson]

OK so I decided to ring in some changes and instead of enjoying a silent walk to the pond here at the Uni where I practise my Taiji and Qigong in the mornings, I'm going to start listening and repeating some Chinese sentences instead. I made some recordings of the example sentences from the Tuttle dictionary which are also bundled with Pleco. Kind of an inverse Li Yang Crazy English approach I suppose, except here it's Crazy Chinese (btw, wasn't he intending to launch that a few years back?). I could stretch to an ipod Shuffle with its dinky little clip but then I thought how absurd. Here I am in China and there must be at least a few clip-type Shuffle alternatives. Does anyone use one and can you recommend it (sound quality up to par)? Then a question to those of you who listen to Chinese on the go: what are you listening to right now? (Where did you download it from? What works best for you, what not so much?). Maybe we could get some good ideas; or maybe similar info is already available under some other topic (admin?). Thanks for sharing.

[giraffe]

I grabbed the audio from the first twelve episodes of the popular tv drama Wo Ju and have been listening to it over and over and over again, maybe 20 or 30 times so far. I'm still a long way from understanding all the dialogue (I would charitably call myself a low intermediate learner) and I'm starting to get bored with it now but I've enjoyed the way the story has verrrrry slowly unfolded. At the beginning I simply didn't have a clue what was happening but now I think I've got most of the nuances of the plot. One thing that continually amazes me is that sometimes when I hear something for like the 20th time and I finally understand what the heck they're saying and then realize that all this time they were saying something really straightforward using words I already knew, but somehow my brain wasn't clicking with it.

[edelweis]

regarding devices:

personally I'd like to have at least these functions:

* random playing - current subtree only (for listening to music, reviewing already learnt language tracks, or just have a target language audio background while doing something else)

* loop 1 file (for language study - while doing something else or not)

* 1 button for short rewind (5s to 10s) (for language study)

* 1 button for partial loop i.e. mark part of a track and loop only that part (for language study) (similar to xmms 'A' loop on PC...)

* 1 pause/play button of course (for language study, when you want to repeat each sentence aloud)

I used to have that really practical small iriver player that did all these (although I am not sure any more about the partial loop?) but it had only 256MB memory, was somewhat bulkier than iPod shuffle, and used AAA batteries so I am not using it much any more...

Not sure what is available nowadays - most low cost and/or really small players have only basic functions.

So if someone has a really small device with all these functions and lots of memory I'd be interested to know.

[edit] or even a not so small device... [/edit]

@David sorry I'm not really answering your question. Are you sure that "shuffle" and play/pause are the only feature you're interested in? (although I had a look at the ipod shuffle there: http://www.apple.com/ipodshuffle/ and I guess "loop 1 track" could be simulated by creating a playing list with only 1 track).

On the other hand if you already have other devices with more functions then I guess small and clippable are your main priorities...

[geeness]

What you are asking for in an mp3 player are very specific... why don't you get something that you can then load a custom firmware onto, and customise??

Everybody recommends the following two players:

Sansa Clip [or the newer Sansa Clip+ (plus version is different, a few important changes, you can read yourself!)]

Sansa Fuze (NOT the + version!!)

Here's a quick summary: Fuze has SDHC card slot, default 8Gb memory (although some came with 2 or 4Gb in-built memory, they were cheaper models.) Supports most music formats, and is very customisable, even with the stock firmware.

The Clip vs Clip+ - tiny mp3 players with basic OLED screen, the clip+ has an SDHC memory card slot whereas the original Clip doesn't, so for expansion the Clip+ is better. The Fuze isn't much bigger than the clip, but is much better, so go for the Fuze if you're not sure.

I have a Sansa Fuze - it's the best mp3 player I've ever owned... here is a review from TheRegister:

http://www.reghardware.com/2008/06/16/review_sansa_fuze/

The Fuze is bigger, better buttons than the Clip or Clip+, but your own opinion may vary. Have a look and try them if possible, I think for Chinese with artist album pictures and long text, the Fuze is better - and the 24+ hour battery life is amazing, the Clip's is significantly less, but has normal USB connection, not a custom cable.

You should remember the Clip and Fuze have both had firmware updates since most online reviews.

You want to customise keys, don't you, and add a lot of other functionality that is going to be missing in some respect from teh default factory firmware. You need 'RockBox'!

RockBox's website is: rockbox.org

The installation is easy, and you can customise as you please...if you get lost with the settings or functionality, you just need to psot on the RockBox forums, and someone will help you out, likely an actual developer.

You may have trouble finding a Sansa Fuze now, but they're still for sale new in USA, and you can get good second hand ones on EBay that have been taken care of. Ignore the Fuze+ newer touch-version in my opinion.

As I said, best MP3 player I've ever had - although if you want a tiny portable player, don't mind worse battery life and the restrictions of a small OLED screen, then go for that instead if you can't find an old version Fuze.

Good luck!

Edit:

RockBox Theme area, which you can install once you've installed RockBox on it:

http://themes.rockbox.org/index.php?target=sansafuze

[edelweis]

@geeness: thank you for the recommendation it looks quite interesting.

[eurostar]

listening to conversational audio from films or tv shows is great. I like to split up the files into 2minute chunks though randomize them together. That way you never know what's coming next and it can be fun trying to guess which movie/character is speaking now. When I want to relax or go for a drive I'll put on a song, but for most the time, random dialogues are the way to go! I've always preferred the ipod touch myself so I can use anki on the go as well.

[wlee08]

Assimil: Chinese with Ease. I uploaded all 104 dialogues to my itouch and listened to it all the time - on buses, grocery shopping, etc.

Fantastic