Design used to follow function
My husband got me a Creative Zen Micro for birthday and he had added in a bigger HDD and a new battery, it really works like a dream. It was a bit difficult to get around at first as it’s from like 2004, but once I realised that I don’t need to mess around with my XP PC to get it work, that Gnomad2 exists and works smoother, I’m all good. And the sound quality is so good, 320 kbps MP3. And the player fits into my headphone case!!
// Hubby wants to edit to say that HDD was replaced with SD card adapter + 16 Gb card (only Sanddisc card worked on it.)
Yeah I’m old enough to remember how exciting it was when anti-skip CD players came out…
It was so cool I’d run with my CD player in my backpack, but sometimes take it out to violently shake it just to see the glorious technological achievement at work.
And they didn’t work at all :D 120 SECONDS ANTI-SKIP BUFFER! proceeds to skip within 5 seconds of jogging
Maybe you had a dud, cuz mine worked great. Biggest issue was how to carry it (Hold it? Put it in a pocket? Strap it onto a limb?)
Obviously it goes into the pocket of your cargo shorts
You gotta let it buffer first!
My old Garmin watch doubles as a mp3 player, is quite nice for running since I don’t have to carry anything
What’s your setup there? Can you think of a way to avoid using a smartphone app?
You don’t need the app, at least not for the mp3 player part, just plug it in to a pc and drag and drop into the location
This is however only the case for watches that support mp3s like my venu sq music
Well noted, thanks. Does this work without the Garmin express app?
In this youtube video he shows how to transfer mp3s with the Garmin Express (desktop) app to a venu sq (music)I know you can use the app for it, but I’ve never done so. No reason to download somthing extra if I do not need to
Seriously why is sending music to an iPhone from a Linux computer not directly possible in fucking 2026? I need to use VLC but its artist grouping sucks, it cannot assign the same track to multiple artists.
Navidrome > Tailscale > Symphonium (or any other player)
I know the pain. I had to use iTunes in a Windows VM. Now I have a Google Pixel with Graphene OS. No problems now.
People look at me weird when I tell them I have a dedicated MP3 player instead of using my phone.
No, I don’t want to run down my phone battery for music. Yes, I want a device I can leave sitting on the counter playing music that isn’t my phone I have to keep walking over to check.
That being said, SO many of the dedicated MP3 players out there are TRAAAAAAAAAAASH. My last one’s 3.5mm jack broke after a couple years. My new one’s SD card slot broke after 4 months. I guess the best method is just buying the cheapest one so when it breaks you don’t feel too bad about it. They’re all made by Asian companies that have no website or contact numbers or any kind of presence at all other than the Amazon page they’re selling their garbage on.
You might as well just buy a cheap Android phone to use as a music player. A number of the MP3 players out there are pretty much that anyways, except they actually delete the cellular modem.
The cheap phones are also more likely to have a 3.5mm jack and an SD card slot too.
Yeah I’ve considered that option. My last few MP3 players really have basically been phones. Touch screen. Android. 3.5mm and SD slot. Just without the cellular. It’s the cheapness that’s the problem. And that cheapness could still be an issue if I bought a cheap actual smartphone.
To be clear though, the last one I bought was $90-100. So not cheap cheap. I was eyeballing some that were as cheap as $50.
I use a Unihertz Jelly Star and I love it!
My dedicated mp3 player is an old phone
If it’s just the battery that’s the issue, put an inductive charger on the counter.
What do you have to keep walking over to check it?
I mean, just buy a bluetooth speaker and leave that on your counter. Then you dont even need to walk back to change your music. Playing music doesn’t drain your battery that much.
Ugh, I bought one that rythmicaly squeaked when you used decent headphones.
Buy second hand
I still use my iPod nano.
Maan, I had Exactly that mp3 player, big and bulky and not especially better IMO. You slid out the whole part with the display to access the USB-A IIRC.
Same. I remember it generally held about 65 songs.
And you could use it as a thumb drive too! Just pop it in and slide those mp3s and text giles or whatever in there! 128MB Baby!
Apple: please install our shitty proprietary software everywhere first, and buy all mp3s (again).
You did! I had the same one too and I liked that I never had to try to find the right chord. People hadn’t really settled on micro USB for most things yet, so you still had 5 different flavors of usb cable floating around.
Yeah, you just removed the “darker part” with the display and plugged it in a classic usb A right?
You got it!
Too lazy to check but do they make any portable music players that support opus and not just mp3?
My Nintendo DS (Moonshell) technically supports vorbis, but it struggles with its 4Mb of memory sometimes lol.
You have to look with a magnifying glass to find music players without touchscreen.
AliExpress: so no screen at all it is then
I had a nomad! it was… .aight…? like, it worked, and with the full size usb-A usb-stick form factor it was easy to load.
Same, I had that exact mp3 player and it still is the easiest to load music player I’ve owned. Just plug it into any computer and it shows up like a flash drive, drag and drop in your OS file manager. No software, no bullshit. Only downside is the storage space, mine was tiny. I think I could only get like 50 or so songs on it if I remember correctly.
Running tights with tight-fitting pockets allow for comfortably carrying a phone when out on a run.
Half-tights for the summer season.
Yeah, I have a dozen pairs and they’re so much better than holding or wearing an arm band or waistband or anything. Yes, I miss just rocking my silkies, but I’m also 40, and the compression shorts provide comfort that definitely is appreciated.
I have a Pixel 9a and I’ve got room to spare in the sleeve. When I drive to races the other leg sleeve is for my car key. I’ve considered a weapon of some sort when I run through wooded areas, because I fear being attacked by bears or wildlife, which will never happen where I live, but it still goes through my mind when I’m back there.
I honestly miss nothing about non-tight fitting running clothing. Zero chafing issues since I switched.
I think picking up cycling helped me dispel the last little bit of caring about what kind of clothing I wear. I suspect as a man ten years younger I may have had reservations about running tights.
FiiO still makes a few reasonably sizes DAPs that could work for running.
I won’t lie here. I miss my Zune. Of course, it would be unusable garbage by this point.
RIP Zune, the best product Microsoft ever made. Mine died several years ago (the lock switch broke and it was a hassle to turn on/off) but I didn’t have the heart to e-scrap it until recently.
Honestly it was amazing at the time. You could cast to a TV before that concept as it exists today. Automatic album art. Multiple format support. It was even a decent video player.
Smartwatch?
Viable if I don’t mind being locked into an ecosystem, and spending 6-7 times as much for something that is more or less guaranteed to lose software support long before it breaks.
With Garmin watches you can drag and drop files over the USB connection. All of mine have worked fine until the battery life degraded enough to not be useful anymore (5-6 years).
Finding a good pair of wireless headphones to go with the watch is another story unfortunately.
Still need the phone with you
Not at all. Most watches support running the music apps directly, downloading to the watch directly and connecting to your phone directly.
Apple Watch, Samsung Galaxy Watch, Pixel Watch, all support these functions.
Not the case for the Garmin watch I have
Now I feel like a god for still having my 256MB Nomad (which still works) and a 160GB iPod (which also works) during in a drawer just hanging out. I should probably take up running.
Hang onto that Nomad… there’s never been a better running audio player.
