toys

need advice on two new toys.

zoe wants a recording device, that she can record bird sounds, sea sounds, jungle sounds etc. , when she travels again. a 'normal' voice recorder hasnt the clarity, ( or maybe they have, hence the request for advice. ) she would then need to download it.

i want an i pod.

we went to radio shack just to see what we could see, but couldn't fight through the mire of 'oh, you need a q0238975213bv...it only costs $92847' etc. etc.

i dont need 15,000 songs and videos. however i find it frightening that the 'new' i pod a friend of mine bought a year ago, that had a thing that looked like a corkscrew that transmitted your songs through the radio, is now outdated and unsupported.


any thoughts?? much aloha

 

I dunno about the voice recorder, but I would suggest a 2gb Ipod nano, the FM transmitter is called an iTrip.

 

and how many songs? and ballpark cost?

 

Ipods are darling cute, and have a nice menu system, but I picked up a Creative Zen Nano Plus for about $125.00 at Best Buy a few months ago. Has FM, holds 1 gig of songs or whatever, sounds good, is about the size of a cigarette lighter, and you can drag & drop your songs in Windows Explorer just like moving them around on your computer. The menu isn't up to Ipod standard, but everything else is excellent. Unless you're into I-Tunes proprietary music downloads, which won't PLAY on anything but an Ipod, check out the Creative players.

As far as recording, just how good does she want it? And how much is she willing to spend, and lug around with her? Environmental sounds tend to be quiet, which requires a sensitive microphone. Most all-in-one recorders have mediocre to lousy sound quality and aren't very sensitive. Mechanical noise from the recorder ends up getting recorded with what you're trying to capture. A small, good quality recorder, with a good separate microphone, can sound awesome. If the money permits, these two would make great recordings, and in stereo to boot.

http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?CategoryName=pa_mp3MiniDiscWalkman&ProductSKU=MZRH10&Dept=audio&INT=sstyle-audio-deptfeature-MZRH10|sstyle:sy_dept_content_b:audio

http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?CategoryName=pa_PADepartmentAccessories_Microphones_DigitalMics&ProductSKU=ECMMS907&Dept=audio&INT=sstyle-audio-deptfeature-ECMMS907|sstyle:sy_dept_content_b:audio

Don't ask Radio Shack employees for advise. They generally don't know anything, and generally their products are crap.

 

Most songs in .mp3 format are around 5 megabytes. A gigabyte is 1000 megabytes (close enough for rough figuring.) So figure about 200 songs per gigabyte.

 

Actually, for recording I have found that iRivers are pretty good with the right microphone. And you can use them to download pictures off your camera. And you can play music on them. And listen to radio.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...f=pd_bbs_1/002-8428794-2426460?_encoding=UTF8
Check that out.

And for recording you'll want a stereo mic (to capture the setting better) with a stereo 3.5mm jack. Like this one:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...-8428794-2426460?_encoding=UTF8&s=electronics

Don't get one that sticks directly into the player - it might seem handy but it's not. 1. You can't put the player in your pocket and keep recording 2. there is a risk of shearing off the jack in the socket 3. It's a hard disk recorder and it does make some noise - so you'll want to isolate the mic from it as much as possible.

Hope that helps laurie

 

Same principle, different hardware. Something with a hard drive would be more convenient than Sony's minidiscs, but in any case a decent recorder with a decent microphone. Stereo mics are great for environmental recording; the sense of space adds a lot to it.

 

oh thank you so much. that really did help us to think about what we needed. she has bought a olimpas ws100 for $35.00 + shippping of another $10 on e-bay.

i think you're right...i dont need an i-pod.

the CD thing is so out of control. the ease at which you can copy them has resulted in CD's everywhere, only half of which play, and half of those only play on certain things. the thing i liked about the i-pod was the ease at which i could collect all my favourate tracks in one place, simplifying both the clutter and the control buttons.
the second thing is the versitility of it. that i only need a tuner and a couple of bitchin speakers in my 'tang and i'll be good to go. (oh- that felt just too cool to write ). when we camp or hit the beach or the ponds for the day, then it's a small boombox. it can be recharged from the car, no bloody batteries, and it plays for hours and hours longer than the cd player would. i didnt realize that i-pod was so tied in to i-tunes.
lastly, this is not 'disposable income' that i am spending. some one once said "if i only ever have one more penny than i need, i shall indeed be a rich man" . that pretty much applies to me, so although $300 or so doesn't sound like a lot to most people, it is to me. i want it to be universal enough (not to mention well made enough) to be able to continue to use it for more than the time it takes for a new model to appear.

now bearing all that in mind i can look a bit more rationally at what is on offer out there.

you are so right about radio shack, but, believe it or not, that is the ONLY place to get electronics on the WHOLE island. (apart from k-mart..and i dont go there) much aloha

 

So don't buy in Hawaii. Everything available anywhere is availabe online. And almost always cheaper than at the local stores, except for things too cheap to be worth shipping.

 

Just for starters, check out Crutchfield, particularly their "MP3 & Portable" section for your current interest.

http://www.crutchfield.com

 

Except a lot of places won't ship to Hawaii, or the cost of shipping there is out of control. It is kinda in the middle of nowhere, after all.

That was one of the coolest things I noticed when I was there...the islands are darn near perfectly self-sufficient for most things you would want to buy.

 

That's the price of paradise, I guess. I'm 2,500 miles, or something from the next nearest city, which aint much better, LoL!

 

I lived for 15 years in Gove (Nhulunbuy), NT, which is 500 miles (800k's) from the next town. Whereabouts in OZ are you? Bazza

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yes, the technology and communication fields haven't quite assimulated the islands yet. but its getting better. you can now use a cell phone successfully on maybe half the island now.

part of the reason portable music becomes an issue, is that there are so many places you cannot recieve a radio signal, especially down the valleys and up the mountains....oh wait ..there are only vallies and mountains. lol

the postage is unpredictable. in THEORY it is not much more. in practice companies load the shipping costs especially to here and alaska. fortunately, at least with the aide of the puter we are able to shop around.

i wouldn't swop this beauty for modern convieniences though.

 

Sorry, I missed this, Bazza. I'm in Perth, which aint exactly a small town, nowadays, but Adelaide is about the nearest city of any decent size at all, which is far, far away, LoL!

 

Wondering where you were. At least you can fly direct to Cairns, via Alice, if I remember rightly. That's a long way too. Bazza

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