Happy holidays everyone.

I've been looking to buy an IPod, but the only reason I'd buy one would be to use in my car (through the car speakers)

Am I correct in thinking that the only way I can do this is if I have a casette player ? Because most new cars don't even come with a casette player...

If this is the case, is there any other MP3 player out which can be used through my car speakers (without the need for a Casette player) which will allow me to x-fer songs direct to it from my PC ?


Many thanks

I use a Belkin TuneCast II in my car.
You connect it to the headphone socket, and 'tune' it to an FM frequency - e.g. 89.6
Then you tune the car's radio to the same, and you get your music

Can u transfer songs direct from your PC to that one ??

No - it's just a 're-broadcaster'. I connect it to my iPod.

Oh I see, so u put the belkin into your normal headphone slot & you then flick through your radio frequencies & one of them will find your IPOD frequency ?

Yep That sounds about right

Thanks guys

Note that this is illegal under the Wireless Telegraphy Act and can result in imprisonment.

Do not buy an ipod. They are crap. Buy the phillips version or an Iriver. Ipods only support MP3 and not WMA

I like mine

How much cash do you have to spend on this?

An Alpine head unit supporting Ai-NET is the best solution available, but also relatively expensive. It allows you full control of the ipod via the headunit.

Another option is a head unit with an AUX input. This is how I use my iPod in car. However its a bit clumsy and dangerous to use the iPod while driving so its best to set up what you want to listen to before you set off.

If yyou havent bought one yet, look at the alternatives on he market from the likes of
I river
Creative labs
Rio
if its just for use in your car, you can buy Car radios ( headunits) that have a hard disk that can be loaded with mp3's

Random Poster... u shouldn't listen to him... the only time you should be listening to WMAs is if you are downloading licenced media (eg from Napster)... if not, you should be encoding all your files as high-bitrate MP3s for compatibility or AAC for quality, both of which iTunes and iPod handle superbly well... also iTunes can convery WMAs to an iPod supported format on the fly...

iPods aren't crap, they just weren't designed for Bill Gate's hugging Windows users.

Ok, I have like 5000 songs on my PC, am I correct in thinking that an IPod (or indeed any portable MP3 player) comes with a wire which I can connect to my PC & just transfer songs over to it ? Or does it need to connect to some kind of official IPod site & I have to pay for the music from there ?

Also, how easy is it to navigate around the IPod to different songs ?

Additionally, I heard that once you have a song on your IPod, you cant actually take it off again ?

beofre you buy a hard disk mp3 player:
How much space do these 5,000 tracks take up in GB?
this will dertimine the size of the hard disk in your player.

what format are they in mp3/wma/aac/ogg/flac etc?
different players play slightly different formats, they all play mp3s (apart form sonys hd1), but if you have a lot of files encoded as WMAs you will be better avoiding the ipod as it doesnt support them.
you can transcode the files to a format the ipod supports, but you will have a drop in quality.

As for Navigation of your music, the players ive tried, I pod, and the Creative Zen are both easy to navigate and find stuff, you can remove music from the player, and put it back again as much as you like.

As for transfering music, a wire goes from your p.c to your player, and you can just copy music from your p.c to your player, usualy by usb2.

Dont just think of the i pod, there are other players out there that offer more.
heres a list of manufacturers of hard disk mp3 players well worth looking at are

Creative
I River
Rio
apple

Thanks Richard.

I've been told that the Nomad Zen is the best for what I want.

All I basically want is one that I can use in my car with minimum fuss (through my cars speakers) without having to rewire them etc, then at night simply take it out of the car & my radio works as normal again. I also need it to be relatively easy to use, easy to transfer songs on to it & take them off again and of course easy to shuffle my play list to whatever I feel like listening to on that particular day.

Its quite a difficult decision - is it true Microsoft are going to bring something out in February 2005 that is like an IPod but meant to be loads better ?

Microsft have colaborated with other manufacturers to provide an operating system for a portbale media centre.
these devices are already available, are hard drive based and have a colour screen that can play video files.
From what ive read about them, there not up to much, if you want to watch films on the go, buy a portable DVD player.

If you using a player in the car, what type of car radio do you have, doe it have a cassete player or AUX in?

It is extremely easy to navagate around your songs on the iPod when you give them genres and more detail so it's more specific and easier to find.

You can take a song off your iPod. If you delete and song from iTunes it automatically deletes it from your iPod the next time you plug your iPod into your computer.

although you can do what you like with other players, as they dont auto delete things.
i know that the nomad software will allow you to remove tracks from the player, and it wont affect what youve got on your p.c.
if youve got more than one p.c you can copy your entire music library from p.c onto your nomad, then onto another p.c.

As for Genres etc, if your mp3s are corectly tagged then you will have no problem with artsits/albums/genres when transfering to an mp3 player.
select an audio file on your p.c and right click it, select properties, then sumary, and you should see the IDTAG info
Most players will sot your music acording to these tags, and not by folders on your p.c, the only exception to this are some players from iRiver.

That's 90% of the computing community, then.

Yes but the majority are not necessarily right!

Its pretty close at the top end of the market, i pods are good, but there are also other players on the market that are just as good, if not better, when taking into account value for money.
ive had a play with the phillips mp3 player, and it didnt come up to the same standard as the I pod, or the creative Zen, in both sound quality, or ease of use.

I've been told that the FM tuner for the car which allows you to tune your radio to play your IPod (or whatever Mp3 player u use) is actually illegal in the UK due to something about it effectively acting as a pirate radio station, is this true ?? I only ask because if it is, then I might as well call off my search for one in regular shops !

Don't worry about it. Its just scare mongering from people with too much time on their hands. If it really was illegal they wouldn't be allowed to sell them. Broadcasting music to yourself in a car is hardly creating a pirate radio station. Jeez....some people eh?

The Belkin TuneCast has a maximum broadcasting range of 30m (although it apparently degrades after 10m).

Unless you drive past a police car and you're overriding a legitimate station that they also happen to be listening to then there's no way of them really finding out.