I just bought a $50 refurbished Sansa Fuze. It uses a SSD, supports Rockbox (open source firmware), supports a microSD card, has >15 hour battery life. I can't believe I've been using an iPod.

goldfire · 1 year

Can anyone point me to something that isn't an iPod Classic and also has decent internal capacity? My library is 60 GB right now and I'd really rather not spend hundreds of dollars on SD cards and then be constantly switching them out.

aperson · 1 year

so whats the difference between having an SSD for internal storage and plain old flash memory? I thought that was all SSDs were?

abnormalbrain · 1 year

Love my Sansa Clip. Cheap, tiny, long battery life, rugged, and light for running.

zzybert · 1 year

I don't know about Rockbox, but I'd definitely recommend the Sansa Fuze and the Sansa Clip Plus. They're small, have good battery life, sound excellent, play OGG and FLAC as well as MP3, have user-upgradeable firmware, and can be expanded with Micro SDHC cards. And they're relatively cheap too.

fossuser · 1 year

Cowon D2 is one of the best tech purchases I've made. 60 hour battery life means I charge it about once a month or two. It supports ogg vorbis, FLAC, and basically any video/audio format you can think of. It has an SD card slot for limitless storage, it works just like a flash drive, no DRM, it is rated as one of the higher quality audio players with tons of equalizer options, do I need to continue?

marthirial · 1 year

I have a Sansa clip that I use for jogging. The thought was, let me use this cheap shit for sweaty things.

2 years later, the thing still looks and works great.

Curiously, the only thing I would change is the actual clip; it can come off too easily.

senopahx · 1 year

I love my Sansa. Ditched my iPod 2 years ago and don't miss it one bit.

dallasdude · 1 year

Also check out the cowon d2 plus. Battery lasts forever, big and expandable capacity. Good stuff.

lolstebbo · 1 year

Confirm something for me please. Can I load MP3s onto the SD card and have the Sansa read off the card directly?

likelikehwy · 1 year

I think I'll get one of these when I get active again. I hate using touchscreens since you have to look at the screen just to pause the music.

cmykify · 1 year

LOVE Sansa Clip+, best audio quality I've ever heard from a portable player without an external amplifier. Plays FLAC, 15-20 hr playback time, microSDHC, 30 USD, folder view.... I can't believe music lovers use iPods...

Magick932 · 1 year

My Sansa Fuze is super awesome :D

Fantasysage · 1 year

If you really want to fuck up your worldview, get a cowon, and realize what quality is like.

hermana · 1 year

I've used Sansa mp3 players for years. They've always worked great (even the cheapest ones) and I'd never even consider spending the kind of money that iPod charges.

Jerky_Sammich · 1 year

Man... THIS! I've been using a Sansa Sandisk E200 series with RockBox and an 8mb microSD card for 3 years now. It's awesome. You can convert just about any movie to MPG with FFMPEG using this command:

ffmpeg -i "INPUT" -s 220x166 -vcodec mpeg2video -b 200k -ab 192k -ac 2 -ar 44100 -acodec libmp3lame "OUTPUT.mpg"

Edit: to clarify, RockBox can play MPG files

galtthedestroyer · 1 year

I totally agree with everything the o. P. Said with one addition: they're cheaper than iPods.

djscsi · 1 year

Speaking from personal experience: I've been through about 5 refurb sansas of various generations - none of them have held up well. I've given my brother sansas for christmas, and none of them have lasted until the next christmas. After 3 years of replacing the broken sansas with new/refurb ones, I gave up. On the other hand, my 80GB Ipod video is still rocking after 3-4 years of solid use. I've never come close to filling up the 80GB drive, so I don't really care that I can't carry around a stack of tiny-ass microSD cards and fumble with sticking them in my mp3 player - I don't need to. This isn't meant to trash sandisk or their products - I really like them design-wise but they are much more flimsy than the ipod and in my personal experience have not held up well to regular use. Apple designs their products to be tools more than toys. You will of course pay for this, but I've now spent as much money replacing sansas than buying my one single ipod.

Also, I hope you linux guys know that you can load music on an iPod with linux right? If you just want to be able to load music on your iPod under linux, music programs like amarok (and I'm sure others) support ipod management.

hamcake · 1 year

Arrg. It's impossible to find hardware that runs Rockbox anymore. Any of the newer Fuzes won't run it. Worst mistake was trading in my old iPod for a newer one.

MrEs · 1 year

Yep I bought the misses a Sansa fuze months ago as motivation to keep jogging up =) I don't know any reason why somebody would pay an loads MORE, to be LOCKED in to using the world’s worst software (iTunes) and LOSE functionality!

Delete music through its UI
Radio
Expandable memory
You can use it without crappy proprietary software
Better sound
Cheaper
You can record the radio (i know, useless but you can do it, lol)

The only negative thing I've got to say about it is that it doesn't use a mini-usb plug. It has some proprietary plug :( You can buy a car/wall/additional chargers off of ebay for ~$7, still a negative IMO.

feetlicker32 · 1 year

even with the default software it still holds its own. i use it to record my classes as well. works every bit as good as a voice recorder.

KomodoAce · 1 year

Rockbox you say? Welcome to the club of Fuze although I have a few qualms with my own 8 gig player.

get_rhythm · 1 year

I also have a Sansa Fuze! I love it.

Grummond · 1 year

I've owned 5 Sansa Clips by now, love it so much I upgraded every time a new version came out. Haven't heard any portable player that matches its sound quality. I can only think of one potential problem, the screen is fairly easy to crack. It still works perfectly fine though, and it's so cheap to replace.

roger_ · 1 year

The screen resolution doesn't look that great.

Which iPod are you comparing it too? The price and expandable storage probably make it a better choice than the iPod Classic, but the iPod Touch also has app support, a better screen, WiFi, etc.

unbibium · 1 year

I'm normally an iPod guy, but a while ago iPod Shuffles got way too small. But I stocked up on Sansa Clips when they were on woot, so I have two. I gave away a third. I swore by the Sansa Clip back when the Adam Carolla show was still on terrestrial radio.

But then I switched to Mac, and Audible only syncs to iPods if you're on a Mac. Bugger. I forget how else it might have happened but I'm back on iPods.

Grummond · 1 year

As much as I hate iTunes, I still havent met a system that let's me copy music to a device and have said music indexed by song, artist, album better than iTunes+iPod does. And no, a directory structure just doesn't cut it. How does the Sansa Fuze hold up in that department?

zombiekiller · 1 year

The Sansa also has better quality output than an iPod. I use a small refurb 2GB Fuze for jogging and it's been rained on and dropped, yet still keeps on ticking.

Mr_Muffle · 1 year

Just got my Clip+ v2 in the mail yesterday. Love it so far, but haven't installed Rockbox on it yet. I'm excited to see Doom on a two color OLED display!

lou · 1 year

I bought a cheapo Sansa e270 back in the day when I lost my first-generation iPod nano on an overseas trip. Never looked back. More features, lasts longer, cheaper.

And now I'm going to check out Rockbox, since I've experienced some weird bugs in the default firmware. Thanks for sharing!

enfuego · 1 year

I have had 6 sansa players between refurbs and new ones in my home. I currently carry a sansa clip to listen to podcasts while jogging or on my daily commute.

But I also bought a refurbished ipod touch on woot a month ago. My first apple product. Those things are great - we all fight over it - I can't believe I held out that long. I'm waiting for the new ipods to be announced this week and hope to buy a couple more to replace the sansas. Sansa's are ok for music I guess, though they are a bit clunky. But I get to read emails, chess with friends and watch videos on the ipod.

ubermonkey · 1 year

Is the desire for a non-iPod borne mainly of:

Cost
Interface
Control scheme
Linux support

or

Desire to tinker more than the Apple ecosystem allows?

I was waaaay more tinker-y in my 20s, so I totally get that, but right now, today, I much prefer having a system that Just Fucking Works without me needing to tend to it very much, which is why I've never even really considered steps like jailbreaking my iPhone, or installing Rockbox on one of my Classics, or trying to "escape" from iTunes (I'm in particular confused about that desire, since I find it a pretty reasonable solution for managing music and playlists -- I really love the "genius" feature, which I use all the time to create running playlists).

Obviously, "what works for me" isn't the right answer for everyone. I'm not trolling, and I'm not a fanboy; I'd just like to understand the opposite view.

fivepines · 1 year

Welcome back to the real world !

hamcake · 1 year

Arrg. It's impossible to find hardware that runs Rockbox anymore. Any of the newer Fuzes won't run it. Worst mistake was trading in my old iPod for a newer one.

eridius · 1 year

What exactly makes this better than the iPod? The only 2 big differences I can see is you're using a different OS, and you can use a microSD card. As to the first, I'm rather skeptical that an open source embedded OS is going to provide a better user experience than the iPod. The open source community so far has a rather poor track record in that area. As for the second, maybe the answer is obvious, but why do you need a microSD card? My iPod already carries more music than I can reasonably listen to in several months, at the rate at which I listen to music.

So please do enlighten me. What's better about this new player, besides the fact that it appeases the anti-Apple crowd?

BigBoss722 · 1 year

iPods are for suckers. Good man.

beefpoke · 1 year

Dont want to play devils advocate here, but my ipod lasts through an entire workweek for me without charging. I listen about 5-6 hours a day and i can make it through an entire week on a single charge. this is the latest gen classic ipod.

LagunaCid · 1 year

Yeah, sansas with rockbox are quite epic. I have an e280 going strong. I love that thing. If only I wasn't too lazy to update my songlist...

stesch · 1 year

Link?

tejmin · 1 year

I've never used an ipod because I never liked the bloated itunes software required to operate an ipod. Sansa players for the win. copy + paste files with ease, small as shit, huge battery life, great sound.

[deleted] · 1 year

I'm far from an apple fanboy, but I'm currently reading this thread from my iPod. That is all.

qckslvr42 · 1 year

I'm all for form following function. That's why I buy products based on things like price/performance, ease of use, support, and compatibility. I don't really give a shit who makes it.

That said, I own an 80gb iPod. Why? Because at the time it was the best for the price in that size. I have now filled it up and need more space. Anyone have recommendations for something larger for a good price?

ryan_is_awesome · 1 year

I run Rockbox on my sansa, but I don't get close that battery life. Two questions:

Are you sure you aren't taking liberties with the battery life?
Which specific Sansa fuze model?

Thanks!

gonz037 · 1 year

Thanks for sharing! I just went and ordered one.

rpowers · 1 year

I have a couple, one's already broken; I agree, they're definitely awesome but I'm not sold on the durability.

cisaza · 1 year

So I'm a digger switching to reddit and I'm having a little trouble getting used to some things - how come when I click the link I'm not taken to a site about the Sansa Fuze? Is there a link somewhere I'm missing? Thanks in advance... (oh and let the n00b jokes commence)

maniaq · 1 year

Rockbox is AWESOME!

zyzzogeton · 1 year

You forgot to mention the FM Radio, and Audio Recorder functions.

chrismorin · 1 year

i bought one for 37$ CAD from tigerdirect a few months ago, really good product

notatoad · 1 year

you're making me sad that i lost my fuze.

Anthaneezy · 1 year

The reason you've been using an iPod is because it looks great. Also, you can run applications on it. You can connect to now ubiquitous wireless hotspots and get your email, watch netflix, get directions, browse wikipedia, yelp a restaurant.

If you want to just listen to music, I highly suggest a Sansa Clip. I bought 2 already. Watch woot.com, they have these frequently. I also have that phone from the fruit company. But in my backpack, I keep my Clip as a backup.

d4soni · 1 year

I used to have one of those...till the headphone jack took a shit on me.

neuromonkey · 1 year

I also hava a Sansa Fuze. I use the iPod Touch for apps and the Fuze for music. Even without RockBox, it beats the iPod. Easier to manage, plays more formats, tiny, great battery life, etc. The only thing that I can find to play FLAC on my iPod Touch is Open Stream Player, which kind of sucks.

neuromonkey · 1 year

Given that my Fuze already plays FLAC, is there any reason to install RockBox? The UI kind of looks like a mess to me.

wackoman · 1 year

While we're on the subject What's a decent non-iPod player with bluetooth you can get on the cheap?

kimad · 1 year

As soon as they release something with 120gb+ of storage I'll get one. Until then though, I'm stuck with an Ipod classic

jsilfies · 1 year

yeah I use to have a Sansa Fuze I lost it and have been using my friends I-Pod and i HATE IT. I miss the fuze.

rocthrttle · 1 year

i just put rockbox on my sansa 260v1 and i really wish i would have done it sooner. just for the themes alone. too cool. so many options to explore. dont hesitate. just go and install the full capabilities. dig around in the settings. if you think it should be there you will find it. games apps and all. i especially like the lamp app. rockbox just rocks.

Stupidenator · 1 year

I bought the same for $49. It's amazing, especially for the price. I have reached the 8GB limit, but the support for microSD lets you add an extra 32GB. This is my second player, the first was a 1GB refurbished sansa c200 that I found for $10. It lasted me over a year and through a great deal of abuse, even losing it's select button. I finally had to upgrade when the headphone jack died, but by then I'm pretty sure I got more than my money's worth.

Both of these are rockbox supported, which adds a ridiculous amount of features including extra formats and a Gameboy Color emulator.

Newer versions of players tend not to be rockbox supported, and refurbished ones aren't necessarily the older type, but if it is it's great. I highly recommend.

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