Advice wanted

[ellid]

How many of you, dear flisters, have iPods? How do they work, and can one transfer songs from existing CD's to one, or must one buy through iTunes? Are they worth it or not?

I ask because a coworker might have one for sale and I'm intrigued. Thanks in advance....

Comments

[rufinia.livejournal.com]

Abosolutely you can put songs from your cds on to a ipod. You import them into itunes and then you plug in the ipod and it downloads everything from itunes you tell it to download.

I love mine- it's been four years now and I can't imagine my life without it.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

How much does iTunes charge you for this service? I've heard that the cost is $.99 per song, which strikes me as nickel and diming people to death when I already own the CD....

[musikologie.livejournal.com]

They're very intuitive and easy to work. You can rip a CD to your computer, and put the songs onto your iPod -- most of the songs on mine are from CD, and weren't purchased through the iTunes store.

If you do a lot of walking, or like to listen to music at your desk, or want to transport your music from one place to another, it's a good purchase. Would you be able to use it with your ear, though, or are you thinking of purchasing speakers to go with it?

[musikologie.livejournal.com]

Importing songs from a CD is free. If you purchase them from the store, songs are from .69 to 1.29. But you could use your iPod and never have to pay a cent for music.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

Concerns about possibly damaging the good ear are a reason why I haven't bought an iPod before now. I'm going to do a bit of research first - I certainly wouldn't be wearing one every day.

[musikologie.livejournal.com]

Depending on how new the iPod is, you can set the maximum volume output, if you're concerned that's an issue. Also, any third-party headphones will work with it (the little earbuds never fit in my ear, anyway) if a certain style might be more comfortable.

[bethbethbeth.livejournal.com]

I held out for ages, but my sister bought me an iPod Touch for my birthday and I really like it. I have about two days' worth of music on it, (plus some t.v. show eps and a few audio books) and there's plenty of extra room...and no, I haven't used the iTunes store at all - the music all comes from CD's or friends' music files.

( I can't wear ear buds and wouldn't risk them even if I could, but external headphones (the mini-ones with loops that go over the ear) work just fine)

[ellid.livejournal.com]

Now *that* sounds like a good idea. I have a headset for listening to my laptop and I position it so it rests on the jaw hinge, not the ear. I can still hear the music but the sound isn't going directly into the ear canal. Thanks!

Lurking lurker who lurks (and has an iPod)

[knossos.livejournal.com]

The ITunes store also has a ton of free programs that you can download. NPR, free classes from all kinds of schools (Oxford, Yale, State schools), and every week they have 3 or more songs for free to download.

You never have to spend a dime, unless you want to.

[hugh-mannity.livejournal.com]

You can even borrow your friends CDs, or MP3s on a USB stick and import those to iTunes. If iTunes is open on your computer and you stick a music CD in, iTunes will import it automagically.

I've not bought anything from iTunes and I've got an 8GB iPod Nano right now there's 1,192 "songs"* on it and it would take 3.5 days to play them all. And it's only 2/3 full.

iTunes is free downloadable software.


*"song" = individual piece, so each track on the CD is one song whether that's a 3 minute pop song or a 15 minute movement from an orchestral symphony. So the capacity of an 8GB nano is probably about 5 days (120 hours) continuous play.


How old is this iPod? Some of the older models' batteries stop holding a charge after a while and it's expensive, if not impossible to get them replaced. My son's gone through 2 iPods that way. My nano is getting a bit long in the tooth and although it holds a charge for a decent while, it's not as good as it was.

[hugh-mannity.livejournal.com]

You can also run them through speakers or your car radio. If you have an ancient car with a tape deck and no input jack, get one of those Walkman to tape faux cassette things -- it'll plug right into the headphone jack on the iPod. I think Radio Shack sells them. Otherwise try somwhere like Strawberries.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

My car is only six years old and has a CD player so I should be okay. NPR programs? This sounds *very* promising....

[ixchelmala.livejournal.com]

There's also a variety of small portable speakers that have the headphone jack plug that will allow you to listen to your music if you don't want a head set all the time. If your car has a tape player, then the tape adapter that one might use for a CD player also works with the iPod.

One more thing, besides iTunes being free and allowing you to copy the music off your CDs for your iPod, you can subscribe (think RSS feeds) to NPR shows like Splendid Table or Car Talk and iTunes will dutifully download that audio file so you can listen to that show when it's convenient for you. (TiVo for your radio shows.) And Yes, free.

[animangel.livejournal.com]

I have an ipod and I like it a lot. You can definately download music from CDs onto your ipod using itunes (which is downloadable and completely free). Actually, itunes itself is a pretty powerful media player. I used it long before aquiring an ipod.

Note that backing up music from your ipod onto a computer is more complicated. Depending on your setup, itunes may try to overwrite whatever is currently on your ipod with whatever you have chosen to "sync" to it. This is the default setting. You can, however, turn this off by changing settings under your ipod in itunes. (You can also choose which music you want to sync).

You can pull music off the ipod by going through the computer and into the drive, viewing hidden folders, and going into music. Note that the ipod renames the music files to nonsense, but the music stays intact. So you can manually transfer music from your ipod to your computer that way. (There is probably an easier way to do this, but I don't know it).

As for road music: the radio transmitters are higher quality if you stay within an area with fairly unchanging radio stations (so you can find a non-used frequency and keep it tuned there). However, they are TERRIBLE if you are going on long trips. "Tape" styles are the best way for long trips, although the tapes themselves may try to autoreverse a fair amount unless some minor surgury takes place. (Instructions are easy to find on the internet).

Headphones: as far as I know, any headphone that fits into a standard computer headphone jack will work with an ipod. I have yet to encounter one that doesn't.

Feel free to ask any other questions.

[girlygothic.livejournal.com]

Everyone's pretty much covered everything already. But just to throw in my own bits and to summarize...

* Yes, you can import songs from CD.
* You can't transfer directly from a CD to the iPod, but have to use iTunes.
* The iTunes program is free - You don't ever have to buy anything from the iTunes Store if you don't want to.
* I feel that it's still worth creating an account with the iTunes Store (which will require giving them credit card info, even though they'll never use it) because if you have an account you can download any of their free offerings. They offer 2-3 free songs a week, and tons of video stuff (which you can watch in iTunes on your computer.) To be honest, most of the free songs aren't that great. But every once in a while there's an absolute gem.
* For best results in organizing your music, it does work best to keep all your music on your computer (and not just import to computer, transfer to iPod, delete from computer.) So if your computer doesn't have the space to store all your songs, that could get a bit awkward, though not impossible.
* I have a 30GB iPod Video, which is about 5 years old.
* I've got my entire music library (over 4500 songs) on my iPod, and it's still only about 2/3 full.
* There is an incredible freedom to always having my entire music collection with me, wherever I am.
* I play my iPod in my car using a RoadTrip, which broadcasts the iPod to FM, which is then picked up by the car radio.
* The RoadTrip does have some quirks that may or may not be dealbreakers for you. So if you're considering getting one, we should probably correspond directly about it a bit so that you know what they are up front.
* The headphone jack on an iPod is a standard 1/8" jack, and can accommodate any headphones that use that size.
* That same headphone jack can also be used (with about $7 worth of cables from RadioShaft) to plug the iPod into any stereo system that has input ports. (I've used this to play songs from my iPod on my parents' and friends' stereos, and I even DJ'ed a party once using it.)

[lorena-snape.livejournal.com]

I don't have an actual iPod, just a run-of-the-mill MP3 player, not anything fancy (no vidoe or anything), but it plays music, podcasts, and audio-fics just fine, for a lot less money.

But if you can get a used ipod with all the bells and whistles for a good price, go for it!

[knitprincess.livejournal.com]

Another iPod user here. Two more good things about it:

1 - you can download any number of podcasts on a variety of topics. There are dozens of knitting ones, but I imagine there are also quilting ones, SCA ones, etc. If you subscribe through iTunes, it'll automatically add any new broadcasts since the last time you synched your iPod.

2 - audiobooks. You can get free ones at www.libravox.com and I just heard a rumor that I can also get free downloads at my local library. I have three Jane Austen novels on mine. It's an 8 GB nano (in red!) and it's maybe 25% full even with more than a day of music and the audiobooks.

[visionshadows.livejournal.com]

As for the hearing issue, there are headphones that are usually designed for children to prevent hearing loss. A friend of mine from high school designed some for her children.http://akqg2.2pycn.servertrust.com/

[quyllur.livejournal.com]

Nothing new to add, either. Just wanted to mention how much I love my ipod. I love being able to download fanmade podcasts on mine. I love podslash! ::G:: There just isn't enough The Sentinel podslash. I love to listen to the stories especially when I'm knitting or doing hand work.

[samantha-vimes.livejournal.com]

There's been studies done on minimizing ear damage, and you'd want to avoid the ear buds and get earphones that block out surrounding noises, because that allows you to play music more softly and still enjoy it.
I can tell the quality difference between CD and MP3, and I will probably never get an MP3 player. Better to carry a small folder of CDs and actually enjoy what I hear.

[dementordelta.livejournal.com]

Hey, thanks for asking this--I've been thinking of getting one too and reading through everyone's answers has been a lot of help! Good luck with yours if you decide to get it!

[prince-hring.livejournal.com]

I use a little gizmo that plugs one end into the cigarette lighter and the other into the i-pod. What it does:

-charges the i-pod
-keeps from using the batteries when listening while driving
-pipes the audio into a tiny FM transmitter: you listen on your radio!

[jillwheezul.livejournal.com]

Love love love love my ipod. Old women like me can even make it work. The portability of an entire walls worth of music on a small device is simply awesome. I resisted a long time, but I am thrilled with how much more time I have to listen to a wide variety of music now without having to change and tote around CD's.