QUOTE(StrangeMagic @ May 31 2006, 6:05 PM)

NEVER GET AN I RIVER! they erase by themselves
Shut up, you have no idea what you're talking about. Please go drown on your own vomit.
QUOTE
Ew, I hate the Zen Micro. I know I'm in the minority around here, but the iPod really is great. Unless you want the Nano, which is a horrible deal. I'd recommend the iRiver.
No. The iPod isn't great. If you are looking to throw away 300 dollars, then you'd be better off giving it to some crack addict than buying one of these worthless piece of shits. How could you hate the Zen Micro? The Micro can kick the iPod Mini's ass, if they made it anymore. It's a good player, with better sound qualities, and now theres the Microphoto. You also have no idea what you're talking about.
Ok, here we go. It all depends on what type of music listener, memory, features, and size.
If you are going to go small, with a decent amount of music, go witha flash player.
iRiver t10-t30
iAudio u3 <-- this is a beast of a player. The only problem might be it's price. This one also probably has the best sound quality
Creative Muvos
The Sandisk Sansa c100
If you can find it, the Olympus M:Robe 100i
The Mobiblu DAH 1500i <-- One of the worlds smallest Mp3 players
I forgot what they were called, but it was inbetween the Flash and Hard Drive based players.
iRiver h10
The Sansa c300
Any of the Samsung Yepp series that fit in this category.
Creative Zen Micro/Microphoto
Theres more, go look em up. These are just some of the ones I'd recommend, I had a whole list, but I forgot most of them.
The Harddrive based players.
iRiver h300<-- If you can find it
iAudio X5, or the cheaper m5
iAudio 6 if you can import it
Creative Zen Vision:M
Olympus M:Robe 500i
Or a Rio mp3 player, those are good too.
Toshiba Gigabeat
Even a Archos Mp3 player.
If you more into Video, then I recommend a PMP.
Creative Zen Vision
Archos AV500
Cowon iAudio A2
iRiver Pmp-100
iStation v43
Archos Gmini
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course, you could go with the crowd and get an iPod. they're a little more expensive, but you can access podcasts
All mp3 players can play podcasts.