Hey ya'll. I'm in the market for an MP3 player. I have always been skeptical of them but I used a friend's iPod yesterday and really liked it.

I was wondering if any of ya'll have some suggestions of players besides the iPod. I think the iPods are great, but I feel like there are better values out there.

Any advice would be great!!

You can definitely save some money on other brands, though the iPod is very cool. Just depends on what you want. Plus with other brands you do not have the restrictions on file type, i.e. .mp4 format. Look around on the internet. Sites such as www.newegg.com and www.tigerdirect.com have a wide variety to choose from.

I appreciate the link, I just don't know what brands are good!?

I have a Sandisk and I like it, it's a popular brand. Other popular brands include Rio, iRiver and Creative. There's also the Microsoft rival to the iPod, the Zune. Hope this helps.

If you like the Ipod, but not the price Apple sells factory refurbs for quite a discount, still have a 1 year warrenty.

Link (http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?mco=32DAAC51&nclm=Certified)

30gig Ipod $179

i have the 4gig nano. in my opinion all it does is make the songs get old really fast. but it is nice to have when out wheeling in moab where there is no radio stations

i just got the new 8gb nano for christmas.... its full already, but what i like about it, unlike my old 40gb is that i can decide what songs i really would listen to. It makes me chose what i want and doesnt make the searching process so annoying when you want that one song by that band, but you cant remember the band's name or whatever.

It's also nicer for the car cuz its smaller, and i just throw it in the top glovebox connected to my Alpine, and im rockin. 2k songs is all you need for that anyways.

I have an ipod nano... but another excellent brand is Creative. My buddy had one and he paid considerably less than I did for mine. I wish I wouldn't have been so "trendy" when I purchased one.

If I had to do it over again I would get a Creative!

I've seen the creative ones on some sites.. I'll check into them. Thanks guys.. anybody else with recommendations please give some input!!

I have only own creative and I love them. definitely more features for the buck. try to make an ipod record radio transmissions. Also I would look to the ZUNE it is full of nice features and it already has tons of accessories that you can get. remember it is backed by Microsoft and they want your business so they are actually giving you an Excellent product

Hey check out the accessories page on the Xterra website--there's an iPod interface kit available now.. just in case ya'll didn't know!

Sandisk Sansa > iPod

I understand the idea of not wanting to be trendy or buy something just because it has had the best marketing, but one benefit to the iPod is all of the accessories you can get for it. In the end, that matters a lot. Just my $.02.