SanDisk Shames iPod shuffle With Sansa Clip+ Comments

Unfortunately that still doesn't solve the issue of most people walking into stores asking if they have any "iPods" when they actually mean "MP3 Player" or audio player in general.

I do wish I was allowed to scream at people in shops...

P.S. My right eye twitches whenever I look at that image (from the article) because I highly doubt that microSD is the right way round for inserting into the slot.

I have a 2Gig Sansa Clip which is an excellent little player, it's been in daily use for the last year. The on/off slider is getting a little bit sticky now so I'll be buying a 8 Gig Clip+ as soon as it appears in this country.

Presumably any songs placed on the microSD will be seamlessly integrated with the ones on the internal memory?

This is good news even for die-hard apple fanbois like me.
To be honest, I'm never actually going to own one of these as will always buy the ipod version (too much apple gear in my house to risk going off-piste now) but the extra pressure to make Apple up their game in terms of cost per GB and external SDHC slots can only be a good thing.

We need to keep this up until they make their iTunes DRM Music Videos accessible to my Xbox then I'll really be happy.....

Finally! Finally! Finally! I've been waiting for a high capacity, wearable MP3 for ages and this was just the development I've been banking on. I wonder if the memory card integrates seamlessly with the internal storage though. It'd be nice if everything could be found in one place.

My sister lost my awesome Sansa Clip on Holiday, this looks really nice, but I think i'll end up just getting a 16gb Micro SD for my Blackberry Storm, which is quite a competant music player, (and not too large to have when jogging etc).

@Dan - I thought new music videos bought from iTunes were DRM free? Although, that doesn't help if you have older videos.

Also, hopefully Apple will unveil some price-cuts during the upcoming 9 September event. Though, because of their dominant position, and the fact that the term iPod is now synonymous with MP3 player, they can get away with charging a premium.

Hmm. Well when I watched Anything but iPod's YouTube review, when the guy was browsing by file/folder (yaaaaay!!!) there were clear separate menus for Internal and Card Memory.

Anyway, apart from that and the slight knock to the aesthetics like the lack of that cool light ring, this would appear to be the one player that ticks all my main boxes :
- Wearable
- Potential high capacity
- Drag and drop
- File/folder browsing
- Apparently great sound quality

Cleary worth the year's wait.

@Gordon: Oh, I wasn't accusing TR of doctoring the image or anything ;). I'm just one of those people whose blood boils ever so slightly if they spot a misplaced apostrophe or something that doesn't quite "fit".

I do kinda smile at the Misco iPod Shuffle 4Gb ad. (only £57.49!) at the top of the page :)

Fanboi as I've been accused of being, I've always hated the Shuffle. Nice as they've always looked, there's not an ounce of practicality in them and they've always been overpriced.

Theres not much to criticise in this little player especially as GoldenGuy has listed all its advantageous features. Ofcourse it wont appeal to the sorry souls like Dan above who must buy Apple no matter how impractical and inferior their rival mp3 players maybe.

@GoldenGuy

When you are browsing by folder then there is a seperate screen for the internal and external memory. If you are browsing the library then it all intgrates with songs on the external memory having a little SD icon next to them. Personally I don't see the point in browsing by folder

@manoz

Enough people must have wanted the folder browsing alternative to ID3 for it to warrant its inclusion. I've seen people complain about the shift away from folder browsing on several forums now and I can see why as it allows you much closer control over playlists and the order of files.

What's nice about this though is that both systems are in place and for the price that's pretty good. But I know I'm not the only that doesn't like the extra step of tag editors when you can just deal directly with the file system yourself.

If you're browsing by folders, I would think you'd *want* to have separate screens for internal and external memory. You don't expect your PC to merge the folder displays of your drive C: and drive D:, do you?

@manoz

Not the PC but I wouldn't mind the firmware of the mp3 player to sort that out. Admittedly harder because it might have to internally allocate a prefix for any duplicate file or folder names, e.g. -1, -2, etc., but it'd be a nice feature to have so everything remains in one place. I still maintain what they've managed thus far is excellent and I'll be purchasing the burgundy one as soon as.

@GoldenGuy: Yes, there is something rather delicious about the burgandy one which is compelling me to buy it even though I don't really use MP3 Players. *Glances at pictures again* Argh! My Eyes! That damned out of place microSD is doing my head in...

Annoyingly though doctor, the 8GB (and 2GB) have been reported to only be available in black. I am tossing and turning the decision in my head to buy ASAP or hold out for the 32GB cards (I really don't want to swap multiple cards with those load times) in which case I might not rely on the internal memory at all and can just buy the 4 gig red. And who knows? Maybe the colour range will increase by then.

If anyone knows news to the contrary then definitely post it.

Noooooo... Ah well, might save me a bit of money then.
Hope they do release the red in all capacities though.