From: Neon John <jgd_at_johngsbbq.com>
Date: Tue, 14 Feb 2006 13:57:13 -0500

On Sun, 12 Feb 2006 10:40:54 +0000, Joseph Jones
<bumpycarrot_at_gmail.com> wrote:

>I tend to agree with Scott's sentiment. The Archos' were okay a couple
>years ago, but I believe they are terribly dated now. I suggest one of
>the iRiver models, or maybe one of the recently ported iPods.

Dated? Only if bling is more important than functionality.

I've played with an Iriver and an Ipod and consider both steps down in
the hardware department even with rockbox onboard. I won't EVER be
ready to give up replaceable batteries. If and when I'm forced to,
it'll be only after some kicking and screaming.

The JBR is VERY rugged. I hate to think how many times I've dropped
mine off my belt clip while scootering or working. Like they say, it
took a lickin' and came up tickin'. I even dropped it in the wet snow
this weekend. I yanked the batteries out until it dried out and no
harm done. I know, someday it'll drop at the moment of a disk read
and I'll crash the drive. I'll just put another one in and keep on
truckin'.

If I ever do need to work on it, the JBR isn't so tightly packaged
that I need an electron microscope just to see the components. I've
had to tack the power connector back down twice now after tripping
over the charger cord. No big deal. Try THAT with these new
microscopic players!

With 2500mah batteries, I get over 24 hours' play time at 32kbps
(audio books) and around 12 hours at 128kbps. Then if I need to, I
just slap in another set of batteries and go. No chargers or cords or
other crap to haul around. I haven't seen anything out there yet that
can touch this, especially for the cost.

I don't want a do-everything-but-a-BJ type box. I want my jukebox to
play MP3s and do it the best it can be done. The JBR does exactly
that.

I have 4 JBRs and one Studio in my little hoard. That should be a
lifetime supply. I probably need to hoard some 100gb drives too, for
when they stop making those.

I highly recommend putting forth the effort to find a JBR version 1 or
if you can't find one, a Studio (play only, not record.) Pop a 100gb
drive in the thing and enjoy!

To give you an idea of just how reliable a JBR/Rockbox combo is, I
have a JBR in my restaurant playing background music. It runs all the
time. During the last Christmas season I pulled it down to load on
some more Christmas music. It had run continuously without rebooting
since LAST Christmas when I pulled it down to put the first Christmas
music on. That's 12 months, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week without
being touched. There are about 1800 songs in the regular playlist.
The old version of Rockbox didn't randomize that large a list very
well but the current version (as of Christmas) fixed that one problem.
One can't ask for more.

I'm about to move the 80gb drive from that JBR to my studio and put it
into background music service. I want to save the JBR in my hoard for
just in case. We'll see how well the Studio does. I expect equal
performance.

John

---
John De Armond
See my website for my current email address
http://www.johngsbbq.com
Cleveland, Occupied TN
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Received on 2006-02-14