MP3 players forum: Best, current MP3 player for audio books......

I'm glad you brought up Palm...

It's encouraging to hear you are successfully listening to Audible.com content on your Palm Tungsten. I would much prefer to have only one little device to handle my PIM and audio needs. And, since I'm already firmly entrenched in the Palm format (m515), the fact that Creative only works with MS Outlook made that a redundant and wasted feature (for me) on the Zen Micro, even though I was seriously attracted to the recording capabilities found there.

So, now for a few questions: Is it a problem that Palm is not compatible with Audible Format 4? Do you have any problems with the matter of being able to resume listening where you left off? Also, can you Podcast with that setup? How about using it in the car with an FM transmitter? (I'm looking at the iRiver AFT 100). Do the Palm units have recording capabilities?

If you could answer any or all of these questions (or others that I've not thought of) I would be very grateful. Thanks much.

I use my Tungsten E (the older model) to listen to Audible audiobooks as well as music files. For music, I downloaded a 15-day free trial of Pocket tunes (www.pocket-tunes.com). The free RealAudio player that came with the Palm will play .mp3 files, but they take up a lot of space. P-tunes will allow you to play .wma files on a Palm. This is a valuable feature, since .wma files are much smaller and it's the default used by Windows Media player if you rip tracks off a cd. I liked p-tunes so much I paid the $35 to buy it after the free trial.

As for Audible, the Audible player for the palm is great. I prefer to use a card reader to load all my Audible files and music to an SD card. The audible manager makes this very easy using their download manager. (BTW, Audible formats 3 and 4 work on a Tungsten.) For music files its as easy as drag and drop.

Listening to audio files is different on Audible and P-tunes. P-tunes has better features for making playlists and moving around between and within tracks. However, if you use the Palm's power button to stop the music, you will have to turn p-tunes back on with your stylus (or fingernail) on the screen after you turn the Palm back on. This means you have to look at it to start it up again, so you can't do it in your pocket. Audible has two advantages in this area. One: you can turn the audio on and off just by turning the Palm on and off. You have to hit the power button twice to turn it off, and then once to turn it back on, and the audio will start playing where you left off; two: if you are not using any other programs simultaneously while the audio is playing (which you can do with both p-tunes and audible) the display on the Palm will eventually go dark while still playing the audio to prevent drain of the battery. P-tunes never goes dark.

Battery life is the ONLY issue that would compel me to buy a separate mp3 player, although I haven't caved yet. I really like having everything I need in my Palm. I worry that the battery in my Palm is not replaceable by the user, so I am hoping I don't kill it soon, since I have become a bit of an audio junkie.

As for playing it in the car, it can be done. If you have a tape deck in you car, you can get a tape deck audio converter used to play the audio of a portable CD player or DVD player through the car speakers. Just plug it into the headphone jack of your Palm and voila, audio through the car stereo.

I haven't tried podcasting yet, so no report on that. I'm not even sure if it's something I would need bluetooth or wireless to get, neither of which is available on my Tungsten E. Love to hear about it if anyone has tried it.

Recording - my Tungsten E does not have recording capabilities. Maybe the Zire models do? They seem to be more geared for multimedia.

Hope this helps. Good luck!

Thanks for the tip. I've downloaded Juice (formerly ipodder) and have subscribed to my favorite NPR programs. What a great feature! Until now, if I wasn't in a car, I missed my npr fix. If only they would podcast entire programs (Morning Edition, ATC), that would be great.

My Creative Zen MicroPhoto MP3 device has an FM tuner AND you can record whatever is playing, so recording "Morning Edition" or anything else is easy.

I had my Palm Tungsten E eleven months to the day and the battery failed. Until then it did everything perfectly, and I became over-reliant on it. I religiously synced with my PC and conducted all of my personal and professional affairs with its robust features.

Palm would do NOTHING - - I called corporate relations in Milpitas, CA and expressed my utter dissatisfaction with the 90 day warranty and repair price of $149. - - $50 less than I paid new. Their offer: they'd split the repair cost with me.

Palm doesn't want or need our business. When your unit fails consider an HP or Dell. If you're not using software and other computer-based functions save yourself grief, time and money and buy a $30. Sharp or Casio organizer that syncs to you computer.

I had a $20. Casio organizer for ten years before it gave up. I replaced that lowly unit with the $199. Tungsten E that lasted 11 months. Consider the increased power, cost effectivenss and capabilites I gained after that decade.

Palm can't compete with its high volume sales of short-life products, and it product line is too large and confusing. Most important is that Palm must learn that customer service is king, and a company that abandons its customers as Palm does deserves to fail. And Palm will. Remember: economic boycotts work. When you get good service tell your friends. When you get bad service tell everyone.

Thanks for your detailed info on the compatibility of the Tungsten E for audio. It is just the info I needed.

One further clarification: how is the sound quality? I have some meditation tracks I want to listen to but they have a tonal component that is integral to their effectiveness. Do you think the tones will translate cleanly?

My Plam TX works better than any of the MP3 players I have tried including the ireiver. It always starts where you left off, even when you change MD's. When the palm does mess up, it always re-boots and you just start over. When any of the MP3 players, including the zunes, have a problem, they freez. Sometimes the only way to un- freez them is re-load the firmware operating system. This is easy to do, but it takes time and you loose all of your improted data. All MP3 players have this problem, exept for the palm.

Unfortunantly, all palms have a slight hiss in the audio. If palm would fix this, they would blow i-river and zunes and i-pod away.

Id like to post a review of http://www.BooksShouldBeFree.com a site I found that is very well laid out. It has only around 100 eBooks but they are the 100 most popular books in the public domain. Also, the site has photos of every book so you can be sure of what you're downloading. As the website's name suggests http://www.BooksShouldBeFree.com all mp3 audio book downloads are free.

I am very interested in this subject. Now that the Holidays are over, for the time being, I'd like to download audio books for traveling and excercise. I'm an AOL user and saw in an earlier discussion that some models, e.g. Zen, operate only with Outlook.

Would like to read input from others.

You are correct that Outlook is not required for the Creative Zen Micro. Synching with Outlook is just a small extra that you can either use or ignore. I copied my Contacts to the Zen Micro just for read only when I dont have my PDA along. This process doesnt interfere at all with synching a PDA. (I also use a Treo 650.) Its sometimes handy to have my Contacts available on the Zen Micro, but in no way does it replace a PDA because it isnt practical to edit Contacts on the Zen Micro. You have to scroll through the alphabet and pick one letter at a time to enter anything, which is way too much trouble.

Im very happy with the Zen Micro and use it to listen to audio books (MP3, Audible, Overdrive, NetLibrary) for at least two hours a day while commuting. It fits nicely in the armrest compartment of the car and I had a stereo shop add cables in there so the sound comes through the car stereo speakers and the battery stays charged. Life is good!

I havent tried audio books on the Treo, so Im not sure if it would resume without having to bookmark, which I think is essential. Also, if you are thinking of getting a new Palm for audio books, besides verifying compatibility with Audible you might want to see if there is PlaysForSure compatible Palm software. I believe the native player is MP3 only, but there may be some other software available.

I have been using my Palm Zire 31 for a year or more simply as a PDA. I had a Creative MuVo2 that I used for audio books and such. My MuVo became flakey and I began looking for an alternative not realizing I really already had one in my pocket. I did have to buy an expansion memory card to have it work, however, but even a small card is large enough to discover if it works for you. I just now finished listening to Anne Lamott's remarkable "Blue Shoe" which only occupied 72 megs of space. I downloaded the book from the library and ported it to my card. I have not found any way of creating playlists on the card except through the Palm device, so I laboriously made separate playlists for each chapter of the book. I wouldn't have to do this as long as the files were in the correct order to begin with, but I often listen to the book at night going to sleep and when I do the reading will stop at the end of the playlist entry instead of the end of the book.

There isn't an actual bookmarking facility with the Palm, but if you stop the audio and turn it off or if you select a PDA function like looking up a phone number and entering an appointment when you go back to the RealAudio program, you will be at the place you left off in the middle of the track. RealAudio has a slide to position you up or down the track indicating how many minutes into the track you are, so it's also fairly easy to move back a bit to rehear the passage. I do not know if it will keep the position for extended lengths of time as I listen to the book every day.

This is working very well for me now.

What good audiobooks does audible.com have? And how much memory does an average book take up?

Thanks for the link to Audiofile Magazine. Too bad many (most) of the reviews are reserved for subscribers. Good news is that the subscriptions are not TOO expensive...

The best audio book source I came across is http://www.hear-now-audio-books.com