Hi there rex8!
An MP3 is a kind of file which contains music. Contained within the
file, is all the music data, and usually some data about who sang it,
what year it was made, and so on. The reason that they are so popular,
is that they can store a lot of music in a quite small amount of
computer disk space.
An MP3 player is just like a personal stereo, or Walkman, except that
it plays MP3s, not tapes or CDs. They're particularly popular because
they're very compact, the battery life tends to be long, and they
never "skip", like CD players.
The way it all works is as follows:
First you'll need to get some MP3s. This can be done by downloading
some from the internet, or by making them yourself.
1) Downloading.
Plenty of sites offer you MP3s, but often you'll find that they don't
feature the biggest artists, who still want people to buy their CDs.
There are still a lot of good quality artists releasing on MP3,
though, so it's well worth checking out some of these sites:
MP3.com: http://www.mp3.com
Dimension Music: http://www.dmusic.com/
PeopleSound: http://www.peoplesound.com/
2) Making them yourself
You make MP3s by putting a CD into your computer, and "ripping" and
"encoding" the tracks to turn them into MP3 files. The
ripping/encoding process can take a while, depending on how powerful
your computer is, so my recommendation would be to use the VAIO as it
will almost certainly be faster. Once you've ripped and encoded the
files, you transfer them to your MP3 player. Your MP3 player will
almost certainly come with software to do all this for you, so that
will be the easy part.
Most MP3 players use a USB cable to transfer data to and from the
computer. You'll need to check that your VAIO and/or iMac has a USB
port (I'm 99% certain that they both do, but it pays to check). You
can do this by looking round the back or side of the computer, and
seeing if it has a port that looks like this (note that the picture
shows two ports - you'll only need one):
http://www.linksys.com/edu/images/USB-PORT.jpg
The real tricky part is selecting a player from the hundreds out
there, and while I can't make the choice for you, I certainly can give
you some good pointers.
Firstly, it's good to know what you're talking about, so you can
compare models. The most important thing about each player, is their
capacity, or memory - that is, how much data it can hold. This will
usually be quoted in megabytes, or "mb", although the big ones may be
quoted in "gigabytes", or "gb. A gigabyte is 1000mb. A general rule of
thumb is that for each minute of music, you'll need around half a
megabyte. If you're keen on having high quality, you may want to think
about using a whole megabyte per minute of music. This is something
you will decide when you are doing the ripping and encoding (most
software will let you choose quality settings).
An excellent site which gives you up-to-the-minute prices on these
products is http://www.bizrate.com - simply visit this site, type in
the model numbers as I have written them, and it will show you the
prices it has available. This is the tool I used to quote you the
prices shown below.
Basic MP3 players start with between 32mb and 64mb capacity, enough
for up to a couple of hours of music. Usually these players let you
put in different memory cards, so you can upgrade them later if you
find that this capacity is too low. Two good players in this category
are:
SONICblue RioOne 32mb: Available for around $90, works with both PC
and Mac.
Samsung Yepp 20T 32mb: Available for around $70, works with both PC
and Mac.
If you want to step up a little in the world, then I would recommend
taking a look at some of the jukeboxes. I'll recommend two:
Firstly, take a look at the Creative Nomad Jukebox model. Creative
have squeezed in around 6000 (yes, six thousand) megabytes of storage,
which is enough for around 150 albums of music. And it's still no
bigger than a CD Walkman. It's compatible with both the PC and Mac.
BizRate is showing the lowest price to be $139 currently, so it's
still within your price range.
Secondly, take a peek at the Archos Jukebox Studio 10 model. They
manage even more, with around 10000 (no typo) megabytes of storage.
This retails at just under $200, so it's certainly at the far end of
your price range - but it is still worth looking at. It is, again,
compatible with PC and Mac.
I hope that gives you better idea of what's involved, and helps you
along with your decision making. If there's anything in this answer
that you feel is unclear, or needs some clarification, then please do
not hesitate to request clarification before rating it.
Good luck with your shopping!
--seizer-ga
Manufacturer's homepages for the products I mentioned:
SONICblue RioOne: http://www.sonicblue.com/audio/rio/rio_one.asp
Samsung Yepp 20T: http://www.samsungyepp.com/cgi-bin/nabc/yepp/yepp_product_detail.jsp?eUser=&prod_id=YP-20T%2fXAA
Creative Nomad Jukebox: http://www.nomadworld.com/products/Jukebox/
Archos Jukebox Studio 10:
http://www.archos.com/lang=en//products/prw_500295.html
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mp3 player hardware
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