MP3 Players & Riding...

[skasner]

For those of you who listen to tunes while freeway riding, I'll be commuting to school again (about 40-45min each way) in a few weeks (thank God its my last semester) and am thinking of getting an MP3 player to listen to.

I've heard some people say that they have had problems with them not working for whatever reason. So... can i get some recommendations?

A co-work of mine has one of those tiny iPods (the ones w/o the display that are like 1gb) and he was thinking of getting rid of it, so i could probably snag it on-the-cheap.

[crazyaussie]

I use my IPOD while riding. Mine's a 20GB and has the display, but if you are using it primarily for your motorcycle you won't be able to shuffle through songs easily, so the IPOD Shuffle (the one you refer to) should be fine. I find that I have to turn the volume on mine almost all the way up to hear over the wind and road noise, but I presume this is the case with most. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Creative Muvio (cheap, reliable, extremely easy to use....)

I actually do the same thing with mine.

[WildKat]

I use my disc man in my tank bag and a fresh set of batteries!

[UFO8MyCow]

I have these ones and they work pretty well but my mp3 player dosent get verry loudso it is still kind of hard to hear on the bike

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=5335728&type=product&productCategoryId=cat08352&id=1051826204625

And lou uses theseand he says they work great.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=5426318&type=product&id=1051826212451

[md86]

Old Sony Walkman sport model with auto-reverse (that's for playing tapes , for you young-uns that don't know what "auto-reverse" is for ) .

[skasner]

i think i'll wait until its closer to the start of the semester, and then i'll pick one up if i have the money. sounds like no one has had any difficulties with them working (vibration, tankbag magnets, etc) right?

[2K5GSX600F]

I have a Creative Zen micro. I just keep it in my jacket pocket to minimize vibration.

[Lagmo]

I can deffinatly recommend the Creative Muvo C-100 sport. 256MB + SD card(upto 512MB) and radio. mounts as a Harddrive on Win2K/XP/Mac OSX, no special programs needed.
Just bought one for a friends wife (colour even matched her 2005 GS500F)
Lovely piece of kit, simple to use, rain resistant and loads of shock/scratch absorbing rubber around it(removable or used with wrist strap).
Earbuds are a bit wierd though(worn around the neck).
Very good sound quality.
If i didn't already have a 400$ PDA i'd spring for one for myself

[NewRider]

Buy these:

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Koss-Sparkplug-Portable-Stereophone-SPARKPLUG-/sem/rpsm/oid/123481/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

They have replaceable foam inserts. Use a tiny drill bit to drill a hole in your favorite ear plugs (which are more pliable and sound deadening that the ones provided) and then replace the regular ones with your earplugs. They work as both earplugs, and music/phone sound. The biggest problem with listening to music with most systems is you still leave your ears open to a lot of wind racket, which really can seriously damage your hearing. Like this, you can eliminate all of the wind noise, hear your music, and still hear ALL road horns, engine, etc etc. I ride like this on HIGHWAY trips only...and long ones at that. Anywhere else, it is dangerous, and I don't recommend it.

I use a Rio Forge 512 so tiny its fits on the interior pocket of my Teknic Speedstrar track suit....got it brand new for $50 over the internet somewhere. Its a lifesaver, I use it constantly, every morning at the gym, and on long trips to my "friends" houses...we have all moved like a least an hur from each other.

[ThAzKat]

I have a sony walkman CD player that I tuck inside my jacket and the large speaker's taken off the headset fit right in my ear pocket of my helmet. I have to take batteries.

[zleviticus]

i use the wife's iriver... it is small and loud and comes with a FM tuner to boot... easy to turn the volume up and down and chagne the songs.

i put it in my front pocket and can access the volume and changer from their.

[md86]

Yeah , those Koss plugs ROCK . I've had some of those for about 3 years now . You can replace the foam with regular earplugs when they get too nasty for ya . I've use them at work for JUST earplugs before , and they helped quite a bit . In fact . they work ALOT like earplugs , in that you CAN still hear stuff around you , it's all just quieter , so you don't HAVE to crank the radio up to dnagerously loud levels .

[md86]

Depends . I can still hear what the enigine and wind noise doesn't already drown out , which is alot . I can hear sirens , I can hear horns , I can still hear the semis when I'm right next to them .

[skasner]

well i borrowed a friends iPod Shuffle for a few days and i'm pretty well sold on one.

it definately makes long rides more entertaining for the ears.

i did catch myself getting a bit more hyper than usual when a good song kicks in, however i managed to keep my squidishness under controll.