[clug] Portable Audio Players

[Ian Petts]

I'm sure this has been covered on the list before, but my Googling has
been unsuccessful...

I'm looking at buying a portable audio device. The main use will be for
when travelling (in the car, mostly) but would like the option of taking
it on a 'plane or whatever - so a car-player is off the list.

It MUST have support for OGG Vorbis files and preferably FLAC as well.
I would like a 20G or larger HD. An inbuilt FM transmitter (to send the
music to the car radio) would be a big plus. Linux support and/or
firmware on the device would be nice, but not absolutely necessary. I'd
like to keep the price under $500(AU) if I can.

The iPod's are nice, but no support for OSS codecs. I was about to buy
an iRiver, but read a review stating that the OGG support was 'poor' and
using OGG resulted in a huge decrease in battery life (something like
15hrs for MP3 down to 2hrs or so for OGG, from memory).

I'm now looking at the iAudio X5 - this appears similar to the iRiver,
but I don't know if this suffers the same battery hit as the iRiver.

Has anyone had any experience with the iAudio?  What do other Cluggers
think? 

Thanks,
Ian.
-- 
Vodka + milk of magnesia:  Phillips screwdriver...