CD player's given up the ghost. I was looking at £200-£250 to replace it, on a par with what it cost around 12 years ago, but then I thought about an Ipod Classic + dock. With 160 Gb of disk space, it should store most, if not all of my CDs.
So what do the STW experts think? Or those who don't know anything but like to express their opinions anyway?
is there an alternative to Apple? – i haven't seen anything else bigger than around 32 gb which wouldn't really cut it.

Ta

iPod classic plus dock is what I'm just about to do. Can't be doing with CDs anymore.

We went down the Ipod route with one of these

got the stereo with amp, dab/internet radio and decent big speakers
how does an ipod/mp3 compression deal with around 100w of decent, albeit ageing, amplification?

tracey, whats that? make and model no?

ta

Ipod will bot be the same quality as a halfway decent cd player if thats important to you. compressing the files ruins the sound quality IMO

Ipod will bot be the same quality as a halfway decent cd player if thats important to you. compressing the files ruins the sound quality IMO

Then dont compress teh files use FLAC format. Just less music on your iPOD.

If you are after a dock to put into an amp, look at these;

http://www.amazon.co.uk/PURE-i-10-Powered-Remote-Control/dp/B001HBIXSW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1260373637&sr=8-1

Much cheaper than buying the official the Apple products, and more functions.

You need one of these: Brennan JB7

compressing the files ruins the sound quality IMO

It doesn't 'ruin' it. Mere mortals (me) generally struggle to hear differences at compression rates of 192 and above.

ipods don't play flac files last time I checked.

If you've got a PC and a wireless internet connection what about a Squeezebox (Duet)

£80ish quid for the box or £230ish for Box + funky handset thing.

It's the route I'm thinking of taking

Quality or quantity – your choice

ipods don't play flac files last time I checked.

They can play apple lossless though.

I really cannot understand people who say they cannot tell the difference in sound quality on compressed files. If it's for properly listening to music you are after, rather than passing time on a bus or train, then you will want to go lossless.
And you'll want some sort of backup of your digital music, so factor that into the cost.
You could always replace the cd player with a DAC and use your computer to store and play the files.
All iPod docks I've heard* are terrible and more about looks than anything else. (*that's not to say there aren't good ones out there)

I certainly wouldn't recommend an ipod as a primary listening device

personally in your situation i'd buy an ipod classic for portable use and a slightly lower spec CD player. keep the same budget but split it between the two

I really cannot understand people who say they cannot tell the difference in sound quality on compressed files. If it's for properly listening to music you are after, rather than passing time on a bus or train, then you will want to go lossless.

Why don't you go over to the HydrogenAudio.org forums? There are a lot of codec developers who would be interested in your ABX logs. 🙂

How about an airport express and decent dac, lossless on your pc, bosh, job done etc?

Rip your music at 320Kb, and I'm damned certain that in a blind test hardly anyone would be able to tell the difference between an average price cd player and an iPod in a quality dock attached to a good amp via a line input. I've got an Onkyo dock with remote going into my big Yamaha A/V amp, and a Yamaha SACD/DVD-A DVD deck, and on most of the 'normal' cd's, comparing the same tracks with those at 320K on my 80Gb iPod I honestly cannot detect any significant difference. I'm sure there are some golden-eared types posting here who would maintain the differences are as clear as night and day, but the fact is probably 90% of the population can't hear it, and couldn't give a toss anyway. My 80Gb has over 8000 tracks on and isn't full yet, but I'll be getting myself a 160Gb for Christmas before the VAT goes back up, and the 80Gb will stay in the car. 'Course, you could just keep everything on a fat HD attached to your computer and run a connection to your amp from the computer sound card. Or via wifi using an Apple airport extreme.

what does iTunes rip at as a default setting? Is that 320kb or something lower?

Thanks

woteva you want IIRC

IIRC, default iTunes setting, like most others, is 128Kb, but it's easy to change, and set it at 320Kb variable bit rate. Depending on what size HD your 'puter has, you might want to get a nice big external drive and put your library on there, then pick up a portable HD and copy onto that as well as a back-up. Your iPod is a backup too, and as I found, very useful when I lost my entire library due to a stupid cockup on my part. It might seem over the top, but when you've accumulated a large library of stuff from lots of sources, like borrowed cd's, downloads, ripped personal cd's, amounting to thousands of tracks, then the thought of losing it isn't worth contemplating. My library is around 9000 tracks and growing, and there's still loads of stuff in my cd collection I haven't ripped yet.

IMHO i would go the ipod route if i was you. cds will be extinct in a few years.

Try an I pod with a 'Fatman' dock. These use old fashiond valves for a rich warm sound.

cds will be extinct in a few years.

Sure they will, just like vinyl. I think they will disappear, but it'll take a lot longer than a few years. There are 25 years worth out there, so plenty of back catalogue. Some people just prefer tactile things.

My take on the whole sample rate thing is simple. ABX all you like, the quality is never going to be better if you use compression, so why bother? If and when I eventually digitise my music, I sure as hell only want to do it once so I'm not taking any chances. And I'll be modding my CD player for a digital out when I eventually get a DAC sorted to play wavs through anyway…

Err, for the OP, I'd replace the CD player 🙂