I've lost my ipod :'( Its 'somewhere' in the house but its been 'somewhere' for a good few months now.

It was the old 60gb one, not the 'classic' but that kind of style, just older. After many happy years together it seems we've grown appart.

So whats new and exciting? Should I get a classic? Or is there somethign better for the dosh?

Needs to…

Be fairly robust (rules out creative IME)
Easy to use (loved the ipod interface, hated itunes though)

Will get used everywhere from the gym and turbo trainer, to being shoved in the backpack for rides, and watching video's on the train.

Might considder a phone if its got a free/cheep sat-nav built in that doesnt rely on a permentant internet conection (cant afford that kind of contract) and does everything an ipod would as realisticaly I need (its gotten beyond the want, the old one is actualy dying) a new phone and a sat-nav is on the list of things to buy.

Budget £150 ish (or £25/month on a 18month phone contract with reasnoble minutes/texts)

Ipod touch. You can buy apps off the store i.e. games, useful stuff like converters, spirit level… the list is endless. BTW you have to pay for some of them. £152 for 8gb, £234 for 32gb.

Sony – firstly for the superior sound – secondly for the ease of use (drag and drop) and thirdly – not Apple.

+1 for sony. The radio is pants though.

I would second a Sony I hate Itunes with a passion, more than SFB hates PhotoShop

Nokia 5800 would do all you're looking for, should be fairly cheap too. The music interface is a bit cack, but at least it's not iTunes.

2nd the nokia 5800. Free sat nav, good mapping options, music player is pretty good and you should be able to get it free, £20/month for loads of calls and unlimited data.

Is anyone other than Apple bothering with large capacity mp3 players anymore? Everyone seems to be focused on flash-based players but they typically top out at 32GB (or 64GB for a very expensive iTouch) and I'd prefer an mp3 player that will take all the mp3s I get around to ripping ever…

Should also add that the camera on a Nokia 5800 isn't too bad, either.

sony do a 64gb player but dont sell it in the uk!?

actually i find it very frustrating

i need a new mp3player, i need a new phone

but current iphones only go upto 32gb
htc desire/nexus 1 has max 32gb microsd And the cards are over 100 quid

ideally id like a 160gb iphone
though 64gb would do (i had a 60gb ipod which i filled)
anyone who made one would have my custom right now!

the 4g ipod will be out in a few months and i believe that will be 64gb
but it will also be ridculously expensive and nop where near as big as the ipodsd!

Love my itouch and don't have any problems using itunes either.

Also like Sony mp3 myself, had various successions of Sony phones with mp3 over the years. Sound very good but worth buying better headphones to get the most out of them.

Although the new generations don't have any controls to adjust bass etc. Which is my personal gripe with most current mp3 players.

Got an SE Satio myself which I use with bluetooth headphones, very handy on the bike, takes good pics as well, 12 mp camera. It does do some apps but I didn't buy it for that. Does have google maps though which is handy.

The iPhone almost certainly will have 64Gb, the NAND flash chips were announced by Toshiba back in December, although some tech blogs hint that with the extra space in the new flat form there might be two chips like in the touch, but one will be smaller, so there'd be 64+16= 80Gb, which is the same as my old G5 Classic 'Pod. No guarantee the top end one will have that, the two 4G's in the wild are either undetermined, like the Gizmodo one which had XX Gb on the back, and the Vietnamese one that only had 16Gb. The iPhone can have OS mapping native to the phone, either Memory Map Free, which let's you download 700Sq Km areas for £12 each. Or if you have an older Viewranger disc then buy the App and copy the maps to your iPhone. The sound quality thing is a red herring, the only reason Sony players sound better is because they come with Sony's own phones, which are by definition better than the cheap bundled Apple phones. Get some decent canalphones like Ultimate Ears MetroFi 117Vi's or Denon AH-C252's and you'll find that at 320Kb music on
an iPhone/iPod sounds bloody good, to the extent that clear differences in original mastering are quite obvious. Ignore FM radio unless you live in a big city, it blows goats on a portable like an iPod anywhere else.

Another vote for Sony here.

and thirdly – not Apple

Good grief. Isn't it past your bed time?

And another Sony vote from me.

No Apple "super control" over your music library, drag and drop to fil it with tunes, excellent sound quality.
Only downside are the names Sony call their players. Mine is a NWZ s693FB. Very memorable.

No Apple "super control" over your music library, drag and drop to fil it with tunes

It's honestly a mystery why people say this. No-one is "controlling" your music library. Apple are simply providing a much more efficient way to manage a lot of songs than just dragging and dropping. If you think that is "control" then be careful who is watching you from inside your telly.

iPhone is really very superb I bought ndrive for £5 which is excellent for the price a nice little satnav. And guess what you can drag and drop but probably not within your price range so look at iTouch.

A great iTunes 9 option is "Convert higher bit rate songs to 128kbps AAC".

Anything on the ipod is reduced to the lower quality which when you're bopping about with headphones is perfectly acceptable and then you can fit a lot more on there. I have a measly 8gb iPhone which was bursting at the seams. It free'd up about 3gb of space.

It doesn't affect the music on your computer. Excellent feature.

I got a very cheap (£20) philips mp3 from asda. 2gb and smaller than an ipod shuffle but with a screen. Very light. Does the job, holds about 8 albums at 128k… Saves you £130 quid for bike stuff. Just a thought!

+1 here for the Nokia 5800 – music, gps, wi-fi, camera AND you can even make calls and text on it!