Cassette Tapes and CD’s have all but given up the ghost on the portable music players market. The MP3 player is now the king of the roost when it comes to music. MP3 players offer fully digital music that is stored on an internal hard drive in a compression format labeled as an MP3. At this moment MP3 players are the top selling consumer electronics device that the market has ever seen. This is due to the great sound quality and the convenience of it’s small size. The songs can be arranged into playlists that make it easy to keep your music organized.
The cool thing about MP3 players is that you can find them in just about every size imaginable, with many features. You will find MP3 players storage capacities ranging from 512 megs to 250 gigs. The prices you will encounter are determined by many various options including storage size and video capabilities.
One of the fairly recent features of the current line of Mp3 players is the ability to play videos and display photos. This is a major factor for most purchasers of MP3 players recently. It is the ultimate in convenience to have the ability to watch music videos or watch full length movies while taking a trip or needing a time passer. No longer do you have to carry around bulky purses and wallets filled with family pictures, now you can store hundreds of them on your MP3 player.
A fairly recent feature that has been added to current MP3 players on the market is a built in FM Tuner. Now when, if you ever get tired of listening to the songs that you have stored on your MP3 player, you can switch over and listen to your favorite radio station.
A new technology that is getting rave reviews recently is the new combo MP3, MP3 players. The MP4 format is very similar to the MP3 format but boasts a better sound quality. Right now the MP4 combo players are on the expensive side because of there newness, but look for the prices to start dropping as more and more companies start jumping into the MP4 market.
An item that we are seeing hugely popular now is the combination cell phone music player. You can easily load songs onto your cell phone via your PC or straight to your phone with one of the many online music providers. Consumers are loving the fact that they no longer have to carry around two device, and can make phone calls and listen to music with one device. They have recently become a better seller than your regular MP3 player.
Three types of MP3 players are available.
1. MP3 players with a built in Flash hard drive. These are a great choice for the active types who like to listen to music while working out or playing sports. You will not have problems with your music skipping as your MP3 player gets shaken. Most of the newer music phones and iPod products are solid state players and come in 1 gigabyte to 32 gigabyte offerings.
2. Mp3 players with small internal hard drives are lovingly called juke boxes due to there high storage capabilities. The iPod classic fits into this category, but they are prone to skipping when jostled. You can find this type of MP3 player in storage sizes of up to 250 gigabytes.
3. The last major type and the oldest of the three is the CD MP3 players. Picture your portable CD player, but with the capability of playing MP3’s that are stored on a regular CD. They have no internal storage capabilities, and are by far the least popular of the three.
The top brands selling the most MP3 players is Apple’s iPod line of MP3 players, followed by a not so close Microsoft’s Zune. iPods boast a 60% market share with all of the other brands spread out fairly evenly. Samsung is topping the market in the digital phone, music player combo market.
Most of the current MP3 players on the market today support the major compression formats including, wma, aac, wav, aiff and MP3. The Mp3 is the most popular format which is supported by all digital music players. A compression format to look out for is the MP4 format that will quickly be making a rise in popularity in the future.