iPod

Creative Zen Micro

A digital audio player (DAP) is a device that stores, organizes and plays digital music files. It is more commonly referred to as an MP3 player (because of that format's ubiquity), but DAPs often play many additional file formats. Some formats are proprietary, such as MP3, Windows Media Audio (WMA), and Advanced Audio Codec (AAC). Some of these formats also may incorporate digital rights management (DRM), such as WMA DRM, which are often part of paid download sites. Other formats are patent-free or otherwise open, such as Vorbis, FLAC, and Speex (all part of the Ogg open multimedia project). Download high resolution version (1024x768, 276 KB)Photo of a fourth-generation Apple iPod with earbuds. ... Download high resolution version (1024x768, 276 KB)Photo of a fourth-generation Apple iPod with earbuds. ... A fourth-generation iPod with earphones. ... This is a copyrighted promotional photo with a known source. ... This is a copyrighted promotional photo with a known source. ... An audio file format is a file format for storing audio data on a computer system. ... MP3 is a popular digital audio encoding and lossy compression format. ... Something proprietary is something exclusively owned by someone, often with connotations that it is exclusive and cannot be used by other parties without negotiations. ... Windows Media Audio (WMA) is a proprietary compressed audio file format developed by Microsoft. ... Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) is a lossy data compression scheme intended for audio streams. ... Digital Rights Management or digital restrictions management (abbreviated DRM) is an umbrella term for any of several technical arrangements which empower a vendor of content in electronic form to control how the material can be used on any electronic device with such measures installed. ... Vorbis is an open and free audio compression (codec) project from the Xiph. ... The Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC) Logo. ... The Speex project is an attempt to create a free software speech codec, unencumbered by patent restrictions. ... If you are visiting this page because your computer cant play a sound file, see How to play Ogg files OGG is also the abbreviated title of the British mockumentary Operation Good Guys Ogg is a patent-free, fully open multimedia bitstream format designed for efficient streaming and storage. ...

History

The first digital audio player on the American market was the Eiger Labs F10, a 32MB portable that appeared in the summer of 1998. It was a very basic unit and wasn't user expandable, though owners could upgrade the memory to 64MB by sending the player back to Eiger Labs with a check for $69 + $7.95 shipping.

The second DAP was the Rio PMP300 from Diamond Multimedia, introduced in September 1998. The Rio was a big success during the Christmas 1998 season as sales significantly exceeded expectations, spurring interest and investment in digital music. The Recording Industry Association of America soon filed a lawsuit alleging that the device abetted illegal copying of music, but Diamond won a legal victory on the shoulders of Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios and digital audio players were ruled legal devices. The Rio PMP-300 portable mp3 player The top view shows the face of the player. ... Diamond Multimedia is a company that specializes in many forms of multimedia technology. ... RIAA Logo. ... Sony Corp v. ...

Other early DAPs includes Sensory Science's Rave MP2100, the I-Jam IJ-100, and the Creative Labs Nomad. These portables were small and light, but only held enough memory to hold around 7 to 20 songs at normal 128 kbit/s compression rates. They also used slower parallel port connections to transfer files from PC to player, necessary as most PCs then used the Windows 95 and NT operating systems, which did not support the then newer USB connections well enough to be considered for use. As more users migrated to Windows 98 by the year 2000, most (if not all) players went USB. Windows 95 (codename Chicago) is a hybrid 16-bit/32-bit graphical operating system released on August 24, 1995 by the Microsoft Corporation. ... Windows NT is an operating system produced by Microsoft. ... Note: USB may also mean upper sideband in radio. ... Windows 98 (codename Memphis) is a graphical operating system released on June 25, 1998 by the Microsoft Corporation. ...

At the end of 1999, a company called Remote Solutions made a significant improvement in DAPs' space limitations by utilizing a laptop hard drive for song storage rather than low-capacity flash memory. The Personal Jukebox (PJB-100) had 4.8GB of storage space, which held about 1200 songs (or 100 CDs, hence the name PJB-100), and was the beginning of what would be called the jukebox segment of digital audio players. This segment eventually became the dominant type of DAP. Typical hard drives of the mid-1990s. ... Flash memory is a form of EEPROM that allows multiple memory locations to be erased or written in one programming operation. ... Two versions of the Personal Jukebox: Black (Music) Compressor (rebranded, by HyTek) respectively Titanium PJB-100 (original, by HanGo) The Personal Jukebox (also known as PJB-100 and, to some extent Music Compressor) was the first ever hard disk MP3-Player to hit the market in late 1999, which makes...

Also, at the end of 1999, the first in-dash digital audio player appeared. The Empeg Car (renamed the Rio Car after it was acquired by SonicBLUE and added to its Rio line of MP3 products) offered players in several capacities ranging from 5GB to 28GB. The unit didn't catch on as SonicBLUE had hoped, however, and was discontinued in the fall of 2001. The Empeg Car is the first in-dash MP3 player developed. ... SonicBLUE was an American consumer electronics company formed as the result of the 1999 merger between computer peripheral maker Diamond Multimedia and graphics chipset maker S3 Inc. ...

The arrival of Apple Computer's iPod in 2001, combined with the iTunes software that all but created the legal-music-download business, greatly expanded the market. Apple Computer, Inc. ... A fourth-generation iPod with earphones. ... iTunes is a media player, written by Apple Computer, for playing and organizing digital music, video files, and purchasing digital music files in the FairPlay digital rights management format. ...

There are three main segments of digital audio players:

• MP3 CD Players - Devices that play CDs. Often, they can be used to play both audio CDs and homemade data CDs containing MP3 or other digital audio files.
• Flash-based Players - These are solid state devices that hold digital audio files on internal or external media, such as memory cards. These are generally low-storage devices, typically ranging from 128MB-1GB, which can often be extended with additional memory. As they are solid state and do not have moving parts, they can be very resilient. Such players are generally integrated into USB keydrives.
• Hard Drive-based Players or Digital Jukeboxes - Devices that read digital audio files from a hard drive. These players have higher capacities, ranging from 1.5GB to 100GB, depending on the hard drive technology. At typical encoding rates, this means that thousands of songs — perhaps an entire music collection — can be stored in one MP3 player. The Apple iPod and Creative Zen are examples of popular digital jukeboxes.

Image of a recordable compact disc (pencil included for scale) A compact disc (or CD) is an optical disc used to store digital data, originally developed for storing digital audio. ... Memory cards are solid-state electronic flash memory data storage devices used with digital cameras, handheld and laptop computers, phones, music players, video game consoles and other electronics. ... Type A USB connector USB 2. ... A USB keydrive, shown with a US quarter coin for scale. ... Typical hard drives of the mid-1990s. ... Apple Computer, Inc. ... A fourth-generation iPod with earphones. ... A display model of the new Zen Micro Photo The Creative Zen is a line of digital audio players produced by Creative Labs and a branch off the earlier Creative Nomad brand (the other branch being the Creative MuVo series). ...

Equipment

Generally speaking, digital audio players are portable, employing internal or replaceable batteries and headphones, although users often connect players to car and home stereos — sometimes via a wireless connection — thereby turning them into portable jukeboxes. Some DAPs also include FM radio tuners . Many players can encode audio directly to MP3 or other digital audio formats directly from a line in audio signal. Four double-A batteries In science and technology, a battery is a device that stores energy and makes it available in an electrical form. ... In-ear headphones Headphones (also known as earphones, stereophones, headsets, or the slang term cans) is a transducer that receives an electrical signal from a media player or receiver and uses speakers placed in close proximity to the ears (hence the name earphone) to convert the signal into audible sound... Radio transmition diagram and electromagnetic waves For other uses see: radio (disambiguation) Radio is a technology that allows the transmission of signals by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of light. ... High Fidelity is also the title of a book by Nick Hornby and a film directed by Stephen Frears, based upon Hornbys book. ... Wireless is an old-fashioned term for a radio receiver, referring to its use as a wireless telegraph. ... The abbreviations FM, Fm, and fm may refer to: Electrical engineering Frequency modulation (FM) and its most common applications: FM radio, used primarily to broadcast music and speech at VHF frequencies FM synthesis, a sound-generation technique popularized by early digital synthesizers Science Femtometre (fm), an SI measure of length... Categories: Stub | Consumer electronics ... For other senses of the word code, see code (disambiguation). ...

Devices such as CD players can be connected to digital audio players (using the USB port) in order to directly play music from the memory of the player without the use of a computer. A compact disc player or CD player is an electronic device to play audio from compact discs. ...

Modular keydrive players are composed of two detachable parts: the head (or reader/writer) and the body (the memory). They can be independently obtained and upgraded (one can change the head or the body; i.e. to add more memory). A module is a self-contained component of a system, which has a well-defined interface to the other components; something is modular if it is constructed so as to facilitate easy assembly, flexible arrangement, and/or repair of the components. ... A USB keydrive, shown with a US quarter coin for scale. ...

Usage

As digital audio players have spread, new uses have been found for them. This includes podcasting, in which radio-like programs, or even TV-like video feeds, are automatically downloaded into the device to be played at the owner's convenience. Podcasting is a way of publishing sound files to the Internet, allowing users to subscribe to a feed and receive new audio files automatically. ...

Audio acquisition

Most, if not all, digital audio players can play music that has been ripped from Compact Discs via computer. In addition to ripped CD tracks, many digital audio plays can accept downloaded music from online music stores. However, due to the complexity of DRM, not all audio file formats will play on certain digital audio players. Some proprietary audio file formats will also restrict users from transferring songs to non-compatible digital audio audio players. Ripping is the process of copying the audio and/or video data from one media form, such as Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) or Compact Disc (CD), to a hard disk. ... The tower of a personal computer (specifically a Power Mac G5). ... An online music store is an Internet service that sells audio, usually primarily music, on a per-song and/or subscription basis. ...

Brands of digital audio players

• iPod from Apple and HP
• Joybee from BenQ
• Dell Digital Jukebox ("Dell DJ") series from Dell
• Creative Nomad/Creative Zen line of MP3 players from Creative Labs
• IRiver players by IRiver
• Rio Karma from Rio
• Yepp from Samsung

A fourth-generation iPod with earphones. ... Apple Computer, Inc. ... ... BenQ (formerly known as Acer Communications & Multimedia) is a Taiwan-based industry leader in digital lifestyle devices. ... The Dell Digital Jukebox or just Dell DJ is an digital audio player series. ... Dell, Inc. ... 32 MB Nomad II. The Nomad II runs off batteries and uses SmartMedia memory cards. ... A display model of the new Zen Micro Photo The Creative Zen is a line of digital audio players produced by Creative Labs and a branch off the earlier Creative Nomad brand (the other branch being the Creative MuVo series). ... Creative Technology Ltd. ... iRiver (full name iRiver Limited), daughter company to ReignCom, is a consumer electronics developer founded in 1999 and is located in Seoul, Korea. ... iRiver (full name iRiver Limited), daughter company to ReignCom, is a consumer electronics developer founded in 1999 and is located in Seoul, Korea. ... This article needs to be wikified. ... Rio is the Spanish and Portuguese word for river, and as such is a component in many place names -- most famously, it is the nickname of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. ... The Samsung Group is one of the largest electronics companies in the world. ...

External links

• Collecting MP3 Portables -- Part I (http://www.antiqueradio.com/Dec04_Menta_mp3pt1.html) and Part II (http://www.antiqueradio.com/Apr05_Menta_mp3.html)- Richard Menta's two-part article covers the first MP3 players on the market. With pictures of each player.
• MP3 Player database (http://www.mp3playerlove.com/) - Non profit organization to catalogue all mp3 players
• MP3 Player Guide (http://www.portableplayerz.com/) - information on the latest MP3 players
• Portable MP3 Players (http://www.digitalmusicmuseum.com/) - features individual player overview and the history of portable MP3 players
• repair and upgrade instructions for portable audio and video players (http://repair4player.org/)