I want to get less reliant on my phone and go out more without it. One of the big use cases for my phone is music.
I have a lot of local music files and I would like to transfer them to a mp3 player. I would prefer something offline that I can drag files too. Also Bluetooth would be a plus so I can continue to use my earbuds.
Something easy to navigate would be ideal too. Basically like what iPods were like with a small screen where you can navigate easily and see album artwork.
If you enjoy the iPod classic format, there’s tons of second hand ones that you can flash software onto for a more modern experience. Lots of aftermarket parts for customization and upgrades like battery and shell. I don’t recall the exact model year but you can search for iPod classic upgrades and there will be tutorials out there for it.
The iPod Classic 5-7th gens are still pretty popular in the media player scene, All can have their storage modded and batteries are still available plus replacement shells if you care about cosmetic condition.
Cost more than new ones(not iPods) from Amazon/eBay etc but I’d imagine most of those are sealed and not easily serviceable.
For Bluetooth, there are adapters but no experience with those personally.
I have a gen 5 with 1TB storage and a larger battery. My only complaint is the connector. I’ll replace it with USB-C eventually.
something from the “stable ports” list at https://www.rockbox.org/
Yes, I rarely listen to songs online anymore because it is extremely inconvenient for me, besides, there is a clever way to transfer any track offline even if there is no download option, although I am not sure that this method works everywhere, in some places there is protection against this, but still, the method, although inconvenient, works, and you don’t have to pay anyone a cent.
If you’re an audio nerd but don’t care to much about a “premium” look/feel, the Fiio Retro Mini hit the bill for me perfectly. Only $70 and has balanced audio out.
The screen is tiny and controls are a bit awkward, but couldn’t beat it for the price. My only complaint is no gapless playback. There’s about a 1/4 second gap.
For snowboarding and skateboarding I’ve always used the Clip by Sansa, works in any weather, pretty damned tough, and if I lose or break it, at $32 I just dont care.
Just using an old phone without a modem plan is the easiest and cheapest option. You can put a custom rom on it.
iPod classic is awesome but iTunes is annoying. I do not like the rockblox mod. Windows vm works
Innioasis Y1 might be a nice option. Looks like a classic iPod, but supports drag-and-drop syncing, USB-C, FM Radio, Bluetooth, even FLAC files. 128 GB out of the box, replaceable with a larger SD card, albeit you have to crack it open. Only downside I can think of is not being able to fast scroll through the alphabet if you have a larger collection.
i use a feature phone / dumbphone that has an sd card slot. load up the sd card with music, and the player is super simple and works great for me. bluetooth earbuds work too, but the rechargable battery of mine died after owning them just a few months longer than the warranty lasted, so i’m back to using wired earbuds (with a usb-c to 3.5mm adapter, do NOT buy the cheap shit from temu, get one that actually sounds decent).
the phone was like $50, and a prepaid sim card inside it makes it so i can use it as cheap backup texting/calling device too when i want to disconnect from all the bullshit the smartphone comes with for a while (still trying to get fully rid of smartphones but it’s very hard these days)
