MP3 media players store and play MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3
(MP3), Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) or Windows Media Audio (WMA) files, which are compressed music and audio files.
Most popular online music stores encode files in WMA and MP3 format.
Apple iTunes store is one of the few online music stores that encode files in AAC format.
Most media players play songs encoded in WMA or MP3 - only Apple Ipod and some Sony media players play songs encoded in AAC
format.
MP4 players store and play MP4 files, which are compressed video files. They also play MP3
files.
Two types of memory in MP players are Solid State and Hard disk. Solid State memory is very fast to
access and does not suffer from skips. This makes Solid State MP players ideal for jogging or skipping.
Certain Hard disk models do suffer from skipping, so do your research.
1MB of music is approximately 1 minute of music.
512MB of music is approximately 512 minutes of music or 200 songs.
1GB of music is approximately 400 songs.
Music and video stored on MP players can be transferred to / from a computer via USB
cable.
Hard disk MP Players range in storage capacity from 2GB to 60GB and are good for storing large amounts of files, music and video
between computers and laptops.
MP player sound quality is only as good as the headphones you listen with.
There are big differences in sound quality and battery life between MP3 Media Players.
Tips for Choosing the Right MP3/4 Media Player
