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pinecrest
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DSInvestor
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by DSInvestor »

Most traditional MP3 players are quite small. If she's not comfortable with a portable phone, she may not like a regular MP3 player. She may like a small tablet like the ipad mini ($329) which can play music, audiobooks, e-books, browse internet etc. Audiobooks can be purchased directly from the ipad so no need to plug into a computer. The Overdrive app (free) will allow her to borrow ebooks and audiobooks from her public library. Wifi is required to browse the store or library catalog. No Internet access required once the content is downloaded on to the ipad.

if $329 is out of her price range, there may be some lower cost android tablets that will meet her needs.

She should also take look at the iPod touch. Exactly the same software as the ipad mini but with a smaller form factor and lower price.

The advantage of ipad/iPod touch/android tablet is that they don't have to be plugged into a computer to get content.

All tablets and MP3 players will have a standard 3.5mm headphone jack so she can buy use her existing headphones.

My mom is in her 70s had never owned a computer until we got her the first generation iPad and she loves it.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by ieee488 »

MP3 players come with ear buds at most.
If you want full headphone just plug the one she is using now into the MP3 player.

However, if she is having a hard time reading the display on her phone, a small 7" tablet may do the job.

Today is the last day for $75 off any Samsung tablet at Staples.
http://slickdeals.net/f/6290828-75-off- ... store-only
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Watty
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Watty »

If she will just be listening to the books around her house then a another option would be to just play them on a computer and to get a set of wireless headphones so that she can be in a different room while she is listening to the book. She would of course have to go back to the computer to stop the book.

There have been a number of threads about wireless headphones for listening to TV and the Sennheiser brand like we have is often mentioned as a good choice and they have the full size headphones. You can search for Sennheiser to find some of those threads. The ones that cost less than $100 are good enough for this since she is not trying to listen to high fidelity music. Be sure to get on that uses radio and not an inexpensive infrared one that will not work in the next room.

FYI, there is a good chance that she can download free audible books from her local library. My wife is an avid listener of audio books and she found that she can join the library in the next county over for $40 a year to get access to their downloadable books too to get an even larger selection.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by DSInvestor »

The beauty of the CD is that it is really simple. They can be played in portable CD player, home stereo, car stereo, maybe even alarm clock stereo. She can borrow CDs from libraries, friends or family and listen to them. She can lend her CDs to friends or family.

A traditional MP3 player that doesn't have an Internet connection will need to connect to a computer to get new content. If the computer has an optical drive any CD bought or borrowed can be imported into the computer and then sync'd to the MP3 player. Definitely more complicated.

A device with Internet access like iPod Touch, iPad Mini, iPad or other tablet can get content directly from the internet. It is easy to buy or borrow audio books. Since these devices don't have a cd drive, they cannot play CDs unless they are first imported into a computer and sync'd to the device. If she likes radio programs, she may like the podcast app in ipod/ipad. I use the podcast app to download podcasts of car talk, wait wait don't tell me, planet money etc. very easy to use and free.
Content that she has purchased electronically cannot easily be shared with others.

MP3 players and tablets can play audio to home stereos or car stereo but additional hardware or cables may be required.

Apple stores are great - all products on display are fully functional and the staff tends to quite knowledgeable. Barnes and Noble stores have a display of their Nook tablets. BestBuy has Apple, android and windows tablets as well as MP3 players. I don't know where to look at a Kindle tablet.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by frugaltype »

There are nice price cuts on Nooks. If you believe Microsoft is going to save them, that's something to consider.

I use Calibre, so presumably I can read books from about any source on my Nook. (It just arrived, I haven't opened the package yet, so I dunno.)
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by nisiprius »

The problem isn't the device, it's the software for putting the music on the device. For example, I find my iPod Touch pretty easy to use for listening to music--it has far more features but everything is well organized and the screen is easy to use. But, setting up iTunes and ripping CDs and downloading to the iPod touch is cumbersome.

On the other hand, once the account is set up, buying music directly from the iPod Touch is not too bad. For that matter, buying music from Amazon on my Kindle Fire is not too bad.

Our local library has a collection of audio books--I'm going nuts because I can NOT find the brand name--that are preloaded onto dedicated players. Playaway! That's the name. There is a pretty good set of shelves with boxes that look sort of like DVD cases, and each one contains an actual dedicated preloaded player that just has one single book recorded onto it. So it ought to be easy to use! But I haven't tried one myself.

Depending on how much time you are willing to spend, the line of least resistance might be for you to buy digital titles for her and copy them onto CD-R's...
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by tetractys »

The question this brings up for me is: Is mp3 format really what's wanted? A decent player, like an iPod, also plays other formats with much more detailed compression. And I would think that more mature persons (not to exclude the young of course), having vaster listening experiences, would appreciate the details of more complete and full sounds for their listening.

So I would look for something that can accommodate more detailed or higher fidelity, less lossy compressions besides mp3, at least as an option. It's true that more space is required, so a player with more space might be another option to look for as well. -- Tet
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by walkabout »

I would consider a Kindle Fire HD 7" tablet. The main reason being that it integrates well with Amazon's content, of which Audible.com is one component. It is also easy to manipulate content on devices remotely (at least for Kindle books). For example, my wife pushes books to her mother's Kindle, saving her mother from having to know how to find and load books. Not sure if that works with audio books. iPod/iPad/iPhone cannot buy audio books (from Amazon) from within the Audible.com app. You must by through Audible.com website. I would guess that iTunes carries audio books as well, but I don't know because I get mine through Audible.com.

Audible.com now also carries The Great Courses at great prices compared to list and sale prices from TGC.

For headphones, I use earbuds and don't particularly like them. Maybe you can find some conventional wired headphones or some Bluetooth-enabled headphones.

Good luck!
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pinecrest
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by ourbrooks »

tetractys wrote:The question this brings up for me is: Is mp3 format really what's wanted? A decent player, like an iPod, also plays other formats with much more detailed compression. And I would think that more mature persons (not to exclude the young of course), having vaster listening experiences, would appreciate the details of more complete and full sounds for their listening.

So I would look for something that can accommodate more detailed or higher fidelity, less lossy compressions besides mp3, at least as an option. It's true that more space is required, so a player with more space might be another option to look for as well. -- Tet
Alas, most mature persons have lost enough of their hearing so that even an mp3 encoding at one of the higher bit rates is beyound their ability to appreciate, especially where the content is a human reading.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by ieee488 »

pinecrest wrote:I'm happy to see that most devices do have headphone ports. When I did a quick search on MP3 players awhile back, the dedicated players, i.e., not tablets, all had earbuds, but I couldn't determine whether regular headphone ports were present.
The headphone jacks on the portable electronic equipment are going to be the smaller 3.5mm. It sounds like you are used to the headphones which have the larger 1/4" plug. So you will need an adapter http://www.amazon.com/Monoprice-3-5mm-S ... B003R70OA4
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by black jack »

My mother-in-law is 80 and is not technologically sophisticated. She is an avid reader, and my wife wanted to make it possible for her to listen to audio books.

I bought a Sansa Fuze, and added a 16gb microSD card. We downloaded a couple dozen audio books to it and mailed it to her, with written instructions on how to get to the books. I had to walk her through the instructions over the phone a couple of times, but she got the hang of it. That was last winter; she just mailed it back to us for a reload. Seems to be working out well.

Bonus: I also loaded some of her favorite music on the player.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by mhalley »

They make cases for all of the various devices so that if you drop them they won't shatter into a bazillion pieces. The case could have a strap to hang from the neck, or an armband etc depending on which type you bought.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by JupiterJones »

Maybe a dumb question, but...

If she likes the CD player, and understands the CD player, and can listen to the books she wants to hear on the CD player, and if an MP3 player would potentially just cause a lot of problems... then why not just let her keep using the CD player?

Alternatively, there exist CD players that can read MP3s. Maybe that would be the thing to get her? You could then burn your audiobooks onto a CD-R as MP3 files (rather than making an audio CD), and she'd get hours of audio out of each disc instead of just 70 minutes or so.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Jeanz »

I dropped my Nook ereader (in its case, and I was sitting down) without breaking it; after all, it doesn't weigh much to begin with. I have not (yet) dropped the Nook HD.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Jeanz »

There are a number of larger devices advertised on Amazon that play either CDs or MP3s, so you could investigate those and see if you think they'd seem more familiar.

I have a Sansa Fuze, and I think it relatively easy to handle for something tiny. if your mother can still thread a needle, for instance, I think she could probably manage, although it does take a bit of finger muscle. They're inexpensive enough that you wouldn't lose much if she didn't like it.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Ged »

I have a Sansa Fuze. I think it's inexpensive enough so that if she doesn't like it, the loss is not significant. The UI is so-so in my opinion.

There are some free audio book sites, such as LibraVox, that uses volunteers to read out-of-copyright books. The quality can be variable, but some of the books are not bad.

Here's a list:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/lifestyle/ ... udiobooks/
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by frugaltype »

pinecrest wrote: Now that I've thought about it a bit, I guess I'm looking for something more on the order of $150.
I paid $191.53 for a Nook HD+ Tablet Slate 32GB from B&N directly, which includes shipping and tax.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by BlueEars »

pinecrest wrote:
mhalley wrote:They make cases for all of the various devices so that if you drop them they won't shatter into a bazillion pieces. The case could have a strap to hang from the neck, or an armband etc depending on which type you bought.
Mike
Good, thanks. I feel like an idiot since I'm probably the only person on the planet that's never used an MP3 player, but I've always just played them on a computer. The word "case" gives me a word to search on. Thanks again.
First, you are a wonderful daughter (or son?) for thinking of all this for your Mom !!! :happy

Second, as I understand it MP3 players are kind of going towards dinosaur status because the younger generation has smartphones with that functionality. That would mean your Mom might be introduced to yet another interface which cannot be replaced should the MP3 player go belly up. Just a thought.

If you get a tablet, I'd make sure that the font size can be adjusted easily. I'm looking at the newer Nexus 7 ($229) now for myself but its fonts are going to be pretty small for things like Web browsing. I don't know about the audio functions on such a tablet. Maybe others do. There is always the ability to use your fingers to magnify things on a tablet (2 fingered stretch or whatever it's called). That is assuming your Mom is still dexterous enough. I would definitely equip such a tablet with a good case. Also at places like Best Buy you could purchase a breakage warranty if you felt it was really needed.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by mhalley »

O, and since you want to supply the content from home, you might want to consider one of the players that use sd cards, that way you just buy a couple of extra sd cards, fill one up with content and then the next time you go for a visit swap it out for the old one.
Also, if you go to the auidible site there is a list of muliple devices that can be used, you might take a look there. I notice one was touted as being good for the visually impaired, don't know if that would be helpful for your mom.
http://www.audible.com/dc?mt=MP3&mfid=211
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Puakinekine »

pinecrest wrote:Black Jack, the Sansa Fuze looks interesting.

A couple of questions that would apply to it and any generic MP3 player:

1. I'd assume the most efficient way of browsing content in an MP3 player is if the audio book was listed just once, with the title and author. In reality, most audiobooks have multiple files, sometimes as many as 100. Do all 100 display at the same time?

2. Assuming there are bookmarks, do they automatically mark the place where you turn off the player?

3. Do most MP3 players, and the Sansa Fuze in particular, have a fitting to thread a strap through so the player can be hung around the neck?

TIA
I'll address questions one and two, but two first as it is easier.

2. Yes, you can set it up to work that way.

1. Audiobooks do have multiple files,but I have never run across the over 100 situation that you mentioned. Perhaps that happens when copying from a CD and the tracks are not joined together? If you are converting from a multiple disk audiobook, each disk makes one file, but you have to check "join tracks". (There are a lot of other tricks to converting an cd audiobook to an mp3 format. I will see if I can find the website that taught me how, if you are going to go this route. It's become intuitive at this point.) If you are purchasing a streamed audiobook or borrowing from a public library, it might be divided into from about 4 to perhaps 25 files depending on book length. The file system makes it much easier to know where you are/have left off in case you've done something wrong with the bookmarking.

Some people have been recommending tablets as audio devices. This may be a good idea, but for the fact that many audiobooks that are available to download from public libraries (Overdrive) are in a .wma (Windows) format, which will not download directly or indirectly to android tablets.

I listen to about one to three audiobooks a week on three .mp3 players. Although, I am not a Jobsian by any stretch of the imagination, all of them are iPods. One is a very old 60 gb classic, one new is 160 gb classic, and one a middle-aged 16gb nano (bought refurbished). The old 60gb sits in my car always connected to power as I gave up on replacing the battery on it, the new one is for travel, so I can have my complete audio library with me, and the nano is for walking and working inside and out. The nano is great, but for the fact that the 16gb of storage is a bit confining as I have to keep taking books off to put more on. The nano format may also not work for your mother, as it is not very easy to see what is on the screen, if your eyesight is not all that great. The classic is a much better size for older hands, and even with my miserable close up vision, I can still decipher the screen well enough without my glasses on. I bought a new classic rather then an iPod touch, as the smaller sd storage was not enough for my needs, and it was also a bit of overkill, as I already had an android smart phone.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by nisiprius »

Warning re adapting over-the-ear headphones to portable devices. It's sort of a crapshoot but headphones have different degrees of "sensitivity;" the sensitivity is how much sound they produce for a given output. Some headphones, particularly high quality audiophile headphones, have low sensitivity and small portable devices may not provide enough drive to get sufficient volume out of them. You'd think this would all be standardized, but it isn't. If you are going to use full-sized headphones, you may need to check to make sure you have return privileges on the device... or you may need to buy a different set of headphones. There are headphone amplifiers but you don't want to get into that, more wires, more cables, another volume control to deal with.

Most likely this won't be a problem, but forewarned is forearmed.

You may be able to find sensitivity specs and do it rationally, but you probably won't.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Jeanz »

nisiprius wrote:
Some headphones, particularly high quality audiophile headphones, have low sensitivity and small portable devices may not provide enough drive to get sufficient volume out of them. You'd think this would all be standardized, but it isn't.
This is new information to me, so I guess I've been lucky. With the iPod Nano I used Bose headphones (I don't remember the model) and now, with the Sansa Fuze, I use Sony MDRZX700 Headphones. No problem with either, even though I have mild-to-moderate hearing loss.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Puakinekine »

Pinecrest, I only know how things are organized on iPods, mine in particular, but, I will give it a go. I keep my audiobooks in the Music folder (too complicated to explain why there and not in the audiobook folder) If I open up the music folder, I am given a choice of finding my book by Artist(=author) or by Album (=book title) or by Genre (=books and spoken word). If I open up Artist and scroll down to find "Jack London", I can choose White Fang or Call of the Wild. If I choose Call of the Wild, it will open to a list starting with Call of the Wild Part1, then Call of the Wild Part2, etc. Once I start with Call of the Wild Part1, it will continue to play until the end of the book, if I set it up that way or I can choose to have it stop at the end of each part.

If I open it up by Album(=Title) I can just go directly to Call of the Wild but when clicking on that still end up with the list of parts. If she thinks of the parts as chapters in a book, would that make it easier? I believe books are too large for the software to manage as one file, but could be wrong on that.

The software app for audiobooks on my android phone works with a similar sort of hierarchy.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by walkabout »

You might already know about this, but if you want to merge your mp3 files into a single file (or many files into a few), you can use this program:

http://www.shchuka.com/software/mergemp3/

I have used it a few times to merge mp3 files from ripped Great Courses. The Great Courses are organized on CD with two Lectures per CD. Each Lecture consists of, typically, 5-6 tracks, for a total of about 30 minutes per Lecture. Courses range from 12 hours (maybe less) to 24 or 36 hours. That can add up to a lot of tracks!

MergeMP3 is pretty simple. Point it to a folder containing your mp3 files, select the ones that you want to merge, and merge them.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by LadyGeek »

I want to be clear that while MP3 files do not have built-in Digital rights management and can therefore be easily copied, that does not imply that the content is without copyright restrictions. Please review the Terms of Service for the product.

For some of the products mentioned in this thread, there are restrictions for personal use only. I didn't look at every product. Bear in mind that suggestions intended to bypass copyright restrictions are totally unacceptable.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by JupiterJones »

pinecrest wrote: but if I can provide her the content (via MP3s), she wouldn't have to drive to the library all the time.
But you'd have to drive to her house to get the MP3 player, take it home, load new books on to it, then bring it back, wouldn't you?

And if you're able to do that, then I'm assuming you could instead just let her continue to use her CD player and just pick up the CDs she wants from the library for her.

That solves both the "her driving" problem and the "she's not used to newfangled gadgets" problem without any more work that you were already willing to do.

Or...
The CD burner went bad on my computer about a month after I bought it. :( I could use her CB burner, but it's more efficient for me to work from home.
For what it's worth, you could probably buy a CD player that can read MP3 from the disc, and a new, external USB CD burner for your computer, all for less than the price of most good MP3 players. :-)
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by SpringMan »

I have had many mp3 players over the years. Many were cheap ones. I now own an Apple iPod and it is the gold standard of mp3 players IMO. The form factor and quality is worth the extra cost and since you will be maintaining it for her, loading up the audio books in itunes should not be an issue. Why not get her something nice? However I personally don't like the ear buds that ipods come with. I use light weight over the ear headphones, Sony brand that ran about $10.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by gravlax »

Got my mom (a senior) a Kindle Fire since she reads so many books.

Well, she stopped reading books, and is now playing solitaire, doing crosswords, and playing words with friend with everyone and their brother. And I still can't beat her at Fruit Ninja!
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Kuckie »

The Sansa Clip and Fuze players have a slot for a micro SD card which costs about $10 for 16gb on Amazon.com. You can simply copy new MP3 music and audio books into the additional cards and give to your mom to keep forever. You also have the ability to copy all the card files into your computer, sort them in any order she desires, and reload the files back to the individual cards. Not saying that the Sansa is the way to go, other products mentioned have more features, but Sansa is a low priced simple solution for someone wanting only MP3 music/audio books copied from CD's.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by Aptenodytes »

Apologies if someone mentioned this -- I skimmed most responses and didn't see it.

In my experience the route you seek always leads to complications and headaches that are only worth enduring if there are no alternatives and the payoff is significant. I don't think your situation passes the test.

The simpler approach would be far more robust: you get a new CD burner and you make your mother audio book CDs from your digital collection. She doesn't have to learn a new machine or a new interface. It is more work for you, but less work for her. But I'm guessing she deserves it.

It is easy to underestimate the challenge of moving to a new interface or machine. I recall trying to play games with my children's handheld gaming devices (Nintendo DS and all that) back in the day and it was frankly almost impossible for me. My kids could do almost anything they wanted with the things and I could barely take baby steps. I'm not saying it is impossible, but moving from a CD player to an MP3 player or tablet would be the same kind of experience, even if not as extreme as my example.
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Re: Easy-to-use MP3 Player for Senior

Post by abuss368 »

Consider a iPod. Very easy to use.
John C. Bogle: “Simplicity is the master key to financial success."
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