[Buzzygirl]

Q7) What can ipod do?

It depends on the type of iPod. On all versions, from the 80gb video iPod down to the 1gb Shuffle, you can play music and listen to audio podcasts. On the iPods with a screen, you can do all that, plus store photos and contacts such as addresses and phone numbers. If you have a video iPod, you can watch videos and movies.

I see ipod have got a lot of accessories eg docking station etc
Q tell me more

There are many, many accessories you can buy for iPods... iPod accessories are an industry unto themselves! However, most iPod accessories are fairly expensive for what you get (in my opinion). ALL iPods have a proprietary docking port, so you will need to use cables especially designed for your particular iPod model in order to charge them and synch them with iTunes, and they are NOT cheap, no matter what version of iPod you own.

iPods are expensive. The cheapest iPod-- the lowly 1gb Shuffle-- costs $79.00 US. That is a *lot* of money for a player with 1gb of storage and no screen.

Q9) Will other mp3 or mp4 do the same?

You can play MP3s on all non-Apple players-- you can drag and drop any MP3 file (music, podcasts) to the player. If you have an iPod and aren't a computer wizard, you are pretty much stuck with using iTunes.

It's not difficult to use an iPod with iTunes. In fact, they are quite easy to use, which is a very big part of the reason iPods are so popular-- but once you go the iPod route, you are pretty much stuck with ONE music provider, and ONE line of music players, and Apple gets to tell you what to do with all the music YOU purchased through them. I have owned a couple of iPods myself, but I sold them because I didn't want to be tied to using only iTunes to get music. Nevertheless, iPods are lovely devices; their fit and finish is just excellent. They are extremely popular, but they are not the only game in town anymore!

Q10) Is mp3 different from mp4?

They are both audio encoding formats. MP4 files are audio streams encrypted by FairPlay Digital Rights Management (DRM) and sold through the iTunes Store using the .m4p extension. iTunes affixes DRM to the music and video files that are played through it, so that means if you buy music through iTunes, you need to use an iPod to play your music (unless you choose to rip your iTunes music library to CD, then rip to CD to the MP3 format; only then can you use your music outside of iTunes). MP4 is an Apple thing, and you cannot use MP4s outside of iTunes, and iTunes works only with iPods. MP3 is an audio format that can be used with many players.

Chinese players which advertise themselves as "MP4" players are really just saying that they can play videos as well as music, all in a neat iPod Nano-looking player, but you still have to convert videos to a format which the player will read. My Chinese Nano clone will play videos, but only if I convert them into AMV format first. Higher-end Chinese players with better chipsets will play more common video formats.

Q11) What are the different types of function available?

Speaking from personal experience, iPod Nanos (not the video iPods) offer the ability to listen to music, view pictures, store contact information, and, if enabled, store some other info on them like a hard disk.

The Chinese players offer all of the above, plus the ability to view videos and listen to FM radio. You can also read e-books as text files. Most have voice recorders, so you can record messages and record programs from FM radio, and they usually come with one or more games built in.

Q12) USB and good?

Not sure what you mean by that.

Q13) Is 8gb too much or 4gb is enough.

Depends on how much music or how many videos you want to put on the player, but if all other things are considered, go for larger storage space. You need to be careful where you buy your player. Many of the higher-capacity Nano-like players sold on eBay have their memory hacked... in other words, they don't have as much space as advertised by the seller, and probably contain much less than advertised!

If you want lots of space combined with many functions, I recommend players like Meizu, Creative, and Archos, among others. You can hardly go wrong with Meizu players. This situation changes almost daily nowadays, as many new players are being developed and shipped from China.

Q14) I still do not understand how you use to record music onto the mp3 or mp4 from say
a) cd, b)buy from the net,
c) Any other sources?

Just insert your music CDs and rip them to your computer's hard drive, then transfer the files to an MP3 player by dragging the music files to the player itself. When you plug in a Chinese MP3 player, it shows up like a USB drive on your computer. Then, simply drag and drop the MP3s to your player, like you would files to any USB flash drive.

There are many online music sites where you can purchase MP3s... just do a Google search for "online music sites," and you will find many.

>Do they have camera too?

Some of the newer Chinese players incorporate cameras, but I cannot tell you how good or bad they are. From what I can tell, built-in cameras are a recent addition to these players.

My question to you is: how much money do you want to spend on a player? Knowing the price you want to pay will help to narrow down your options, when you are ready to purchase a player.

Hope this helps somewhat.