ibex333,
Thanks for the zen like advice (pun unintended), but that's the nature of the beast isn't it. I mean, you have a gazillion mp3 players to choose from and they lose value faster than a loaf of bread sitting on a supermarket shelf for a week, so choosing one is extremely difficult. Like you, I must have bought more than a dozen or so over the years ranging from cheapie assembled with duct tape no-name ones to an Iphone and, in the end, I've settled on a Creative Zen V Plus 8GB. I am not a big fan of watching stick like creatures moving around on a 2.5" screen either but there are many others who don't mind, else companies won't be churning out video players in such large quantities. So different strokes for different folks.
The project that I mentioned is aimed at the geek in some of us (I am waiting for the CF drive to arrive to attempt it), not so much at those who want to save money. BTW, I've lost too much data over the years to hard drives to recommend anything used that's got one in it (I know, I know, I should have backed it up first).