Great MP3 player under $100?

[thatsright]

What I'm looking for:
1. Great audio quality output (I don't mean the headphones.)
2. Ability to recognize and play at least 4,000 songs.
3. Micro SD slot
4. Music playing only. Don't need Audiobooks, FM radio, biometric monitoring, bluetooth, etc.
5. Not big
6. About $100 max.
7. Small-ish

I have had a line of Sandisk Sansa players. They are great, small and relatively good audio. However my latest one is having issues and so I just bought a Sansa Sport 8GB. But it will only allow 2,000 songs to be recognized. I have about 3,000 on my external SD card, so it can't see them all. Sort of defeats the purpose of expandable storage. So, I'm giving up on Sandisk players. All the reviews of other players I read are poor audio quality or big and very expensive with features I don't care about.

Any suggestions given the above?

 

[Victorian Gray]

What I'm looking for:
1. Great audio quality output (I don't mean the headphones.)
2. Ability to recognize and play at least 4,000 songs.
3. Micro SD slot
4. Music playing only. Don't need Audiobooks, FM radio, biometric monitoring, bluetooth, etc.
5. Not big
6. About $100 max.
7. Small-ish

I have had a line of Sandisk Sansa players. They are great, small and relatively good audio. However my latest one is having issues and so I just bought a Sansa Sport 8GB. But it will only allow 2,000 songs to be recognized. I have about 3,000 on my external SD card, so it can't see them all. Sort of defeats the purpose of expandable storage. So, I'm giving up on Sandisk players. All the reviews of other players I read are poor audio quality or big and very expensive with features I don't care about.

Any suggestions given the above?

Fiio X1 2nd gen

example on Amazon for $90

https://www.amazon.com/Fiio-Resolut...e=UTF8&qid=1530478066&sr=8-1&keywords=fiio+x1

Company website

http://www.fiio.net/en/fiio

I've had a 1st gen X1 for several years and based on my experience, wouldn't consider a different brand.

 

[ZGR]

Galaxy S5 is my mp3 player.

 

[nOOky]

I use an LG G4 for my mp3 player with Jaybird X3's mostly for running, but that FiiO looks like a good option. I've destroyed a couple of the Sandisk clips and the AGPTEK or whatever equivalent is junk imho. The only reason to keep using an old phone is that I can make an emergency 911 call if I have to, but not everyone needs that.

 

[postmortemIA]

Older cell phone with good sound quality, HTC M7-M9, A9, etc. LG V10..

 

[jamesdave]

I still use my cell phone as my mp3 player and I am satisfied with the sound quality.

 

[Muse]

I have had a line of Sandisk Sansa players. They are great, small and relatively good audio. However my latest one is having issues and so I just bought a Sansa Sport 8GB. But it will only allow 2,000 songs to be recognized. I have about 3,000 on my external SD card, so it can't see them all. Sort of defeats the purpose of expandable storage. So, I'm giving up on Sandisk players. All the reviews of other players I read are poor audio quality or big and very expensive with features I don't care about.

Any suggestions given the above?

I still have 2 Sandisk Sansa M250 MP3 players. They are awesome. The biggest gripe is the 2GB storage, not expandable. They actually have very good FM, which I use a LOT. It's a lot better than my Alcatel Idol 4S smartphone FM, which I don't use because the reception is relatively sucky. However, for MP3 the Alcatel smartphone is terrific... mostly. With its 128GB micro-SD card, just mega-hours of audio. The sound quality, I can't tell the difference from the Sansas. As long as you lock it, it's as free of glitches as the lock on the Sansas. The headphone jacks can go bad, this has happened to me with phones.

If you don't want to use a big smartphone for audio get a small one, they come pretty small. Yeah, it has features you don't require in an MP3 player but if the size is small and it supports what you want, why not use one?

The audio app on the Microsoft phones is so so, but usable for me. I'd think an android or Apple phone would have a superior app.

Edit: I just read some reviews of the Fiio at Amazon. Hard to know, the user interface is a letdown for many and there's an issue with lag. One reviewer said it can take the player 15 minutes or more after loading music to get it sorted out! One feature I like on my Windows phone is sorting by loading. When so set, the last loaded file appears at the top and that's usually the one I want to hear. A lot to like with the Fiio but it's hard to judge the user interface issues without a hands-on evaluation.

 

[Victorian Gray]

I still have 2 Sandisk Sansa M250 MP3 players. They are awesome. The biggest gripe is the 2GB storage, not expandable. They actually have very good FM, which I use a LOT. It's a lot better than my Alcatel Idol 4S smartphone FM, which I don't use because the reception is relatively sucky. However, for MP3 the Alcatel smartphone is terrific... mostly. With its 128GB micro-SD card, just mega-hours of audio. The sound quality, I can't tell the difference from the Sansas. As long as you lock it, it's as free of glitches as the lock on the Sansas. The headphone jacks can go bad, this has happened to me with phones.

If you don't want to use a big smartphone for audio get a small one, they come pretty small. Yeah, it has features you don't require in an MP3 player but if the size is small and it supports what you want, why not use one?

The audio app on the Microsoft phones is so so, but usable for me. I'd think an android or Apple phone would have a superior app.

Edit: I just read some reviews of the Fiio at Amazon. Hard to know, the user interface is a letdown for many and there's an issue with lag. One reviewer said it can take the player 15 minutes or more after loading music to get it sorted out! One feature I like on my Windows phone is sorting by loading. When so set, the last loaded file appears at the top and that's usually the one I want to hear. A lot to like with the Fiio but it's hard to judge the user interface issues without a hands-on evaluation.

Re the Fiio. My personal experience with it has been great. I've had mine (X1 - 1st gen) for about 3 years and wouldn't even think of going to a different company when i eventually replace it. No issues with lag ever and that weird 15 minute loading thing seems odd. I'm guessing that's in reference to the machine sorting newly loaded music and I have to say, it didn't even take that long when I first loaded my 64 gig card after I bought the Fiio. And certainly when I do normal loading ( usually I add music at 15 or 20 albums at a time) it generally takes no more than a couple of minutes to catalogue. Fwiw, I've owned Creative, Sandisk, Sony and Apple players over the years and I've been happiest with this one.

I guess as with most anything, experience and, perhaps more importantly, perception differ from person to person. <shrug>

My 1st portable mp3 player

I actually think I might still have it packed away in some box in the closet.