I am thinking of getting an MP3 player and was wondering if ya'll have any, and if so which ones?  I am debating between an ipod and a zune but would consider any alternatives.

Ipod has been great to me. I like the simplicity of it.  I don't know much about the Zune.

i own an ipod. works great and has an abudance of accessories for it

I recently went on the market for a new mp3 player. I wanted to stay away from iPods because everyone I know who had one had it break on them. I even had one friend who went through 3 in 1 year. Also, I know they tend to have poor battery life. I know they are very simple and well designed and work well, but personally, I didn't trust them and I didn't want to pay for the iPod name. So I go a Zune. It has 30GB harddrive, radio tuner, and it can play movies. It has worked great for me. I think the interface of the device is far superior to iPod. I have heard that people have had trouble with the device, but it has been great for me. The only thing I would warn you about is if you have lots of music you bought from iTunes. Zune will not play .m4p music files so anything you buy off of iTunes will have to be converted or lost. I bought a converting program for like $15 to do this and it worked great. If most of your digital music is in mp3 format, you can transfer them right to your zune after you load them to the zune software library.

If you have any questions about the Zune, just ask.

I'll recommend anything that Creative Labs makes.

Ipod for its ease of use and accessories.

I never owned a real MP3 player, but my friend had a Ipod just break for no reason last fall, and he couldn't get a new one from apple. From what I hear Ipods are more fragile than other brands.

Ipod for 3 years. No problems. Still working and the battery still plays for 15 hours. Use it every day. Use it every time on the boat.

Just keep it out of direct sun light.

8-)

I love my iPOD nano.

I recently went on the market for a new mp3 player. I wanted to stay away from iPods because everyone I know who had one had it break on them. I even had one friend who went through 3 in 1 year. Also, I know they tend to have poor battery life. I know they are very simple and well designed and work well, but personally, I didn't trust them and I didn't want to pay for the iPod name. So I go a Zune. It has 30GB harddrive, radio tuner, and it can play movies. It has worked great for me. I think the interface of the device is far superior to iPod. I have heard that people have had trouble with the device, but it has been great for me. The only thing I would warn you about is if you have lots of music you bought from iTunes. Zune will not play .m4p music files so anything you buy off of iTunes will have to be converted or lost. I bought a converting program for like $15 to do this and it worked great. If most of your digital music is in mp3 format, you can transfer them right to your zune after you load them to the zune software library.

If you have any questions about the Zune, just ask.

I have a 2nd generation iPod and it still holds a complete charge. I have dropped it a few times and it still is ticking. I have 3 shuffles as well. Two 1st generation and 1 of the new clip on ones (for the family). They all have worked great.

If you are planning on extended continuous movement (like running) while using one i would suggest a Nano or Shuffle. They have flash drives that will never skip. Zune as well as the larger capacity iPods have spinning hardrives. My old one will go about 20 minutes of running before it locks up. Thats about the extent of the amount of music cached before it starts accessing music from the spinning drive.

As far as music from iTunes working on one device and not another...This is all due to the Digital Rights "software" wrapped around a song bought from iTunes. This software is what limits you to play a song on only 5 machines, but limitless iPods. Steve Jobs recently wrote an open letter to the recording companies asking them to drop the digital rights stuff and let anyone play anything bought from anywhere on any device. It wouldnt surprise me if this becomes reality. I say this cause where you buy music may not matter soon.

Zune is nice as far as I can tell, but I'm like 75% of the world that agrees iPods are simpler, just as cheap and was the first (and other than Zunes weak music store) to integrate a device to desktop software to an on-line store.

One last thing.  All the current (and several older models) iPods play video.  The Nano and Shuffles do not.

I've had a few higher  end models( IPOD, Creative Labs), but I have to say the most bullet proof one I've had yet is the RCA  Lyra  I got for free through a promo deal. It's about $40 at walmart now. I'm an avid long-distance motorcyclist(approx. 50k miles/year, and on a sport bike, so high speeds). I ride in all kinds of weather, and usually very aggressively. This thing went through 2 full seasons anf part of another, and has never let me down.

The one I have is an older model, and has an SD card slot, which is VERY nice. I have  bunch of SD cards laying around, so I can load all sorts of different music and have miles and days of fun..

However, it is VERY simple, and the one thing I will give the IPOD(which broke in 3 weeks, and that was just from vibration), it did sound better on my Etmyotic ER6i headphones.

I have a Zen Sleek photo by Creative Labs, and its 20 gigs for 170 bucks... No videos, but it holds pics and plenty of music.