mp3 player - iPod? Zune? What Else?

[SkunkedAgain]

I've got an 80GB iPod Classic that just eclipsed the 2 year mark. It's becoming more and more riddled with hard drive issues that the Apple store folks can't figure out. I've heard that the big drives use standard hard drives versus flash memory, and therefore are more sensitive to getting banged around or even going on a run or bike ride.

I've legitimately got nearly 70GB of music and that's all I want to listen to. I don't necessarily like all of Apple's limitations and compatibility issues with PCs. My iPod is about to die and as far as I can tell, they don't make anything over 40GB or so with flash memory.

What other decent options are out there for mp3 players besides the iPod?

Does anyone have a Zune and have opinions, good or bad?

What are my options with a need for so much memory?

[pulsar_nx]

With that much memory you may need to find one that takes SD cards and swap out cards to get it all on flash memory.

As far as apple, the touch can have as much as 64GB of memory which is close.

[PurpleHaZe]

Last year i bought the xmp3 from xm radio i love it, 9 bucks a month you listen to live x.m you can record there songs and put your songs in the player i use it more than i thought i would. I thought about the i pod and zune. didnt want the hassel of downloading songs and such. hope this helps.

[Jim916]

I have an Archos 5 it that plays music and can surf the web on a 5 inch screen. It has the Andoid OS. I like it so far and you are not stuck with Apples rules.

[delcecchi]

I don't think there are any players that have more than 32G of flash. And that much flash is pretty expensive.

The hard drive ipods only run the drive periodically to load up an onboard ram. I have dropped mine a few times and it still works fine.

How about a 16G nano and 5 playlists. Then you just have to decide the night before what you want to listen to. Put on the appropriate playlist and you are good to go.