MP3 Players - The Advantages

Everyone today has a digital audio player.  Technically known as a MP3 player, these tiny devices have found applications in all aspects of our daily lives.  Whether you like to listen to music as you jog, workout, work, or even as you go to bed, one of the many cheap MP3 players in the market today may be the best solution for you.  Today’s players are small enough so that they can be with you throughout the day, and into the night if you wish!  Most players consist of four components – a flash memory card, power supply, headphones, and a plastic housing.  The flash memory card stores your favorite music in digital format.  The power supply – typically a built-in battery powers the unit, and the plastic housing can accommodates the electronics and battery.  During play back, the digital signal is converted to an audio sound through a pair of headphones or earbuds.

The miracle of today’s MP3 player is because of a process called perceptual audio coding or PAC, and it relies on the inherent limitations of human hearing.  Humans are capable of hearing sound signals in the frequency range of 20 Hz to 20 KHz.  Within this range, competing audio signals may mask or override each other.  For example, from two signals of the same strength but differing frequencies, the signal with the higher frequency will mask the signal of the lower frequency, and the human ear will only detect the high frequency signal.   Using PAC, the irrelevant and redundant parts of the sound signal – or in other words, those signals that cannot be detected by the human ear, are removed.  This reduces the size of the audio file.  Since the removed parts cannot be recognized by humans in the first place, there is little reduction in the sound quality.  In the second step, the reduced file is further compressed using a process similar to zipping any other computer file.  The result of these two processes is a digital audio file that is about one tenth the size of the original audio track, with only a small loss of quality.

MP3 players have numerous advantages over other portable playback devices such as CD players.  For one, the portability of today’s units is unmatched!  You can buy eight gigabyte player that measure less than two inches by two inches by one inch.  An eight gigabyte unit can store about fifteen hundred songs!  If you wanted to carry the same amount of music on conventional music CDs, you would likely need over a hundred of them!  Today’s digital music players consume very little power.  A single battery cell will last over twelve hours.  Finally, if you get tired on the music you currently have on your player, you can erase it and replace it with new music.  With conventional CDs, you do not have that luxury.  You would need to buy yourself a new CD.  It is also important to note that inexpensive MP4 players are also available in the market today.  These players are the video version of MP3 players, and are a must if you prefer visual entertainment to the audio version.