Best easy to use digital audio player

[Idonno]

I'm looking for a digital audio player for my fathers 84th birthday.

One that is able to support high quality files like flac would be great.

It should be somewhat stationary with a remote so he can operate it without getting up all the time. A portable one with a dock is best as long as he can use a remote when docked if there even is such a thing.

It needs to have decent sound as well.

And one final request is that anything that does not have an "i" at the beginning of the name is preferable.


I know that a computer would probably be the best for this but, he has beginning alzheimer's and that would most likely be confusing so simplicity is important.

I also know that that's a lot to ask for but if it exists, hopefully someone here will know.

 

[americanaudiophile]

If you want to play flac files up to CD quality a Sansa Fuse or Clip will work. For files above CD quality the iRiver Astell and Kearns AK100 is the only one. The problem is as far as I know there are no docks or remotes for these so you would have to connect it to at least a pair of powered speakers. An iTouch will work with the Flacplayer app installed and will work with all the docks out there. You could also use Sonos to play the files from a PC, Mac, or NAS. There are a lot of options with Sonos so check them out at www.Sonos.com

 

[Idonno]

Yea, Samsung makes something similar to an I touch. The only problem I have with either of these is the limited storage they have. The fact that they can do so much more than necessary for just listening to audio makes for a very expensive digital audio player w/limited storage, since audio is all it will be used for.

The Sonos idea would be great but, it requires a computer and I've already been down that road with my parents. It just leads to great frustration for everyone involved (especially my parents). If someone was there to help them with a computer it might be different but, that isn't the case.

Any other Ideas? It doesn't have to support flac but, it would be nice if it did support some sort of CD quality format and I'm not one to believe that MP3's can produce that.

This system is for the man who's gallium arsenide laser theory is directly responsible for the laser we have in our CD/DVD players today. When I was young I used to listen to the speakers he designed and built after personally picking the brain of Paul Klipsch (a very nice man I'm told). They were awesome.

He used to play the Cello and until the last few years he was always part of a singing group. He also has an extensive musical collection.

I guess the reason I'm saying all this is because even though he's starting to fade away (which I find very sad) He's still a very smart man that just has a tough time picking up anything new. He also still has a surprisingly good ear for musical quality, for a man of his age.

He has been a great dad, so anything I can do to make his last years as enjoyable as possible would be good and a digital audio player he can use with as little effort as possible is about the best thing I can think of right now. So all input is greatly appreciated.

 

[andrew_berge]

I think the simplest thing to operate would be an old fashioned stereo system, but with a USB port.
Less menus and settings to sort through, just turn it on and push play.

I'm not sure how popular those are, i know i've seen a few in Walmarts and such places. I doubt you'll find one that can handle any other lossless format than wav, though.

Useful list of FLAC capable hardware, not sure when it was last updated, though:
http/flac.sourceforge.net/links.html

 

[Idonno]

Useful list of FLAC capable hardware, not sure when it was last updated, though:
http/flac.sourceforge.net/links.html

Very useful link thank you!