I am interested in personal music for lap swimming.
What works or doesn’t ?
I’ve heard good things about the SwiMP3. Have never used one, though.
I have the 2008 edition of the SwiMP3 and it still works perfectly (1.5 yrs later). I had a H2O Audio with an Ipod before, but I didn’t like the in-ear phones or having to wear a belt or armband to carry it. SwiMP3 is worth every penny.
I have the Swimman.com shuffle with the swimman headphones, and it is honestly amazing. It’s 100x better then the H2O audio that I used to have for my nano. It’s a little pricey, but it’s well worth it. I’ve seen some refurbished ones on ebay selling for like 150. Search swimman on here, I’m sure you’ll find a lot of chatter about them.
x3 on the SwiMP3. I tried the H20Audio stuff, and it was really fiddly and a pain in the ass. The SwiMP3 works like a champ, and is super simple. It just clips to your goggles straps, and sounds pretty darn good.
Spot
Well with all the testimoney here and at 130 bucks Swim mp3 is the tested swim music system of choice.
There is one interesting gizmo on Amazon that has sub woffer to mount on the back of your head!!!
how do I convert i tunes library to mp3 ?
X4 swimp3. I also had the H2O Audio previously and the bone conduction technology is much better.
There’s the rub…don’t know if you can convert I-tunes to MP3. I had enough cool tunes on CD that I just used those.
Spot
Do those swim MP3s actually work? I can’t even imagine being able to hear music with the rush of water to deal with. What is it like?
It works like a champ. You can hear a bit of water rushing in your ears, but since the SwiMP3 uses bone conduction to send sound waves, you hear the music perfectly clearly. Its really pretty cool.
Spot
In fact with the swimp3 you can hear it better when your head is in the water. It makes swimming so much more tolerable.
i like the H2o audio stuff.
+1 on the swimman.
Get another brand of waterproof headphones to save some $$. Make sure they go down the ear canal and seal it. If any water gets in you can’t hear the music.
One big advantage of the swimman is that out of the water it’s still an ipod shuffle, so you can use it for other workouts as well.
Swimman is the way to go. I tried about three before I bought the swimman it’s pricey yea but it’s totaly worth it. Put a little neosporin on the headphone earpieces and it seals nicely.
It clips to your goggles, isn’t in the way at all. I wonder how the guy waterproofs it. I’ve had mine for a year no problems. If you have an Ipod shuffle already you can send yours in and he’ll waterproof it.
Suggestions on other types of waterproof headphones?
I have a swimP3 that I can sell you, used it about 10 times. Works great. Its the version 1 not the version 2 (send me a PM if interested).
To convert from itunes to mp3 I bought a program called tunebite that converts the file format. Program ‘plays’ the song and records it in an Mp3 format.
+1 for swimmp3 thing.
a few notes:
-i listen mostly to npr podcasts- you can just drag/drop those directly from itunes into the swimp3 “drive” folder thing
-it works great until i start swimming really hard, then i cant hear it, but i cant swim that hard for that long, so its ok
-mine was really fiddly, when i plugged it into my pc, kept getting “usb device not recognized”. Turns out it works if you torque the wire where it plugs into the headset to make the connection really tight- i wrap teh wire around the headpiece once i plug it in to keep tension on it.
Suggestions on other types of waterproof headphones?
I actually built my own by taking in-ear earbuds and sealing all the holes and wire junctures with wetsuit glue. I used cheap $10 earbuds (in case it didn’t work and they died) and 2 years later they still rock.
If diy isn’t your thing I’d recommend the H20 Surge headphones (http://www.become.com/h2o-surge-waterproof-headphones?&qet ). Make sure to get earbuds, not the behind the neck headphones (I tried these from H20, and the fit sucked…sold them on ebay). If any water gets in your ear canal you can’t hear the music, so the design has to be one that fully seals the ear canal.
You might want to check out the mi-sport waterproof headphones…no wires, 1GB memory. Supposed to work quite well. I’m thinking of picking these up myself!
Mi sport is interesting. Have you had personal contact with satisfied customers?
I like the price.