As soon as I got my Pocket PC, I noticed that it has a handy little feature called Windows Media Player. I started using it immediately. Now my daily walk to work is full of skip free digital music. Another bonus is that my Pocket PC fits into my shirt pocket, so I don't need to carry around an extra bag for my CD player anymore.

Mobile music machine
Windows Media Player is one of the greatest features on the new Pocket PC. It's an audio player for the Pocket PC that can play all your favorite MP3 or WMA files. It's a built-in feature, so if you own a Pocket PC, it's probably already there for you to use. It's pictured in Figure A.

FIGURE A


Windows Media Player lets you take your favorite MP3 music with you anywhere. Roll over picture for a larger image.

All you have to do is connect your device to your desktop computer with Active Sync 3.1, transfer some music using Windows Media Manager for Pocket PC, and you're ready to jam on it. I'll go into how to transfer music later, but for now, let's consider a couple questions you might be asking yourself about this exciting application.

How does it sound?
The number one question I'm sure everyone is asking is, "How does it sound?" For a device this small, it sounds great, but it really depends on the quality of the internal speaker on your device. I tested Windows Media Player on the Compaq Aero 1520, which I upgraded to a Pocket PC. The speakers on the Compaq devices happen to be very good.

However, the real use I see for these devices is as a replacement for your compact disc or cassette player. All Pocket PC devices have stereo headphone jacks on them, which is ideal for plugging in a pair of headphones or connecting to a set of speakers. My favorite thing to do is to use my car adapter, from my portable CD player, to plug my Pocket PC into my car stereo. That way I can listen to all my favorite music while driving down the road. The sound quality when connected to external speakers is as good as those speakers allow. The speaker on my device is okay, but I certainly wouldn't use it to provide the music at a house party.

Storage
Another issue I'm sure you want addressed is storage. The age-old problem with computer devices is running out of memory. How much storage space do the MP3 and WMA files take up?

If you're familiar with the digital music form of MP3, you already know how much space these files take up on your system. One song can be anywhere from 1MB to 10MB depending on the length and sound quality of the song. But imagine being able to get the same sound quality as an MP3 while taking up half the storage space. That'd be nice, wouldn't it?