Kenwood has a good one for $300 or less, and the file access time is AMAZING.

I had a Z828, which was the top end from last year's models. The track switching time was like a second, enough to bother me. That's gone with this year's models, don't worry about it.

 

Right, I did say "most people". Not everyone. Some people are picky. Those that are, probably won't like any mp3 encoded at any rate.

There is also the drawback of, higher bitrate... bigger files... less you can fit per cd. Of course, only being able to fit 50 mp3's still beats a cd.

 

I encoded everything @ 160 and had no problems.

 

That's the one I was originally going to get but I got the 740 instead because I found it for a really dirt cheap price. Naturally, I had to go for it.