Toshiba Gigabeat MES30VW or Zune

since you want a $200 player, i would recommend the zune because some retailers are selling it for $199 (hint: circuit city). The large 3" is easy on the eyes and it's 30GB capacity will store about 250 hours of your mp3's. Or you buy a used ipod for $200, but you're on your own to find one.

If I may recommend another player, Creative Zen Vision:M is another excellent player. Retailers are also selling this at $200. The screen is smaller but gorgeous, and this player has the best range of format compatibility of any player, especially useful if you download short clips off the internet in a variety of formats.

I would probably reccomend the gigabeat instead. They are very similar players (and in fact the Zune is manufactured by Toshiba), but I prefer the control layout of the gigabeat, and have no particular use for the limited wi-fi the zune offers. You can't go wrong with either, although I myself do own a gigabeat. The Zen Vision:M also looks pretty nice, although I had a zen micro that didn't last a year. I do own a MuVo, however, and it seems to be pretty durable. But even so, I'd go with the gigabeat. you might not find a new one for $200, but I hadn't heard of this low priced zune, either.

Well I have both so I think I can shed light on the subject.if your looking for reliability,zune all the way.I got a gigabeat back in october 2006 and I've had to replace 2 of them under warrenty since then,and it jerks on songs and a lot of things.the nice things I can say about it is it has a lot of features,like downloainding pictures form a digital camera and it comes with the cable to connect it to a tv,and it also comes with an ac adapter so you can charge it from a wall jack.It also goes really fast through the menus,and its really nice if you have Windows Media Center Edition cause you can sync recorded tv with it.The Zune on the other hand performs good.the 3 inch screen really does pictures,album art and video justice.It also has the sharing ability there so you can at least share songs between other zune users,which is kindof like a negative cycle,cause you would get one to share music,but you wont be able to because at the moment not many people have one because of that same reason,so its kind of like the ends justifying the means.Hope Ive contributed to your search.and if you forgot,zune all the way for reliability.