The one thing I really do miss, is that my MINI Countryman was optimized for Apple, and I could control my iPod touch via the steering wheel of my car, see cover art on my nav screen, etc. That is not available for my Pono.

I dunno…I paid the Kickstarter price of $300, which was $100 cheaper than my 64Gb iPod touch cost, four years ago. And, considering the hard drive on my previous iPod failed…I think flash memory is far more stable, because it's not mechanically based. YMMV of course.

The only files I can't play, are those paid downloads I made from iTunes in the "protected file" era, where Apple was selling proprietary encrypted music files that would not play on anything but iTunes. I suppose I lost about a dozen albums out of 19,000 songs. Which sucks, but is even more reason not to reward…

"Audio files can be loaded onto the PonoPlayer using the Pono Music Center desktop application (soon to be released on Windows and MacOS). The PonoPlayer can also be sideloaded as a USB storage device (Windows, MacOS, Linux)."

I really don't know, as I'm a Windows user (used iTunes for Windows on my iPod touch). Worth looking into. I've just transferred my full library in the last two weeks,when my Pono showed up. Oh yeah, it also handles FLAC and hi-resolution audio…though my reasons for getting one were capacity-related.

Frankly, if you're paying that kinda money, you're an idiot, what with the Pono player now out, up to 196Gb without a hard drive (strictly flash memory and microSD cards). http://ponomusic.force.com/