After yet another visit to a client using a CD player for music on hold, I wondered about replacing the thing with an MP3 player. Any thoughts? Are they reliable enough to see out a year or two of 8 hours/5 days a week operation?
Trevor Wilson
After yet another visit to a client using a CD player for music on hold, I wondered about replacing the thing with an MP3 player. Any thoughts? Are they reliable enough to see out a year or two of 8 hours/5 days a week operation?
Trevor Wilson
If it uses flash memory, there are no moving parts -- it should last many years.
**Nope. Flash memory has a life-span. I am wondering if this needs to be taken into account.
Trevor Wilson
**Nope - for the most part. Flash memory has a _memory write_ life-span.
I'm sure it can be read over and over again until you smash it with a hammer after hearing that !$$##)@{@@}@^$ song onemore time. :-)
Jonesy
-- Marvin L Jones | jonz | W3DHJ | linux 38.24N 104.55W | @ config.com | Jonesy | OS/2
The limited lifespan of flash is associated with the erase/write cycles, which use a high voltage to tunnel electrons through an insulating oxide barrier. The high voltage gradually degrades the oxide, limiting the number of erase/write cycles per block.
The number of such erasures varies with the flash type, but is usually in the hundreds-of-thousands range (Samsung says it's up to a million cycles, if wear levelling and ECC are used).
There seems to be a storage lifetime, once the data is programmed... it's usually quoted as something on the order of 10 to 20 years, if I recall correctly.
I haven't seen any reports, or anything in the data sheets which would indicate that the number of *read* cycles for a given flash-memory block has any effect at all on the storage lifetime or the number of erase/write cycles you can use. Reading doesn't involve modifying the stored charge at all... it just senses it via a FET.
Unless you're planning to download a whole new batch of music to the flash music-on-old player ever few hours, I doubt that you'll be able to wear out such a device within less than a lotta years. It should certainly survive well past the lifetime of a typical CD player!
-- Dave Platt AE6EO Friends of Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
**Thanks for the info. It looks like they will do the job just fine.
Trevor Wilson
Only for rewriting. Do you expect to be altering the flash drive all the time, every day?
On Sat, 9 Feb 2008 20:00:54 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@radagast.org (Dave Platt) put finger to keyboard and composed:
Hmm, my PC's motherboard is now nearly 10 years old. Is it time to refresh/reflash the BIOS EEPROM? Or does the storage lifetime only apply if the device is not powered during that time?
- Franc Zabkar
-- Please remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email.
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