Before You Buy An MP3 Player

By David Morris

This may sound like an obvious question to ask, "What do you want to use your new MP3 player for?" This is really the first step to get the most out of your MP3 player. It also saves a lot of time and frustration. As it's easy to find that the player you've bought does lots of things that you don't need and doesn't do the things that you do need.

It also makes choosing your player much easier and enjoyable, as you may find you are overcome by choice, not really knowing which player is better, or more suited to your needs, than another. Is it just for listening to music while you are jogging or working out? Do you use the radio while in the kitchen? Or are you looking for something that you can plug into your TV and watch videos with?

MP3 players have either easy to use button controls, for example, press play, up and down to run through your music lists and volume; or touch screen controls. Touch screens have become popular with the Apple iPod touch, and there are also many other MP3 players using them too. Many people find it an advantage to use a touch screen, as it is easier and also a fun way to use the player. If you have never used a one before, it can take a little practice at first.

Will your MP3 player play all your music and video file? It's important to check that your files are compatible. A common complaint people make after buying a new MP3 player, is that it won't play their music files. While we come to think of all music files as an 'MP3', there are several other common formats. Including AAC, which is the standard used by Apple and iTunes, WMA or Windows Media Audio, and also RM or Real Media

If you find a player that you do like, but it doesn't play all your file formats, don't worry, as there is a solution. There are many free software programs available that will easily and quickly convert your files into a compatible file for your player. You may also want to check if your player comes with a software program to do this, many do.

Ask a friend. If you have a friend or family member that seem to have a good MP3 player, which they find easy to use, ask them about it, let them show it off to you. Ask them what they really like about it, and if they think it would be suitable for you. - 23815

About the Author:

Learn more about an MP4 player. Stop by David Morris's site where you can find out all about cheap MP3 players and what they can do for you.

Brock Lesnar Wins UFC Heavyweight Title

By Ross Everett

On a historic night for the sport of mixed martial arts, Brock Lesnar avenged his early loss to Frank Mir with a TKO victory and in the process unified the promotions heavyweight championship at UFC 100. Mir/Lesnar was the main event of a stacked card and the culmination of a frenzied week of activity in Las Vegas.

The anticipation surrounding UFC 100 was unprecedented among the fight sport media and, more significantly, among mainstream sports media. MMA has long has been an object of scorn, disdain and ignorance among traditional sports media, and in this context the fact that every major outlet including ESPN, SI.com and Fox Sports featured UFC 100 as their top story of the day is downright amazing. The broader implications of UFC 100 remain to be seen, but it could very likely become a turning point for the sport where MMA transcended cult or niche status to burst into the mainstream consciousness.

Preliminary buy rates suggest that more than 1.5 million people purchased the event, which would not only make it the UFC's biggest PPV ever but put it in the top five of *all* PPV sporting events. While it fell short of the all time PPV record of 2.4 million buys set by the De La Hoya/Mayweather fight, the unprecedented interest has put MMA on the map to stay.

The main event established Lesnar as not only the UFC heavyweight champion, but the most hated 'bad guy' in the sport. He implemented a perfect gameplan against the BJJ mastery of Mir, leveraging his strength and power to pummel his foe while not placing himself at risk of submission.

By contrast, Mir made a tactical mistake in allowing Lesnar to put him on his back so quickly and control him on the ground. He may have considered this his best opportunity to win"wait out Lesnar and look for an opportunity for a submission"but it never materialized and by the end of the first round hed already absorbed a brutal beating. Lesnar quickly took Mir down again at the start of the second round, ending the fight with a punishing ground and pound assault that prompted referee Herb Dean to call a stop to the contest at 1:48 of the second round.

Lesnar diminished his dominating performance with his postfight antics"he taunted Mir after the stoppage, prompting the crowd to boo him mercilessly. He responded to this with a double handed middle finger salute before a short and arrogant postfight interview that would have been much more at home in the WWE than in this setting. Mir was the consummate professional in defeat, giving credit to his opponent and generally displaying all of the class that Lesnar lacked. - 23815

About the Author:

Ross Everett is a staff oddsmaker for Sports-1 Sportsbook as well as a freelance writer specializing in MMA, boxing and how to bet on NFL football. He is a respected authority on Internet sports betting, cigars and fencing. He lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with three Jack Russell Terriers and a pet wallaby.

Chargers Rip Sputtering Chiefs

By Ross Everett

The San Diego Chargers bounced back nicely from their Monday Night Football loss to Denver last week, opening a 20-0 halftime lead before coasting to a 37-7 victory over the Kansas City Chiefs. Chargers' quarterback Phillip Rivers passed for 268 yards and three touchdowns in the victory. Running back Ladanian Tomlinson ran for a season high 71 yards.

The Chargers easily covered the NFL pointspread as -6 road favorites. It was only the second pointspread cover of the year for San Diego, who moved their ATS record to 2-4. Kansas City dropped to 2-5 against the spread.

After the game, QB Rivers suggested that the loss to Denver was a turning point for his team:

"Last week, we felt like we made progress. We had the attitude we were looking for, focus, but we didn't win. But we knew we got better."

Tomlinson broke off one of his most impressive runs of the year on the Chargers first touchdown drive, a 31 yard pickup that he said lifted the team's spirits and led to the easy victory:

"It kind of got us going. It was something we needed and it was a big play for us. It was a staple of our offense. It's been around for years, old power. It was perfectly blocked and was just a great job of execution."

The Chiefs continued to struggle on their home field, which at one point was considered one of the toughest venues in the league for visiting teams. Chiefs' nose tackle Ron Edwards lamented this home field struggle:

"We want to win for the home fans, for us, for everyone out there watching," nose tackle Ron Edwards said. "It's real painful."

Rivers pointed to the Chiefs' legacy of home field dominance in celebrating the win:

"Any time you come to Kansas City and win, it's good. We talked about getting on a roll and you've got to win one first before you can. Hopefully, this is something we can build on."

The Chargers return home to take on their hated rivals, the Oakland Raiders. Next Sunday's game has San Diego listed as a -16' home favorite with the total set at 42'. They'll travel to play the New York Giants the following week before returning home to face the Philadelphia Eagles on November 15. Kansas City will enjoy a bye week before returning to action on November 8 on the road against the Jacksonville Jaguars. - 23815

About the Author:

Ross Everett is a widely published widely published freelance sports writer and noted authority on sports betting odds comparison. He writing has appeared on a variety of sports sites including sports news and betting odds portal sites. He lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with three Jack Russell Terriers and an emu. He is currently working on an autobiography of former energy secretary Donald Hodell.

Brock Lesnar's 5 Toughest Challengers

By Ross Everett

Following Brock Lesnar's UFC 100 victory over Frank Mir, many new fans to the sport are under the mistaken impression that he's unbeatable. In his short tenure as a professional fighter, the former WWE champion has seen a remarkable transformation in public opinion from the suggestion that he's a 'sideshow freak' to the misconception that he's 'unbeatable'. With all due respect to Lesnar, who is progressing by leaps and bounds as a fighter with every bout, hes got a big deficit in experience to make up on the job as UFC heavyweight champion.

Lesnar is no doubt a handful for any opponent, but in many ways has been the beneficiary of favorable matchups throughout his MMA career. More recently, Frank Mir made a serious tactical error, thinking that he could absorb a beating on the ground and wait for a submission opportunity. Lesnar had gameplanned Mir perfectly, and implemented a fight plan that allowed him to pound his opponent mercilessly while avoiding the risk of submission. Neither observation is meant to diminish the significance of Lesnars victories, but to underscore the fact that hes not unbeatable. Heres five fighters who could do it:

1) FEDOR EMELIANENKO: 'The Last Emperor' is until proven otherwise the best heavyweight in the sport. The former PRIDE champion has striking power, submission mastery, and may be the toughest fighter mentally in the sport. Fedor might get taken down by the new UFC heavyweight champ, but hed reverse it from the bottom and win via armbar.

2) ANTONIO RODRIGO NOGUEIRA: Nogueira would present Lesnar with another formidable challenge. The former Interim heavyweight champion has equal, if not superior, BJJ skills and has proven to be tougher and more durable than Mir. His five career losses are all via decision and came to the absolute highest level of competition (Fedor Emelianenko twice, Frank Mir, Josh Barnett and Dan Henderson). The Mir fight was a lopsided loss, but it was later revealed that he had been recovering from a staph infection that limited his training and clearly impacting his conditioning. His ability to withstand punishment and take a punch allows him to be patient against powerful opponents and wait for an opening for a submission, as evidenced in his fight against Tim Sylvia. The UFC heavyweight division is notoriously thin, but among the current crop Nogueira is by far Lesnars worst matchup.

3) JOSH BARNETT: Barnett is another unlikely opponent for Lesnar, due as much to his recent positive drug test in California than anything else. Still, Barnett could be the worst matchup in the sport for the new UFC champ. Lesnar is likely the more powerful of the two, but Barnett is an imposing physical presence himself at 63 250 lbs. Barnett also has a solid wrestling background, with the added dimension of his sizable submission repertoire. As his career has progressed, Barnett has become a more patient and tactically sound fighter and his standup game has improved significantly. Perhaps Barnett's greatest weapon against Lesnar is his wide knowledge of 'shoot wrestling' submissions that are very effective and tough to learn how to defend.

4) ALISTAIR OVEREEM: Overeem is bigger than Lesnar"260 pounds and 65 tall. He went through a rough patch in his career during his tenure in PRIDE, but has compiled a 5-1-1 record in his last seven fights. Mirko Cro Cop suggests that hes the *only* fighter in the world who could beat Fedor Emelianenko at this point. Hes got great standup including a kickboxing background that could cause Lesnar problems, as well as solid ground fighting ability. Hes yet another heavyweight that is unlikely to bend to Dana Whites contractual demands, and currently has a relationship with DREAM in Japan and Strikeforce in the US. Still, hes a dangerous matchup for any fighter on the planet.

5) RANDY COUTURE: Lesnars win over Couture was far from decisive, and it didnt have anything to do with the age disparity. Couture got caught with a big shot and it cost him the fight. Until that point, he was more than holding his own. He was making his opponent work hard, had the edge in the striking exchanges and had opened up a cut over Lesnars right eye. Itll never be a favorable physical matchup on paper for Couture but at the same time Lesnar in no way proved his categorical superiority over The Natural

Lesnars next challenge is likely to be the winner of the Cain Velesquez/Shane Carwin match. Both are big, rugged competitors but are also beatable opponents for Lesnar. An intriguing matchup down the road could be against Croatian striking machine Mirko Cro Cop. Cro Cop has battled injuries over the past year or so but if he could come close to the form he demonstrated in winning the PRIDE Open Weight GP he could be another formidable challenge. At his best, Cro Cop is simply the most devastating striker in the sport. While the UFC is likely to set up 'favorable' matchups for Lesnar in the near term to allow them to take advantage of his PPV popularity, he'll have his hands full defending his UFC heavyweight title. - 23815

About the Author:

Ross Everett is a freelance sports writer and noted authority on sports betting odds comparison. He writing has appeared on a variety of sports sites including sportsbooks and betting odds portal sites. He lives in Southern Nevada with three Jack Russell Terriers and a kangaroo. He is currently working on an autobiography of former energy secretary Donald Hodell.

Learning Guitar Online

By Adrian Logan

There are wide ranges of manner for you to learn guitar no matter if you are eyeing on an acoustic or electrical guitar. Beginner guitar lesson online can be very enjoyable. For people who know a guitarist, they can consider themselves lucky because they can ask their friends to personally give them the guitar lesson needed. For the rest they have to get a guitar teacher to teach them.

Although the outcome is very good, hiring a professional to teach you how to strum the guitar can be a little costly. However if you do not have enough cash to spare then you can always learn by means of using online DVD guitar lessons. You will have the help of a professional plus the bonus point of learning at your own pace.

Learning guitar online has become popular because you can learn the insturment without paying a lot of money. With the help of online guitar lesson, you simply have to go to the site that offers the tutorial. Bit by bit you will get started with some of the basic lessons.

To be of help to different kinds of people, online lessons are obtainable in wide array of platforms like DVD lessons, eBooks, and a lot more. If you are wondering which of them is the best option then you might want to get those which provide videos and software so you can learn easier and in a more enjoyable manner.

Going for a beginner guitar lesson online where the instructor will teach about the step to step method to play can be the most efficient manner of learning as this can offer a fast result while being able to work at your own pace.

Because it is not easy to make these software and video just for you to learn how to play the guitar, most of them are available with one-time payment. Don't worry because after your first payment, the preceding lessons are free. In case you are already knowledgeable about the basics such as strumming then you are free to go on a more specialized training.

Some of the other beginner guitar lessons online would include playing acoustic guitar, lead guitar, and blues guitar. Because there won't be someone who is learning with you, the software will allow you to learn at your own speed. Indeed, even if you have to spend a little, you will realize that the price is worth it.

Don't give up along the way. In due time, you can surprise your friends on how efficient you are in playing the guitar even if they know that you haven't hired someone to teach you. Just gear yourself with enough patience and later on, you will realize how well you are performing. - 23815

About the Author:

Anybody wants to learn to play guitar and play like The Eagles, Green Day, Pink Floyd, Guns 'N Roses, Jimi Hendrix, Nirvana, Eric Clapton, The Beatles and more? You can now learn how to play the guitar using our Free lessons, step by step instructions, tutorials, jam tracks and famous songs!