I have used the headphone jack of my Sandisk m260 as an input to an amplifier. It's a little on the low side, but works. I love the solid state design. There is no hard drive to mess up. It's easy to use with windows. I just drag and drop my mp3 files onto the device in Windows Explorer. When you plug it into the USB port it shows up as another hard drive.
http://www.sandisk.com/Products/Item(1940)-SDMX4-4096-Sansa_e260_MP3_Player_4GB.aspx
It is a little cheaper than the ipod version. I bought mine at a Best Buy sale when Office Max had them on sale as well. It ended up being $149 with an additional $30 rebate for an after rebate price of $$130 or so after taxes.
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Rob Channell
One Way Motorsports
1979 911SC mostly stock
1972 911T Targa now with a good 2.7
1990 Miata (cheap 'n easy)
1993 C1500 Silverado (parts getter)