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Just like Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien, water and your iPod just don't get along. Too much wetness and your iPod will meet an untimely death and will send you scrambling to find a replacement.

Finis, a California-based company co-founded by Olympic Gold Medal Swimmer Pablo Morales, has took the rocky relationship of water and MP3 players and made it a happy marriage.

The real measure of the XtreaMP3 is its performance underwater with your favorite songs pulsating through it. The sound quality was much better than expected. There is a slight loss in quality though some is expected since you are underwater. The neoprene armband does fit comfortably. You have to work with the placement of the armband, so it doesn't rub against the side of your torso during your swim strokes. You can easily and quickly go to the next and previous tracks and change volume with hardly breaking out of your freestyle stroke.

The XtreaMP3 provides a better alternative to buying a waterproof housing for your iPod. Water can still seep through these specially-designed enclosures and cause all sorts of havoc to your iPod. The drawback with the XtreaMP3 is that it only has 1GB of memory and there is no display. Though, the lack of display keeps it smaller and more streamlined. Syncing is easiest done with iTunes. Music can also be loaded on to the XtreaMP3 through an archaic drag and drop process in Windows Explorer.

The Finis XtreaMP3 is a recommended alternative for listening to your tunes while swimming laps in the pool or snorkeling through a secluded reef. Finis lists the XtreaMP3 for $149.95.