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iRiver iFP-190T 256 MB Digital Audio Player

iRiver iFP-190T 256 MB Digital Audio Player

List Price: $129.99
Your Price: $92.88
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Everything you've wanted
Review: Just got this for Christmas after ALOT of research. Best investment I've made in a long time. First of all-VERY easy to install and use, even for Windows 98 users. Second-as you've probably heard, the sound is phenomenal. I've heard alot of different portable devices but this thing is the clearest and crispest out there. Third-device is VERY small and light. The extras like the radio and voice recorder are also very easy to use and quite functional. Radio reception is very clear. Overall, absolute best purchase you can make within the $150-$200 price range. Also great for running and lifting-doesn't skip a beat and is so small you won't even notice it. This thing is about the most user friendly device out there and you will be hard-pressed to find a device with better sound. Awesome.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Best Money Can Buy
Review: This MP3 is great. You can recard all of your favorite songs off the radio.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Great player, but the 300-series is even better
Review: I bought the 128 megabyte version of this player (180T) and then discovered that the 300-series (in both 128 and 256 megabyte versions; 380T and 390T) includes MP3 encoding and inline recording. I prefer to buy from Amazon.com or Circuit City, but they don't yet have the 300-series yet so I returned mine to Circuit City and bought the 256 megabyte 390T somewhere else. I want to use this device for recording lectures, and it's much easier to have files in mp3 format right away rather than have to convert from the larger WAV format (as one could do with the 100-series). If neither this nor inline recording matters to you, then the 100-series may be fine for you. Other differences: slightly different shape, blue backlight in 300, battery compartment different and presumably fixing the problem others complain about (but which I didn't find). There is not a great difference in price however, so I would recommend the 300-series.

I was/am very pleased with the iRiver MP3 player, especially because it is so small and light and easy to carry around, and it seems less "precious" and vulnerable than the iPod, which it probably is because it uses flash memory instead of a hard drive. (Of course there is no comparison in terms of storage capacity. This is not a player for storing all your music, as the iPod can be.) Everything functioned well. I was disappointed with the default software, but if you are comfortable with Windows file management, you can go to the iRiver web site and download firmware that allows you to use regular Windows file management with this player.

Aside from music, I use this player along with one of the 'Tivo-for-radio' programs available online (e.g., Replay Radio or Cyberecorder). I can record radio programs I want (BBC, NPR, etc.) and easily transfer to the iRiver. (See also the web site PublicRadioFan.com for radio stations of music and information all over the world.)

If you are looking for something really easy to use, you may be put off by all the complicated features and the need to use small buttons and look at small print on the iRiver screen. But if you want lots of features and don't mind learning how to use them, this is a great player. I'm well into middle age, but I don't find the small print to be a big problem, especially since there is good backlighting. But I'm comfortable with complicated features and appreciate them. You can listen to FM radio, record from it, do voice recordings, set the speed of fast forward, adjust equalizer settings, etc. Gadget freaks will love it. Or you can just enjoy your favorite music.

Final surprise: I twice called iRiver support, and each time a PERSON answered immediately. I think that's the first time that's happened to me calling a company in this century! I'm told that isn't always the case however. But the support was good, quicker than Apple and much better than the disastrous support I found at Samsung.

In sum, I'm very happy with the iRiver flash memory mp3 player.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Great 1st unit for me!
Review: I just opendd this thing today, and I'm very impressed. I did a lot of looking on this web site, reading reviews on most of the 256 units. I decided it to buy it obviosuly, and while this is my fist unit (don't know tons about them yet), this seems to be a great value.

Within 30 minutes, I had taken the unti out and figured out the menus - threw in the driver CD to install the driver - threw in some cd's to record some songs into Windows Media - and then easily connected to the usb port - clicked on the desktop software - and easily transferred 15 songs to the unit that I am listening to now. It was easy.

This unit is tiny, pretty sleek, and is well worth $150 or so.

This first time buyer is thrilled, and considering it was my first time ripping any music, this was a painless process with this unit.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Grossly Overpriced & Horrendously Engineered
Review: While the iFP-190T is impressively compact, looks nice, and sounds reasonably decent, the controls and functionality were apparently designed by an incompetent madman with an evil sense of humor. The users manual is slightly more than worthless and the device itself is less intuitive than a box of cereal. Learning to navigate is a matter of painful trial & error. The Music Manager software that comes with the device is cumbersome and amazingly limited. Also, for reasons passing understanding, iRiver does not support MusicMatch downloads. In summary, the iFP-190T is an ill-conceived, poorly executed, absurdly expensive doorstop.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: AWESOME
Review: So much fun, I wish it had more memory but that was all I could afford. Maybe next year prices will go down a bit.
Very intuitive to use.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Simple, easy to use, small with a god sound
Review: Hey there, I live in Brazil and bought one from a friend that was in US. I read some reviews that told about beeing difficult to install, difficult to upgrade de firmware.

I had no difficult at all. I bought, put the install CD and installed the Iriver Manager. Then I plugged on my pc and I begun to d/load to the device.

Pros

- So far I had no problems with the USB cable.
- The FM turner sync good for the stations I listen.
- It handle 59 mp3 songs.
- Very easy to download songs, to learn "how to use it".
- Good sound.
- Good earphones, even for a gym

Cons

- With the equalizer "on" the battery ends quickly, that's why it would be nice rechargeable ones.
- The feature that he doesn't play protected wma, many songs recordered on that format don't play
- the neckstripe is not good for gyms. it would be better with arm bands.

Overall

Those cons. above does not affect the player, so if you want 256M buy it

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: BROKE DOWN AFTER 5 MONTHS
Review: GREAT SOUND, EASY TO USE, SMALL, I LOVED IT UNTIL THE ON/OFF SWITCH WOULD NOT WORK. NOT UNDER MFG WARRANTY BUT I HAVE BEST BUY WARRANTY. IT WAS NEVER MIS-USED OR DROPPED.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: the big difference between Hard drive/Flash memory.......
Review: Okay. Here is a write up, that I did, on the comparisons/contrasts on MP3 players. Mainly, the Harddrive versions (I.E. Rio Riot/Apple IPOD -both of which I own) and the flash memory type... (I.E. Memorex 3642 Mp3 Player, of which I own as well).
What prompted this little jaunt (of which you may send to as many people as you like) My (expensive) Apple IPOD died during a sync last month. Just me copying files over to it, and the battery ran out of juice. I would have not attempted to copy music had I known the battery was low, but the battery read FULL STRENGTH. Anyhoo, I called Apple, they said return it for maintenance.
I did. Sent it back.
They returned it, still broke.

To my suprise, there is only a TEN DAY return policy.

TEN DAYS.

I did not realize this at all... and will not ever buy another apple product.

So, after a month or so of messing around trying to find another MP3 player... I decided to go with a flash memory MP3 player, the ones that use memory sticks.

SO, here are the pro and cons of these devices.

Pro's for the Memory Stick Mp3 players

-Cheaper. WAY CHEAPER than Hard drive types.

-If you go into music match and file convert to MP3 Pro and shrink the size of your MP3 to like, say 3o percent... you can really make a good Kompression. Example. My Memorex MP3 player has 32mbs of memory on board. It is expandable to 256mb. 32 mb will basically let you put one cd's worth of music. It is easy to put music on and off of them, due to your computer reading the USB as just another hard drive, so you drag and drop to put on, delete them to take them off. But, after you shrink your files to MP3 Pro 30 percent, you can put twice as many. So, basically a 256mb chip will allow me to put 208 songs on my little less than palm size MP3 player. And it wieghs like 3 ounces.

- More on memory. These little chips are the size of the upper part of your thumb, at least my thumb anyway. They come in 128mb, 256mb, 512mb and even though there aren't any MP3 machines out there to handle them YET, you can even buy a 1.5gig thumb size chip thingy. Considering the size of the chips and the shrinking kompression I told you about earlier, I could shrink my whole KOLLEKTION down to 10 of those 1.5gig chips. At the current shrink rate I am at 5 DVD's, which are way bigger and more fragile than these little chips.

- Not as fragile as hard drive type. You can drop one of these chips and not scratch it. I wouldn't stomp on one with my foot, nor get one in water, but they are encased in plastic. Ruggedish.

- Batteries last for like two days. There isn't much going on here, no moving parts, no laser or hard drive to put power to. Most of these flash Memory types have a single AA battery. I use a rechargeable type, so we are talking very low cost here.
In comparison to the hard drive types, where you will get a solid 8 hours of playing, this really whupps up.

- Size. Small. Very small. Mine is three inches by three inches. A square. But, you can get smaller ones. And the memory chips that go in them are the same ones you use for your camera. And you can put files on them. If you want to put a word doc on your memory chip, you can. Your Mp3 won't recognize it, but it is nifty storage.

COMPARISON/CONTRAST

- Size does matter. In the case of hard drive Mp3 players... lets face it, you can, if you so chose to, put a library of congress on these monsters. They are the caddilacs of the hand held devices, and guzzle batteries like gasoline. But when it comes down to it, size is the only thing they have going for them. I don't mean to downplay the hard drive types, but don't drop them, don't shake them, and after shelling out $499 to Apple you might consider insurance. Apple doesn't care about you or your apple after 10 days of ownership.

- Price/Komparison. IPOD ran me $499 bucks. My memorex MP3 player ran me 45 dollars. The 128 memory chip runs you 50 bucks. Owch. There really isn't a comparison to the two. The memory stick Mp3 players just kick ? on this issue. And, you get MORE than a ten day return policy, since you buy these things at Target/Wal Mart etc...

So, that is my review in a nutshell

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: This is awful
Review: This player is awful...because many of my wma tracks are tagged with licensing the iriver is a nitemare.....buy the samsung much better player for the money and wont lock you out of teh much smaller files wma provides


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