Rating: 
Summary: Iriver problems, Overall great
Review: I have the iriver for about a week now and have the following bugs I need to have addresses:Unit:
Iriver 120 firmware 1.17
Music files: approx 4100.
Computer: dell laptop running win xp (all updates and service packs installed) Problems:
1. EXCESSIVE BOOT TIME: 120 taking about 3min 45 sec after turning on before I can play music. Takes excessive time to read DB/ files? I thought making the DB file allows dynamic sorting of MP3 via tags. This is not happening. Friends IPOD with about the same number of file only takes about 10-15sec at most to boot to playable position. 2. SORT BY GENRE: sort by genre function is not working correctly. Some file show correctly but many genre directories showing as numbers! 01,11,20, 30, 98 etc. Note: The other sort sections sort correctly i.e. artist, album, folder, title. This is frustrating, one reason I choose 120 was for the genre sort capability. Note: all genre tags on files show correctly in the following programs: window media player 9, winamp 5.0, MP3 tag editor, etc. 3. IRIVER 120 FILE LOCKUP: the 120 locked up hard during playback of MP3 file. Stopped at the 1:44min post. No button response. This is unsat and would be a BIG problem if no tool available to reset unit. File doesn't lock computer based MP3 player programs. Otherwise system works like a champ. Overall happy with unit. But the above problems need to be addressed and corrected. I have tried resetting and reinstalling firmware twice with same results.
Questions: manual not clear on TAG INFORMATION pg 42 of manual. What does this purpose of this function. Please if anyone has the answers to these problems let me know!
Overall I still like the unit! Lawrence
ltdorn@hotmail.com
Rating: 
Summary: Not for Macs!
Review: I'm using an iRiver iHP-120 with OS 10.3 on a Powerbook G4. I've had it for about 24 hours, and its interaction with the OS is an absolute disgrace. Connecting to the Player The computer recognizes the player about 1 in 10 times that I plug it in. To copy files to it, I have to spend 20 minutes randomly plugging and unplugging the cable and turning the unit on and off. It came with version 1.17 of the firmware, and I upgraded it to the latest beta, 1.20, to no avail. When the computer does recognize the player, it shows up as a hard drive and you can simply drag files to it. It doesn't interact with iTunes, but you can drag your iTunes folder to it. Filenames The player doesn't like the characters in many of my filenames, so the OS throws up error messages in the middle of copying files to the player and then stops its copy. Nowhere in any documentation does it mention which characters are taboo. So far I've found that it objects to question marks and quotation marks. There is no rhyme or reason to which files are copied before an error message comes up, so I had to download a file synchronization program to finish up the job. My strategy with filenames that it objects to has been to remove the file from iTunes, rename it, then drag it back into iTunes. ID3 Tag Database The player can filter songs using the fields in ID3 tags. In order to do this, it builds a database of ID3 tag information. You can only do this from a Windows computer. Files with long names or in folders with long names (more than about 48 characters) cannot be indexed. All the files can be found using the Windows Explorer-like directory structure if you wish to locate a particular one, but I prefer to simply play everything randomly. Battery Life Ostensibly, the battery will last for 16 hours of play. I have not gotten to test this due to OS X's refusal to copy random files with names it didn't like. I did charge the battery fully and then take the player to work without the charger to finish copying files to it. I figured that given the long battery life, it would last long enough to copy the remainder of my files (about 4 hours) even though the battery would drain faster because the hard drive would be working constantly. Not so much; it died after 3 hours. Sound I've played it in the car once; my stereo has a line-in, so I used the included cable to hook it up. It sounded very nice, and my car is not known for having great speakers. Buttons Control is mainly through a joybutton (think joystick but shaped like a button). Pressing it or pushing it up/down/left/right accomplishes most operations. It's finicky about how it's touched. I have small fingers, and it sometimes misinterprets the direction I pushed it in. I'm adjusting and getting more accurate. The Bottom Line Once I have my library all copied over and I only need to hook it up from time to time to add new songs, it would be feasible to copy files to a Windows machine for transferring (for me, as I happen to have a few laying around on my network). I chose the iRiver over the iPod because of Apple's evil battery replacement scheme, but I cannot recommend that anyone else do this. Don't plan on returning it if it you don't like it -- you have to destroy the packaging to extract it.
Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic!
Review: The 20GB iriver is perfect. I would not change a thing. This is my second iriver, but my first hard drive type player. I had their 128MB flash player (which was so great that I decided to upgrade). Battery life on the ihp-120 is about 14-15 hours if you're changing folders, turning on the backlight, turning it off and on..etc. I really like the large screen and the ease of scanning through your music selection. The sound is the best part of the iriver. The other brands do not have the same high quality sound...they seem more focused on providing silly features and more memory, but they forget what the purpose of the mp3 player is...to play music. Iriver gives you all the accessories instead of the ipod where you have to buy the remote and all the different headphone attachments. Not a bit of buyers regret!
Rating:
Summary: the IHP-140 GB is out !!!
Review: Well the IHP-120 GB is great, but how many of you know the IHP-140 in 40 GB is out? I have included a link to the European iRiver site where it has previewed. Actually, the 40 GB existed prior to the Christmas season but iRiver did not want to release it here in the states for legitimate fears it would cut into the 20 GB sales. Aside from the larger drive there dosent appear to be any other changes. United States price or availability is unknown at this time but should be forthcoming! Here is the site: http://www.irivernordic.com/products.php?pid=24
Rating:
Summary: Best jukeBox in the market.
Review: I spent days researching about hard disk based MP3 players and I finally decided to go with iriver 120. And it was the best decision of my life.. i am loving the product. battery life is awesome (I got 11 hours in one charge). FM player is very nice too. Sound quality is excellent. You can do everything from Remote, that comes very handy..
Don't be a victim of iPod marketing.. this product is far better in all aspects.. If you are looking for a MP3 player.. Just buy this one you won't regrt it.
Rating:
Summary: So much better than IPOD!
Review: I bought the first generation IPOD and have used it for 1.5 years. I can't stand the battery life on it. I would use the IPOD for 1 hr and then not use it for a day or so. Then, when I tried to use it again, the battery was already dead. Not good! I recently purchased the iHP-120 and I love it! It has so much more features than the IPOD and the battery life is excellent!!!
Don't waste money on the IPOD. The iHP-120 sounds so much better and once you get used to the interface, you will love this device. The earbuds are so much more comfortable also. I am so glad I got this device. The only negative thing I have found is there is no on the fly playlist capability, but you can create them from the PC. I still have this problem w/ my IPOD, even though I know the new ones have this feature. Still, I would recommend the iHP-120 over the IPOD because of all the other features and best of all, the excellent battery life. Buy one today, and you will love it!
Rating:
Summary: You definitely get what you pay for!The IPod-Killer is here!
Review: I've been using this player and it's great! Although there are many choices out there iriver did a great job the second time around (iHP 100 was the first cut). Some of the features I like are
**Remote - a must have since it's really inconvenient having to take out the main unit in order to change settings like the volume or songs
**No drivers or software - needed to copy over songs - it can be a big headache when you have to install software just to move files over when all you want to do is a copy. One of the reasons why I didn't go w/ Creative is due to their bloatware. Since it looks like an external (toshiba) hard drive when you plug it in it's can be used for external storage. There's 20GB and I wasn't able to fill it up with songs that *I like*. I've used up only 5GB so far. The extra space is great for use as a portable hard drive. If your computer supports USB-HDD you can boot from it too.
**Upgradeable Firmware OS - The nice thing about this is that no MP3 player is perfect the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd time around. having this upgradeable firmware allows them to add/fix features. I've already submitted a few nice to haves to iriver (although I haven't received any response) such as on the fly playlists, deleting from the player directly, statistics like running time, clock feature, smaller fonts, etc. I hope they'll be able to put this into the next firmware upgrade. They're currently on version 1.17
**Many formats - This can play almost every format (mp3,wma,asf,wav) available and even ogg!
**Many extras - It comes with a nice leather carrying case to protect the iHP that has the holes for the buttons (although you won't use them often since everything is accessible from the remote), a very decent set of earphones, usb 2.0 cable, line-in cable, external microphone and a 2 inch headphone extension cord since the plug on the remote is recessed in a bit. It's nice that you plug your headphones into the remote as opposed to the main unit because this accomodates short headphone cords like my sony fontopia earbuds
**Solid design & construction - When you first put this in your hand you know they didn't skimp on the materials. Everything feels solid (not that cheap and light plastic is a bad thing) and made from metal. Even the glass on the remote is extra thick so you don't have to worry about pressing too hard on the lcd and breaking it.
**Optical out and In - I used to store MP3s on my hard drive but now I store it on the iHP. When I put it on my desk to charge I plug this into the Klipsch 5.1 system via the optical outputs and the sound is crisp and there's no distortion because it's digital. The optical outs also doubles as analog in/outputs. The leather case covers up these openings to keep them clean.
**Many configuration options - (and many more to come) that can be accessed from the main unit and from the remote! You can configure the equalizer to use SRS,WOW, TruBass and even can't the presets. Even the scroll speed is configurable.
**Sounds good - The sound is also very loud and crisp w/ more than enough bass. It even has a feature that will fade in the song so that you don't get a sudden loud start in the song. I've placed a request to them so hopefully in the next version they might have some sort of normalization between all songs.
**FM/AM Tuner - The tuner on this unit gets great reception. Because I live in NYC I have a lot of stations. I have enough presets from all of the stations I want. You can also configure different backlight options when it's connected to an adapter and when it's connected by battery, sleep time, fade-in,
**Many repeat options - Repeat or random shuffle by 1 song, 1 directory, all directories
**Crisp LCD display on main unit and remote - The fonts and display are very sharp.
**Good battery life - I get over 10+ hours so far on a single charge. I haven't listened to them any longer that so it might of gone longer. After 10+ hours I still got 1 out of 4 bars left.
**Search by genre, artists, album, song title - This feature is really nice when you have songs scattered throughout different folders. I can say I want to hear all songs from even if they're in different directories. This features requires you to build a ScanDB from the computer but it's easy. You'll just need to right click from the computer the iHP drive that shows up and select generate DB. This is the only feature that requires a driver installation. Note: your songs need an ID3 tag for this to work
**Song queuing - you can queue a song while another one is playing. This is a minor feature but extremely useful.
**USB 2.0 - This is really important when you're transferring over hundreds of songs. Using USB 1.1 (12Mbps) it would take over several minutes to transfer ten 5 MB songs while it takes USB 2.0 (480Mbps) 10-20 seconds.
**Displays non-english ID3 tags - This can display chinese ID3 tags.
**Playlist support - It can use up to 200+ playlists (.m3u) so you can create a playlist of your favorite songs from winamp and use it on the iHP. Some cons although minor
** Can't play music while plugged into the USB port. This might not be too bad since you can play it off w/ winamp when it's plugged in.
** Using the search by genre/artist slows the boot up time by 5 -10 seconds. If you don't need this feature you can turn it off.
**No docking station - not a big deal since remote can stand upright by itself on the table.
** 20 GB drive - I'm sure there's a way to replace the drive with a bigger one but this size is more than sufficient
** More expensive than most other 20GB players.
You can see all the time and effort they've put into this mp3 player. Although some of the features are minor it is the time they've put into details that make this a great player. If you want the "BMW of mp3 players" you gotta pay "BMW prices". Overall, the feature set and quality (sound and hardware-wise)are perfect. Most of the minor issues and features can be fixed with future firmware upgrades. You can't go wrong w/ this! :)
Rating:
Summary: If you're thinking about it, just stop thinking and buy it.
Review: I researched my new HD player purchase for weeks before deciding on the iHP-120. I was originally inclined to get the proven iPod or the Dell DJ, but both fell short of my wishes (the Pod only has 8hr bat life and the DJ lacks several capabilities.) I eventually decided on the 120 for several reasons: OGG playback, external mic recording, LCD remote, optical capabilities, battery, and the reported sound quality. I've had it for almost five days and it failed to disappoint me on most of these counts. It plays OGGs perfectly, the remote rocks, optical recording should be great, the battery gets almost 13 hours when I boot and shutdown multiple times, and the sound quality is stellar. The only complaint I have is that the microphone recording is...really low volume, but I don't think I have the gain right.*begin edit*Figured this one out. Changing Recording Source from Line In to Ext Mic worked wonders*end edit*
I ripped my CDs using EAC to OGG -q 6 and then copied to the player. 7GB transferred in under 10 minutes...lightning fast! Playlist support is great, although you can't create your own on-the-fly (next firmware upgrade should add support for this, iRiver). The only other thing I wish it had were support for FM-to-HD recording, but again a firmware upgrade would do the trick, it's not a hardware problem.
Thank you, iRiver!
Rating: 
Summary: Sweet - and getting better all the time
Review: I bought this less than a month ago, and almost immediately noticed some problems. First, it didn't let me shuffle through playlists or artists - only through lowest level directories and all my music... not so hot. Secondly, certain ogg files just crashed it so that I had to use a pin/mechanical pencil in the hard reset hole.
However, aside from that, I was very happy - it was cheaper than an iPod, worked on Windows, and Linux (with some homebrew software) with full support, and should work as a hard-drive just fine on a Mac, but without the music database management. The ability to have a 20GB hard drive that I can plug in to any computer (more recent than Windows98) and have work is great as well. My concerns, however, were largely addressed when iRiver, who seem to really take the philosophy of giving the customer what they want to heart, recently released (currently beta - soon to be production) firmware that fixes both these problems. Not only that, but they added some other great features. For Mac OS X users who want to use this and are adventurous, they might try compiling the Linux software (I've never tried it) on a Mac, or if they have access to a Windows/Lin machine, they can transfer files to the player from a Mac and then build the database on another machine, or simply live without the database - if your directory structure and filenames is well-organized, this is easy enough. Without further ado, my favorite features/bugs with this very sleek product:
- a portable 20GB USB hard drive is a really nice thing to have - only wish it were easier to find a shorter USB-to-mini-USB cable so that I could carry the computer connector with me more easily.
- comes with everything you need and then some - a carrying case, which adds size, but can be kept on a belt and protects the player while still leaving it fully usable, power adapter, USB cable, a remote (which as far as I know is not standard with an iPod, and is very nice to have) and a pair of Sennheiser earbuds that sound amazingly good for earbuds.
- the stereo line-in and internal mic are great - I've recorded concerts (with the bands' permission, of course) and lectures discretely, and I can save them easily.
- the new firmware gives no problem with playback
- no dynamic playlisting as such, but allows Winamp *.m3u playlists (which can be generated from many different programs) and when using the music database, you can select all songs from a given artist/album/genre. With the new firmware, shuffling through these lists is possible, too.
- scrolling using the joystick is *too slow* for large numbers of artists/albums/titles - this is probably my biggest peeve with the device - it scrolls through about 8 items every second, so in order to get to the middle of a list thousands, you might be scrolling for a minute or more.
- aesthetically great looking, though the display can be too small for some people to read
- built in radio is definitely nice
- when the use of the database is enabled, the player takes considerably longer to boot up, but that might be impossible to change easily.
- the ability to play ogg files is great - especially since it allows you to get more bang for your buck by compressing your CD collection to the smaller, higher-quality format
- no docking station, unfortunately, and inability to function as a player while functioning as a hard drive, unfortunately
- interesting features that I haven't explored much are the ability to read text files on the player's display, the ability to tag your mp3s with lyrics so that the player displays lyrics as the song plays, in sync with the music, and a language study mode. Luckily, the most of the few problems I have found are probably possible to fix via firmware, and since iRiver's reputation for getting firmware upgrades to consumers is pretty good, I have high hopes.
Rating:
Summary: No way to create playlists on the fly...
Review: I am looking into buying a jukebox. I did a lot of research, and iRiver iHP 120 and Rio Karma came out on the top. The iRiver has everything (see other reviews), EXCEPT the ability to create your own playlists on the player while simultaneously listening to music. Grrr... how could they miss out on such a handy feature on such an expesive product. I hope they post a firmware upgrade with it soon, otherwise I'll have to buy the ugly looking Karma. Just wanted to let you all know.
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