Rating: 
Summary: The Karma's Achilles heel
Review: I agree with the glowing comments in the many positive reviews. Tons of features, good price, intuitive, great sound. I'm surprised that nobody else has mentioned the Achilles heel of this otherwise excellent player: The internal battery cannot be replaced. Rechargeable batteries live approximately 2 years, depending on useage. When the battery in your Karma dies, you'd better pray that Rio will replace it for you at the factory. If they do, then you'll have to ship your unit, and pay a hefty fee for the parts and labor, and you'll be without your Karma for 3-4 weeks. If, however, Rio is not able to replace the battery, then you'll only be able to use your Karma if you supply power with the AC adapter. The Creative Zen had this problem when it first came out. Within 6 months, Creative released a newer Zen with a user replaceable battery. It would be a shame if you spent your hard-earned $$$ on the Karma, and then a few months from now, Rio introduces Karma 2.0 with user replaceable battery.
Rating: 
Summary: Karma and iPod fight to the death. . .
Review: I'm going to put this very simply. Why did I buy the Karma instead of the iPod? Perhaps. . . Apple iPod: 10GB, 8 hours of battery life.
Rio Karma: 20GB, 16 hours of battery life. By the way, when I bought it the 20GB Karma cost less than the 10GB iPod.
Rating:
Summary: King Karma A Player that PLAYS your music!
Review: I had a limited amount of money to spend. I thought long and hard about the decision to buy the best mp3 player. Read reviews and went to different forums to educate myself. Found a ton of info.
Commercials about the Ipod were everywhere. Where do I start?
Well, first is the battery life. Excellent! Who wants to use their player, forget to charge it overnight and get beat of music the next day? Karma has 14 hours!
Size: Smaller than an Ipod, but thicker in size, it fits snuggly in the palm of a relaxed hand. Awesome! One hand can be used easily for searching music, tweaking equalizer, etc. Playing music: This is where the Karma shines and leaves other players in its shadow. The main reason why I bought it!
It cross fades from one song to the next smoothly like a radio station. I actually downloaded sample radio Identifications to put between the music to make it sound like my own personal radio station! Outrageous!
The software in this allows you to literally have your own personal DJ in your pocket. No other unit comes close to this! List of options is mind shattering.
Play All, Play based on Genres, Decades music came out, play top ten, top 100, play top music played 1 day, 1week, 1 month ago.. etc!
Also you have easy and immediate access to music and settings. Menu works like a slide show. It allows you to get to the main menu with just a few clicks at any time! Make playlists while listening to your music. RCA Jacks on cradle to connect to your home stereo and computer at the same time. Fast download transfers thru Ethernet or USB. The cradle pulses to your music as you play it!
The amount of info it lets you see about the song being played is incredible! It even tells you how many times you've played it and when you installed it.
The final decision to buy this awesome unit can be summed up in one sentence.
What do you REALLY want the player for? There are other units out there that are thinner, can record like a DAT player, have a FM radio, and be recognized as an external hard drive. Some players are all in one like the Iriver 120. But if you want a player that has phenomenal sound and that can give you Radio Station/ DJ like mixes at your fingertips for YOU to command, then it's a no brainer. Who needs games and a day planner mixed in? I have my pocket pc that can do that so much better. I don't let slick commercials and status quo effect me. To me that's sheep mentality. If someone jumps off the Brooklyn Bridge would you? Come on...The reality is it plays your music the way it should be played... with CLASS.
Rating: 
Summary: Works on a MAC!!
Review: So I bought this baby for a friend who has a PC, I have a MAC. I plugged the Karma into my network (through the ethernet jack at the back of the stand that comes with the Karma). The Karma has it's own webpage and from the webpage you can download and run a JAVA progam which will let you upload and download music to/from the Karma from ANY computer. I mean ANY, that's what the Java programming language is designed for!!! So I have a MAC and this baby works
Rating:
Summary: Expectations met
Review: If you are like me, this product is for you. I consider myself technologically above average and a serious music fan. I've had MusicMatch since version 3 (still have the original CD-Rom). The 20(give or take)GB capacity means I have to think hard about the need for a seventh Beatles album vs. the need for a third Jonathan Richman album. I've gotten to the point that the car went from crawling with CDs to crawling with MP3 format CDs because I can't get comfortable with the thought of having only about 200 albums at my fingertips. (That's not a sign of insanity it is?) If the words "download new firmware" scare you, wait six months. If the cost seems a little high, wait a year. If you are the type to worry about Ogg and rocker switch vs. joystick, get your review from someone else. If you have a lot of MP3s, care about decent sound, want better music portability, and are seriously considering this product, jump right in - the Rio's fine. With the caveat that I'm still playing with it and have yet to really battle test it, there is nothing here that fails to meet expectations. The only feature that really set this player apart form the pack were the cross fade which segues consecutive songs (very smooth) and the further developed playlist capability. But I didn't buy it to be blown away by bells and whistles. I bought it to make listening to the music I love easier. I hoped to find solid hard/firm/software, good sound and smooth navigation. Mission accomplished at what I consider a very reasonable price. PS: I checked out the I-Pod and have to say, I'm glad I went a different way. I couldn't get over the thought that I would be paying significantly for the name and white facade. I'm sure it's a great product and supporters will likely find enough differentiation between that and the Rio that make the money worth it (It's thinner! It works with i-tunes!) but starting fresh, I didn't feel the need to buy into a platform when this product seems just as good and, from my view, better.
Rating:
Summary: good
Review: well, the Karma is an excellent player. that much is certain. the headphones that come with it are not very comfofrtable, though. But it works brilliantly with my Sennheiser PX 100's. Note, however, that unless mine is defective, the true capacity of the player is only 18.5 GB. I don't think it's just me, because a google search for "rio karma 18.5" shows some other people out there who think that.
Rating:
Summary: Bought it instead of iPod and Zen
Review: I spent a LOT of time playing with both the iPod and the Zen Xtra products before buying this one. Pros vs. Zen: The Zen was just too big to comfortably operate with one hand. That, plus the physical button layout was way too clunky and the scroll wheel was bogus. The Rio Karma is a pleasure to hold and to operate. The scroll wheel is very intuitive, and very well built. Pros vs. iPod: The build quality is every bit as good as an iPod. High quality materials, and the dock is very high quality. I found the features on the iPod unit itself to be limited. One example: Scrolling through large lists of songs, you have to do just that: scroll through each and every item! On the Karma, you scroll through the alphabet first and choose a letter, thereby reducing the number of items on the list. Doing this with the Karma scroll wheel is VERY fast. Also, with the iPod I know of no way to get track details (e.g. encoding rate, year song was recorded, extra comments, etc) on the device itself. Karma has lots of nice features along those lines. (Create as many playlists as you like; set it so that you can preview 10 seconds of songs; create bookmarks to your heart's content.) Another thing was that even at 80% or so volume, the iPod simply wasn't very loud. A problem on planes. The Rio Karma is incredibly rich-sounding, loud and clear, even at just lower volume levels.
Rating:
Summary: Great features, excellent sound and price.
Review: I've owned TWO iPod's so unlike those who have never owned anything else and claim iPod's to be the greatest thing out there, think again! Both iPod's, as pretty as they are, have been nothing but trouble. The first one had battery issues, and problems with the headphone plug. Eventually, it would not even work anymore. The 2nd, only 4 months old, had problems with the buttons... you could press them continuously and nothing would happen, the battery again was screwed up... it would just be charged and the meter would show full, then 1 bar, then two, then NONE. Finally, the other day, it started making noises and as I expected, the drive went bad. So, I'm off on vacation in a couple weeks and cannot wait for Apple to repair it. At the time, it WAS the best around. That is just not the case anymore for the overpriced, over-praised iPod. So far, the Rio has been terrific. Sound tends to be a personal thing so it's hard to say that this one sounds better than that one, etc. But the iPod limits you to their pre-programmed sound settings, 95% of which are ....junk. The Rio let's you choose... pre-programmed settings, regular Bass and Treble, or, a 5-band EQ. The results are really great and you can get the sound just the way you like it. It's not shy on Bass like the iPod is, and has the adequate power to really sound awesome. Features seem to be endless! OGG and FLAC support, 20GB, battery works great and lasts...see Apple, it CAN be done! Ethernet is really cool... just connect to your network, it grabs an IP address, you can use your browser to connect! It has a line out jack, USB 2.0, great screen with some neat display visualizations and numerous configurable settings. Numerous ways to play your music back, cross-fade between tunes is nice. Every cable is provided... Ethernet, USB, power, line out, etc. The cradle is quite cool... deep blue LED's glow when the unit is connected to the PC. Ok, a few quirks... 90-day warranty is inadequate. There is no provided case, or in-line remote. The device is so compact that it fits in just about anything. I found a little neoprene belt-clip case at Comp-USA that's perfect, but the controls are hidden away. The in-line remote would have been great given there is no custom case for it....yet. Downloading to the player worked but did hick-up a few times with an error. iTunes is still the better PC program. The unit is very solid in build, but the controls are a bit on the flimsy side. You need to be careful...but, unlike the iPods, at least the controls have worked perfectly every time. Also, for those that complain of all kinds of re-boot and crash issues, etc., UPDATE your firmware! The support site is excellent with numerous updates and fixes. Updating is really easy. Beyond that, the player has been great. If anything will give iPod a run, this may be it. I've wasted considerable money on two iPod's and there will NOT be a third! The price I paid was $20 less than the 10GB iPod.
Rating: 
Summary: UNRELIABLE PRODUCT! HARD DRIVE CRASHED.
Review: I got this RIO KARMA 15 days back, and it crashed today. This is a totally unreliable product, plagued by random reboots, automatic pauses, and other little bugs. When I tried to shut it down, it took forever to shutdown. I reset using the pin, then it just showed flash screen!! TOTALLY UNRELIABLE!! DONT TRUST RIO. GO FOR IPOD, INSTEAD.
Rating:
Summary: Has gapless playback, bookmarks; IMHO, it beats iPod, iHP120
Review: I originally purchased a 20GB iPod, but changed my mind and bought a Karma instead. The 3rd generation iPod has a lot going for it, but it suffers from two critical design flaws: (1) Poor battery life: 3-4 hours when listening to music at higher bitrates (192+kbps) because the hard drive needs to spin up more often
(2) Bass distortion when using equalizer It's too bad, because otherwise the iPod is an excellent MP3 player. I also considered the iRiver iHP120, which has some impressive features (FM-receiver, fully-functional remote, voice recorder, line-in/out, and driver-less USB connectivity). Unfortunately, its interface is clunky (the lack of a scroll wheel makes navigating large music collections painful), it has limited shuffling/playback options, it's not ergonomic, and its startup time is slow when using the database functionality. Then I read up on the Karma. It's small, has gapless playback, bookmarks, Ogg and FLAC support, scroll wheel, excellent menu system, several shuffle/playback options, ethernet connectivity (through the cradle) in addition to USB2, line-out (also through the cradle), starts-up quickly, is comfortable to hold, and is significantly cheaper than the others. Also, replaygain support is planned. The Karma was buggy when initially released, but the problems were cleared up with a firmware revision... now it's quite solid. Also, the developers have been very responsive to user requests. Initially, I was a little concerned about buying a product from RIO, but they've overhauled their company and now seem to be committed to customer support and satisfaction. Of course, it's not perfect: the included case is just a bag with a drawstring, there is no remote, the warranty is 90-days (but you can purchase 3rd party warranties for $15), you can't charge via USB, and the screen scratches easily (I picked a pack of 16 screen protectors for $6). I would've liked a lanyard-wrist-strap too. Still, I'd say it's the best hi-capacity-MP3-player available and I'm surprised how little press its received.
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