Rating: 
Summary: Buyer Beware
Review: Be careful buying any RIO product. Their customer service is terrible to nonexistant!! Foretold is forewarned.
Rating: 
Summary: King of the Road
Review: I travel so taking my tunes on the road is the priority #1. The Karma is great at this. Built in Ethernet, ability to sync tunes with more then one PC, and USB2.0 make the Karma way more useful then my ipod was for traveling.Problem:
I sync 7Gig of music to my ipod from my PC at home and get on a plane for the week. About Tuesday I buy a new CD. In order to sync my ipod to my laptop (to get new CD loaded) I have to wipe out any tunes on the ipod that are not on my laptop. Don't even get me started about not being able to share tunes already on the ipod down to the laptop because the ipod converts my MP3's to some other format.... Solution:
The Rio Karma. This little guy is so friendly. He'll take tunes from any old place and talks USB and Ethernet. Plus the interface is very mature. I believe the development team behind this Karma are responsible for the RioCar (Empeg Mark II) Car players - that was a device that was years ahead of it's time also. I think the old style ipods look better then the Karma but with the new ones it's a draw. I reccomend the Karma to anyone looking to buy an HD MP3 player.
Rating: 
Summary: Not ready for prime time
Review: The Karma looks great: small size, slick controls, gorgeous docking station. Lots of features. Unfortunately, it doesn't live up to its expectations. The ethernet connectivity feature doesn't work properly. After spending many hours trying with the help of tech support, the best they could come up with is a defective docking station. Maybe. I'm not going to try again. I suspect the problems go much deeper. The Music Manager software doesn't work well either. The manual and the help files are a joke. If you use the USB connection, maybe you'll do okay. The other reviews I've read seem to say "NO".
Rating:
Summary: Nice Design but poor quality.
Review: THIS PLAYER DOES NOT STAND UP TO VERY MUCH ACTIVITY. BEWARE!!! At first I loved the player. Great menus. Good design. Perfect way to have access to your music collection at work, home and play. I started using it for walking, but after a couple uses, it started to stall from the slight bounce of the walk. At first it would last a half hour before stalling, but soon it would not even last 5 minutes. You could hear the internal hard drive trying over and over to recover. When it stalled, all the controls would complete freeze. The only solution was to let it run itself dead. After the battery was dead, charging it seemed to "reboot" it. I deleted all the songs and reinstalled them. I have the latest firmware installed onto it. Nothing improves it. I have resorted to using it on my desk only. It will not even stay on track from the movement inside the car. Rio's response to a request to service this is that it was not designed for activity and would need to be serviced outside of the warranty for $200. Not only is the warranty only 90 days, but it they won't stand behind such problems anyway. My friends with the iRiver players all use theirs for running and have had no problems. This one will not even last walking.
Rating:
Summary: Bum Karma
Review: I was really excited about the Rio Karma 20GB MP3 player until the HD failed after less than 24 hours' use. The recovery screen only says, "Bad Karma," and "Call Customer Support;" however, I'm not sure I want to go through the process of upgrading/installing firmware (if even possible - nothing seems to work). Even with the features, great sound, and intuitive operations, I'm not sure I can rebuild trust in this HD to store my music after such a rocky start.
Rating:
Summary: Has a 3 months life
Review: The warranty is only 3 months and thats because the life of this product is only expected to be 3 months
I always though before that those complaining lied but now after 3 months my Rio Karma player is dead.
If you want to buy it then you must get an extended warranty.
Rating:
Summary: **AVOID THIS PLAYER** FAILED AFTER 1 MONTH !
Review: ***PLEASE SEE USER REVIEWS ON OTHER WEBSITES AND CHECK OUT RIO AUDIO FORUMS ABOUT HDD INTEGRITY ISSUES, FAULTY ITEM***
After researching tech reviews and magazine articles I decided to choose the Karma over the iPod for two reasons, 1) bigger HDD for less money and 2) Support for more formats. I am a student so the money issue was probably the biggest draw.
I purchased my Karma with alot of anticipation. Right after I bought it I happened across "USER reviews" on CNET.com which bashed the player. Several of those reviews mentioned an issue with HDD integrity while others lambasted the customer service and tech support. Undaunted I surfed my way over to the official website to scour their FAQ list. What I found were their User Forums. So I started reasearching. Sure enough, there were more than several mentions about the HDD that would, for seemingly no reason, lock-up or just fail completly, all of which started out the same, a skip here and there, and then FAILURE. I dismissed this thinking to myself that these people were probably just unreasonably hard on their players and treated them too rough. I appreciate my stuff so I, of course, would not do that.
I recieved my player not to long after I ordered it and was extremely happy. It is well designed, easy to use, and sounded great. Then on July 8th, EXACTLY 1 month to the day I bought the player the HDD failed. BAD KARMA the screen read. Based on what I had read on the User Forums what I needed to do was contact tech support and request an RMA. The thread also mentioned that needed to specify that I would want a new player or they would only send me a REFURBISHED one. When on the phone with the support tech. I mentioned this and he told me that was impossible, and that I would only recieve a refurb. unit. I corrected him by stating that I was still covered under the 90 day manufacturers warranty so I could still request a brand new player. He then informed me that there is a provision in the warranty that states if I purchase the player from an outside vendor, not RIO AUDIO, that the unit would need to fail within 30 days, at which point, I should contact the vendor I purchased the player from and request a new one. In the event that they do not replace it, only then would RIO AUDIO provide me with a new player at the "DISCRETION OF THE COMPANY". Barring this, my 90 day warranty only entitles me to a REFURB. unit. I was so ticked off I actually pulled out the warrenty card that came w/ the player to find this "PROVISION", it was NOWHERE to be found. I would not except this and took it up to a 2nd Teir supervisor, Sydney, who curtly told me that under NO circumstances would they issue me a new unit.
After an hour of calming down I decided to cut my losses and just go for a REFURB. Again, I turned to the User Forums for guidance, at which point I started to find many threads about how bad their RMA follow up is.
So now I'm just going to buy an iPod, hope to recieve my refurb. in less than 2 months, and sell it on eBay when I do and eat the loss.
SO PLEASE, **AVIOD** THE RIO KARMA AT ALL COSTS. SAVE YOURSELF MONEY, TIME, AND A WHOLE LOT OF AGGRAVATION!!
Rating: 
Summary: A Different Experience
Review: Ok, I read a bunch of reviews before buying this fine piece of equipment. Many were negative, but having bought a quality product from Rio in the past, I was optimistic. So far, my experience with the Rio Karma has been exquisite. My review is as follows. Pros: User interface. The menus are extremely easy to navigate. I enjouy the Rio stick, but find the selection wheel kind of pointless, but I do often find my fingers straying to it. The menus are very extensive and there are many different configurations for all the settings. Ease of transfer. It came with the ability to use an Ethernet port to transfer, but I only have USB, 1.1 at that. File transfer would be faster had I better connection, but I can deal with a mediocre file transfer rate. Sound quality is wonderful for a player of this kind. My friend has an iRiver that was more expensive, but I perfer the sounds of my Karma. The ability to create on the fly playlists I also enjoy. The Rio Dj, which allows you to creates playlists with different parrameters, is very innovative. Comes with transfer dock which can connect to any system with the red and white audio jacks. Very cool to hear my Karma through my stereo. Very nice. It boasts a 15 hr battery life, but I have yet to test it. The size is short and squat, which I like. It fits comfortably in the palm of my hand. Software. Music Transfer program is bug free so far and has a very simple user interface. Warranty, I didnt get the Rio warranty, but bought the player at Circuit City who has a one year warranty for replacement, which does work. Take in your broken player, and they give you a new one (or store credit). The hard drive has performed well so far, but I have heard some horror stories about dying drives. Cons: The one thing that bothers me is the fact that Rio skimped on a case and packed a carrying "pouch" with the Karma. Think of those little bags that you used to fill with colorful rocks at crappy tourist attractions. The pouch is like that. The lack of a case bothered me, but not enough to choose another player. On albums where tracks run itno another, flow, there is sometimes a slight, extremely slight, pause befor the next track. I can deal with it, but it can get annoying. The headphones that come packaged witht the player wer ok, but I perfer my own Sony earbuds. It lacks features that other players have, such as the ability to record sound (which I probably never use, but it would be nice). No remote, but I can manage. Overall: Overall, the Karma is a solid player and a good value. I got mine for under $300, which was a very good deal. I perfer it to the iPod, which I feel is overhyped. There is no case, so I have to be careful with it, but I am not very reckless with my electronics. If you want a quality player for a good price that scores well across the board I would reccomend the Rio Karma in all its 20 gigabitey goodness. I would have given a 4 1/2, but the rank in intervals of one. The deduction because of the case, or lack thereof.
Rating:
Summary: Bad Karma
Review: Got this player about a year ago and was very happy at first. I have had Rio players in the past but this one had all the features I wanted and it appeared to work very well. Right after the 90 day warranty is when it first locked up. I searched the internet and found that this is a very common problem and wished I had researched this unit before I bought it. Am VERY disappointed that it freezes up all the time but have learned to carry a paper clip with me to reset it. And for anyone interested I am NOT a fan of the Ipod. The Karma would be excellent if only it worked...
Rating:
Summary: A Good Player - Compared with the iPod (NOT bashing either)
Review: I'm sure you're all sick of these comparisons to the iPod, most of which just say "iPod sucks!" or "don't get this, go for an iPod!" I, however, have used the iPod extensively (and I really DO like it), and have recently purchased a Karma. Thus, I hope this review helps as a real comparison between two fairly similar products (and yes, they ARE similar - they're both 20 gig mp3 players with comparable functions, though the iPod does have some more extras).
Size - Like I said above, the capacity of the Karma and the iPod are the SAME. Really, there's no difference here.
Design - It depends on what you're looking for. Style is, of course, a matter of personal preference, but the general consensus is that the iPod is prettier. It's also slimmer, but the Karma is shorter. Moreover, the Karma is easier to navigate with - it has a highly hand-oriented design, dedicated volume buttons, and both a joystick and a scroll wheel. Both players have a "Hold" switch, so again, no big difference there.
Portability - The iPod definately wins here. The Karma is, like I said, a bit thick, though it is rather short to compensate. Also - there are a million different cases available for the iPod, while you really have to look for someone to clip your Karma to your belt.
Battery Life - The Karma claims to have 15 hours, compared with the iPod's 12. I haven't put that to the test yet, however.
Note - BOTH these players have NON-USER-REPLACABLE batteries - if you want a replacable battery, go with the Creative Zen Xtra (which is a good deal bulkier than either of the two players I'm discussing here).
*Sound* - Here's the kicker where I'm concerned. I have always been (and, honestly, still am) partial to CD's - So, the second I got my mp3 player, I downloaded a few songs to check out the quality (with a pair of decent headphones). I listened to the Karma and to my personal CD player with the SAME pair of headphones, and the sound of the Karma was, if not the same, then very close. The iPod, even with a good pair of headphones (rather than those silly earbuds), cannot compare in that respect.
Reliability - All I have to say is that complaints about hard drive failure are much fewer in number than some of these reviews would have you believe. Also, there is updated firmware, and you typically get a 90-day warranty in case anything goes wrong. Still, I haven't had my Karma that long yet, so I'm in no real position to make a definitive statement. Just don't be scared out of buying this player.
Overall - I really do like this mp3 player. However, like the iPod, 300 dollars for ANY 20 gig mp3 player is just too much. I probably would not have bought it had I not received an amazing deal through another seller. If you buy it off Amazon, however (the current price on this site is 200 dollars), it's definately a good deal. That being said, I highly recommend this player if what you really want is your entire cd collection in the palm of your hand with CD-quality (or almost cd-quality) sound.
If you want neither the iPod nor the Karma, you should also look into the iRiver, Creative Touch, Creative Zen Xtra, or the Dell DJ.
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