Rating: 
Summary: I *LOVE* this MP3 Player !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: I read a lot of reviews for just about every MP3 player out there before I bought this one. I've had this since about April-04 and I couldn't be happier. The size is more than enough to keep me happy all day at work plus there is an FM tuner, which a lot of other players don't have. My husband thinks that the controls could be easier to use, but I disagree with him. The most important thing is that it does exactly what it's supposed to do without any problems. I really love this MP3 player !!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Poor Quality!
Review: I received this as a gift in Nov 03, loaded it up and used it four times before putting in a drawer for a month. Then I got it out and the hard drive had failed!! Just popped up with an error message of "Check HDD" and that's it. Emailed IRiver tech support, never heard from them. Radio still worked, however, but it showed zero MB available. I could see if I had dropped it or mishandled it. It just died without any reason. It's a piece of crap.
Rating: 
Summary: purchase with caution
Review: I recently purchased this player and was excited about its cute design and ability to interface with .wma files. I have had no problems with the radio or the ability of this device to play MP3 audio files--the sound is very good. However, none of the .wma files (files burned from my own CD's) will play on the player. Perhaps this is a mistake that I am making in attempting to download these files, however noone seems to be willing to help me with this problem. I have been extremely frustrated with customer support--I have sent 3 emails to their customer support center and received no replies in over 2 weeks. In addition, no one answers their customer support line--I've stayed on hold in excess of 30 minutes multiple times. Because of this, I am left with returning the player and not recommending it to those who may require any sort of technical support.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent player for the money
Review: I was looking for an MP3 player to use during long flights and while working out in the gym. I wanted an iPod but the short battery life was the biggest mark against it. I currently have 309 songs on this player and see no reason to update it in the near future. At any rate, updating the song list is quite easy using any Windows PC. No special software needed. Using the Sony MDR-G72 behind-the-head phones, it provides good sound. I have played everything from Judas Priest and Rob Zombie to Carmina Burana and Dave Brubeck. The bass and treble is excellent for such a small package. The FM reciever appears to work very well too. So far the battery appears to be lasting about 9 hours with continuous play. That makes it through any domestic flight in the US. If you want a dependable player to simply play music, get this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Fast, practical, very good battery life, great sound and LCD
Review: It is a good compromise between a Flash player (bought then returned iRiver 395 - great but pricey and no USB 2.0 support) and a jukebox player. 1.5G is more than enough for my needs and the transfer is ultra fast. Works withour problems with my Windows XP Professional and Windows 2003 Server. It shows up as an removable HD and that's perfect for me: no music software needed.
While the rounded shape is very practical, I wished it had a scroll wheel or the joystick found on the other iRiver players at the center. The jog dials are better than the ones found on the Nomad players (thicker and not flimsy) but require some learning curve.
The battery life is great, the radio is terrific and the large LCD is a big plus. Oh and the sound with SRS turned on is amazing. Overall, a great device for the features and price, highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: ipod? no irvier
Review: Just picked this up about a week or two ago after much debate of whether to wait for the ipod mini. Def. made the right choice. The ipod does have a larger hd and is probably a bit smaller (thought weight is close to the same and the design is square as compared to round), but the iriver makes up for this in other areas. One, it has a great fm radio on board. You don't realize how much you want this option until you don't have it (such as with an ipod). Two, it handles WMA files perfectly. WMA files are windoms media players preferred file (so if you've burned all your cds onto your hd using windows media player, they are likely all WMA. They are smaller than the same file in MP3 format and have as good, if not better, playback quality as an MP3 file. Ipods don't read WMA, so for any PC user, this could be a major shortcoming. Three, truely drag and drop of folders onto the iriver. Ipod doesn't allow you to keep your music organized into the folder as most windows users typically do. It tags music by song, artest, album, etc. then sorts it out itself. It does allow playlists, but I still feel like I lose a bit of general organization. The iriver allows you to quickly just drag you existing folders onto the machine as if it were a stand alone drive. Very, very easy playback and navigation. Too bad it doesn' have a 4 g capacity, but if you use WMA format you get almost 50 hours of skip free music. The ipod at 4 g will only get you about 75 if using mp3 format, so the ability to use WMA pays off again. Plus, the IPOD is not skip free past 25 minutes of continuous shaking. So, if you run aggressively for longer than 25-30 music, you might be in trouble.
Rating:
Summary: I'm keeping this one.
Review: My Archos 20GB died after more than two years and being dropped one too many times... So, after too many moments of silence, I started looking for a replacement that was sturdier --> and less than $200. Fortunately, iRiver ended this nightmare quest for me. After buying and returning nine different alleged mp3 devices this weekend, I'm keeping this one. The iGP-100 is in the same price range as much smaller Flash players (including iRiver's own Flash products, which seems odd). It's got everything I want, except expandability, but at a gig-and-a-half I ain't complainin'... and it's less than 1/4 of the weight of that darn Archos brick. The iGP-100 doesn't come with any extras besides the charger and some earbuds I'll never use. A sports arm-band would have been nice, though! Lifting weights with it is going to be awkward until I find one that fits. Windows XP treats the iGP-100 like a removable drive and no funky software is required to drop WMA files on it and start jammin'. In fact, it doesn't seem to come with any software besides drivers for obsolete operating systems, which is cool and probably kept the price down. Windows Media Player 9.0 does everything else a guy (or gal) could need with regards to music management. We hates Music Match, yesss, we do, so not seeing it was bliss. Within 120 seconds of opening the package, I had copied eight (8) CDs worth of 64kpbs WMA (three CDs of Creed, four CDs of Nickelback, and the entire soundtracks from XXX, Scorpion King and Daredevil) onto it and was rockin' with 1.1GB still free on the player. The USB 2.0 is very cool after suffering with every other slow USB 1.1 player I bought and returned this weekend... The quasi-jog-dial navigation could be better, but I'll get used to it. Lot's of wandering into the system menu by accident to start with... The whole "long click" or jog-dial thing isn't something I'm used to. And one could wish for replaceable batteries of a standard type, just in case, but not with this one. A slightly smaller, squarer form factor would be ideal... the roundness is a little awkward. Nevertheless, the iGP-100 beat out both of the RCA Lyra players (they have great XP driver support and SD expandability but no way to organize/play music in folders -- I don't want to listen to 500 songs on random repeat, that's as bad as the radio), the iRiver 256MB Flash player (requires funky software and doesn't act like Flash drive), anything by Sonic Blue (I returned both the Rio Chiba and the Rio Cali == junk), the TDK Mojo 256 (in spite of good technical support and customer service, it's junk -- it ate the contents of my favorite SD card full of tunez and spat them out and does *not* act like Flash drive) and anything by Mpio (they seem to use the same junk software and firmware as TDK and their English, well, it isn't). All in all, I'm tired of standin' in the return line and I've tried all the other < $200 alternatives already, so the iGP-100 is the one I'm keepin'.
Rating:
Summary: I'm keeping this one.
Review: My Archos 20GB died after more than two years and being dropped one too many times... So, after too many moments of silence, I started looking for a replacement that was sturdier --> and less than $200. Fortunately, iRiver ended this nightmare quest for me. After buying and returning nine different alleged mp3 devices this weekend, I'm keeping this one. The iGP-100 is in the same price range as much smaller Flash players (including iRiver's own Flash products, which seems odd). It's got everything I want, except expandability, but at a gig-and-a-half I ain't complainin'... and it's less than 1/4 of the weight of that darn Archos brick. The iGP-100 doesn't come with any extras besides the charger and some earbuds I'll never use. A sports arm-band would have been nice, though! Lifting weights with it is going to be awkward until I find one that fits. Windows XP treats the iGP-100 like a removable drive and no funky software is required to drop WMA files on it and start jammin'. In fact, it doesn't seem to come with any software besides drivers for obsolete operating systems, which is cool and probably kept the price down. Windows Media Player 9.0 does everything else a guy (or gal) could need with regards to music management. We hates Music Match, yesss, we do, so not seeing it was bliss. Within 120 seconds of opening the package, I had copied eight (8) CDs worth of 64kpbs WMA (three CDs of Creed, four CDs of Nickelback, and the entire soundtracks from XXX, Scorpion King and Daredevil) onto it and was rockin' with 1.1GB still free on the player. The USB 2.0 is very cool after suffering with every other slow USB 1.1 player I bought and returned this weekend... The quasi-jog-dial navigation could be better, but I'll get used to it. Lot's of wandering into the system menu by accident to start with... The whole "long click" or jog-dial thing isn't something I'm used to. And one could wish for replaceable batteries of a standard type, just in case, but not with this one. A slightly smaller, squarer form factor would be ideal... the roundness is a little awkward. Nevertheless, the iGP-100 beat out both of the RCA Lyra players (they have great XP driver support and SD expandability but no way to organize/play music in folders -- I don't want to listen to 500 songs on random repeat, that's as bad as the radio), the iRiver 256MB Flash player (requires funky software and doesn't act like Flash drive), anything by Sonic Blue (I returned both the Rio Chiba and the Rio Cali == junk), the TDK Mojo 256 (in spite of good technical support and customer service, it's junk -- it ate the contents of my favorite SD card full of tunez and spat them out and does *not* act like Flash drive) and anything by Mpio (they seem to use the same junk software and firmware as TDK and their English, well, it isn't). All in all, I'm tired of standin' in the return line and I've tried all the other < $200 alternatives already, so the iGP-100 is the one I'm keepin'.
Rating:
Summary: great product with a few minor flaws
Review: My co-worker and I both bought one of these, and we love it. It is the perfect size to fit into the palm of my hand and is light as a feather. The pleather holder has a belt strap (downside-no buckle, u must undo belt to put on) and it also has the hook on top to attatch to a chain while in the gym. The earbuds it comes with work great for a standard set. The buttons are easily pressable when you want to, and don't press when you don't want to (i.e. in your pocket). I rarely turn on the 'hold' feature and it works the way I want. I have downloaded mp3 and ogg, as well as made m3u playlists and all play fantastically. Here is where you will really see the quality of your recording. If you have bad (128 bit and lower) recordings, you WILL have to turn up the volume, adjust the equalizer, etc in order to hear the song properly. That being said, most of my music is 190-220 bit, and I hear it just fine.
The few I had at 120 I am re-recording at higher bitrates. It doubles as a portable file transport well, though you have to take the custom USB cable with you everywhere. Power cable is nice though my dog chewed it up. The battery lasts for quite a while. I listen about 2 hours a day, and charge once a week. It doesn't require any drivers except for WinME/98 so when you plug it in, it recognizes it as a drive. If you add files, clicking remove hardware works fine. If you delete files from it, 'remove hardware' will not work (at least with USB 1.0). Overall, this is a dream to behold. That 1.5 GBs holds about 300 of my songs, and is plenty of room for all my needs.
Rating:
Summary: Just plain perfect
Review: My co-worker and I both bought one of these, and we love it. It is the perfect size to fit into the palm of my hand and is light as a feather. The pleather holder has a belt strap (downside-no buckle, u must undo belt to put on) and it also has the hook on top to attatch to a chain while in the gym. The earbuds it comes with work great for a standard set. The buttons are easily pressable when you want to, and don't press when you don't want to (i.e. in your pocket). I rarely turn on the 'hold' feature and it works the way I want. I have downloaded mp3 and ogg, as well as made m3u playlists and all play fantastically. Here is where you will really see the quality of your recording. If you have bad (128 bit and lower) recordings, you WILL have to turn up the volume, adjust the equalizer, etc in order to hear the song properly. That being said, most of my music is 190-220 bit, and I hear it just fine.
The few I had at 120 I am re-recording at higher bitrates. It doubles as a portable file transport well, though you have to take the custom USB cable with you everywhere. Power cable is nice though my dog chewed it up. The battery lasts for quite a while. I listen about 2 hours a day, and charge once a week. It doesn't require any drivers except for WinME/98 so when you plug it in, it recognizes it as a drive. If you add files, clicking remove hardware works fine. If you delete files from it, 'remove hardware' will not work (at least with USB 1.0). Overall, this is a dream to behold. That 1.5 GBs holds about 300 of my songs, and is plenty of room for all my needs.
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