Rating: 
Summary: Rio Riot = Slow & Clunky
Review: Yes, 20-GB is a lot of memory. However, the Rio Riot is also physically large and not 'shirt pocket size' like the iPod. You'll need both hands to use this clunky player. The Rio Riot also falls short with the slow USB connection. ... A 5 GB transfer to this player will take 7 hours. With the iPod, this would only take 20 minutes! Also the FM tuner is very weak and has trouble picking even the strongest stations. Bottom line: if you want a sleek mp3 player with ultra fast firewire and great battery life, get an iPod.
Rating: 
Summary: Rio Rocks! 4 3/4 stars
Review: I have had the Rio Riot for a few months now and It Rocks! The amount of memory is great. You can fit your entire CD collection and have still have room for tons of song downloads. ... It reminds me of a playstation video game control in terms of size. As far as installing the software on my computer, it was a breeze. I didn't have a single problem.
One negative: When you go to lock the device, it is very easy to turn the power off by pushing the switch too far. But with a little practice, that problem disappears.
One note: If you buy this device, go for the free software upgrade from Real Networks to the RealOne player, it makes your user experience even better.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Review: Back in 1979, my father brought home a blue and silvery device that played cassette tapes. It was called a walkman, and at most, it would play 90 minutes of music. It was bulky, chunky and altogether wonderful.Now, on my desk, I have about 30 hours of music (and more will be loaded tonight) in a device that is smaller, lighter and sleeker than that original Walkman. It plays the songs I love in a randomized way - just like having my own radio station that knows exactly what I like. It's easy to load, easy to play and easy to carry. I am, in general, thrilled.
Rating:
Summary: Phenomenal product
Review: I don't understand the negative reviews written about this product posted here in early May. Regarding the Real Jukebox software, yes, this is old software. But we're not stuck with it by ANY means. Just upgrade the software to the RealOne Player. The RealOne Player has one of the nicest interfaces I've ever seen. It takes some getting used to navigating at first, but like anything else, once you use it a little, you'll get the hang of it. Much nicer than the old Jukebox software that comes with the Riot. As far as poor music quality, here's what I learned VERY QUICKLY. When ripping your own CDs, you can't do ANYTHING else while your computer is ripping the music. Turn off your screen saver and close all programs. As soon as you start ripping, don't even touch the mouse! Just leave it be. When transferring music to the Riot, RealOne Player does lock up now and then during transfers. It just seems to have problems with certain tracks. Unplug the Riot's USB cable, rip the track again, plug the Riot back in, delete the track from the transfer list and, finally, include the track in the transfer list again. It's been my experience RealOne Player successfully transfers the track the second time around. This is cutting edge technology, not perfected. In my opinion, the shortfalls are far outweighed by the many rewards reaped once the entire collection is correctly ripped then transferred :) Hope this helped.
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your time
Review: My player had to be returned within 48 hours. I read all the reviews, and didn't mind the size or the speed of the music transfers. BUT, s soon as I started using it, the player froze and gave me an inaccurate low battery message. I re-calibrated, updated the firmware and reset and reset and reset. To no avail. I had the same problem with shoddy workmanship with my Rio 800. I wish they would STOP sending products to market in some sort of Beta version. Way too much money, lousy execution of a great idea. Save yourself the trouble.
Rating: 
Summary: Great sound, but battery problems
Review: Although the Rio Riot is quite a piece of equipment, I'm returning it today. Pros: EXCELLENT sound, best I've ever heard. Great interface. Amazing capacity. Decent radio. Nice carrying case. Cons: A bit big, but who cares? Very slow transfers (slower than normal USB transfers.) Songs aren't synced to desktop computer. Deal-breaker: The battery. They recommend you drain it completely before fully charging, which sounds like old tech. Battery life can be 10 hours, but frequently, is far less, even after full drain/recharge. Sometimes, battery reads empty even when fully charged. Also, you can't change the battery or buy a spare... not good if you want to take it with you for more than 10 hours at a time! Sorry, folks... I don't think this is ready for prime-time just yet.
Rating:
Summary: Warning: Please read this before purchasing product
Review: Stop, don't do it, do not buy this product. Rio made it to compete with Archos' line of MP3's. They are 10 fold better and its not even funny how much better Archos software is that Rio's! If you have a brain and consider yourself human do not buy this product!
Rating:
Summary: 2500 Songs and Building
Review: The only fault of the Riot is documentation which should include screen shots of both Mac and Windows instalation and set up. Once you get going it is like having your entire music library with you. Navigating is a Breeze.
I feed the sound to my amplifier and it replaced a 200 disc changer.
Rating: 
Summary: Lots of potential, poor firmware and software.
Review: I waited and waited for release of the Riot. Finally bought one last weekend. It went back to retailer for a refund. iPod is no where near perfect either, but I have now decided its the best choice. Why? Let me list a FEW of my complaints. 1) Lock ups requiring hard resets. Beta grade firmware. 2) Battery is no where near 10 hours, more like 6 hours (at half volume). 3) You must fully discharge before recharging. You cannot leave it on the charger for more than 8 hours. No monitoring circuitry to stop charging when full. This combined with poor battery life and requiring a full discharge before recharge makes it very inconvenient, to put it politely. Manual doesn't mention this, but the unit has to be ON to take a charge. I found out the hard way. Also, the unit looses charge even when it is turned off. What is that about? 4) Proprietary USB cable. I have to lug another cable around since I can't just use a standard USB cable. SonicBlue, Why? 5) does not charge through the USB cable so I have to lug the charger with me since the batteries won't get me even close to a full day at work, not even counting the commute time. 6) Mangles my perfectly fine MP3s. This is a known problem with Win 2K and XP. My two main OS's!! It says its compatible on the box, why isn't it? With these OS's, there are pops, screeches and sound artifacts introduced into a large number of the files after transfer. I have ripped and re-ripped the music at different bit rates to no avail. Also, many songs just stop playing after only a few seconds. These files all work fine on my PC's, Mac, and iPAQ. How can you mess up a MP3 file transfer? 7) Cannot transfer music OFF of the Rio to a PC or another player. I like to transfer music between my work and three home machines. NOT with the riot you don't. 8) Can't transfer playlists created on a PC to the riot. Creating playlists on the Riot is a joke. Remember entering your name in video games using the joypad? Its Back! Well now you have to use the jog wheel, which takes even longer and is a major pain. Almost worthless. 9) You HAVE to use Real Jukebox (not even the PLUS version mind you) to do transfers. This is in my opinion the worst jukebox software made and SonicBlue has decided to FORCE us into using it. Someone at SB cut a deal with Real here? You can't even browse the Riot using Explorer. This is just ridiculous. I already own full versions of much more capable software that I prefer to use. I resorted to using Real Jukebox to transfer the files only. 10) The Riot is too big to carry in your pocket. Too big to comfortably carry in your hand when jogging. 11) Requires two-handed operation with the poor button placement. 12) USB 1.1 is WAY too slow for this amount of storage. It took me 10 hours to do my first transfer, then it trashed half my music (see #6 above) so I could do it again (which did not correct the problem. I have to identify the trashed songs (by listening to them ALL first) and retransfer them untill they come across clean!! Eventually they do. 13) SonicBlue's tech support has got to be the worst I have ever seen. You wait for hours while paying Long Distance charges. You got it, no toll free support. They still have not responded to my emails, but did manage to SPAM my mailbox three times already. I had a lot of respect for the Rio product line in the past. It will be a long time before I go back to them. This unit was not ready for production. SonicBlue has tarnished the Rio name forever in my book.
Rating:
Summary: Only three words to say......
Review: First of all, this product was hyped up too much. It was supposed to be small and state of the art with a large hardrive. The only truth to that statement is that it has a large hard drive. The surfing of this product is god aweful. For 20gb of music, you would expect a much better system. A system like the Nomad Jukebox 3 is great. I bought this when it first came out...The size is akward. They say its dimensions are smaller than any other 20gb HD based mp3 player. THere is some truth, but the fact is, is that it is FAT!!! Dang. The jukebox may be bigger, but it is thinner and much more streamline and much easier to cary. Also the dials seem flimsy and with one drop they feel like they could break. Pros: *Big HD
*Big Screen
*EQ settings
*Accessories Cons: *Size
*Sound Quality(OK...)
*Make (Cheap)
*Bad song surfing
*Battery
*USB is slow (no firewire)
*Can only transfer songs with given software Overall, I do think that if you buy this, don't expect to be satisfied...Serously, this item is not worth [the price] and is more like a beta edition than a final edition...
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