Rating: 
Summary: Definitely worth the price paid for it...
Review: When I first saw this item, I made the foolish thought of playing with new technologies without doing my research. However, in the case of the SONICblue Rio Volt, I was hardly disappointed. This handy little gem is definitely a step in the right direction, mixing an ordinary CD player, with the future of audio: MP3.My biggest concern when I purchased it was if I bought it now, would it become obsolete in say, 6 months. But this fear was put to rest when I found out that Rio actively keeps its products up to date by being able to download it, put it on a CD, then having the Rio Volt read that CD. In about 15 seconds, the unit was upgraded! Incredible. In addition, this unit has some very wonderful features, such as a remote control (handy for driving in the car), as well as anti-skip protection (the variable selection between 10 and 40 seconds is a nice touch). Also, it can read any CD that you put into it, whether it be a normal CD, or a CD loaded with MP3 audio files (I haven't found a CD it HASN'T read correctly yet). In general, a buy definitely worth the money I invested in it...
Rating:
Summary: Detailed RIO review (Part 1)
Review: This may end up being a lengthy series of messages. I recently decided to buy a friend an MP3 player as a gift, and in the process, I went through 5 different players before I finally settled on the RIO Volt. Hopefully, I can spare some others the same hassles of purchasing/testing/returning products that I went through, by giving them adequate feedback on some products. My needs were simple. I wanted a portable MP3 Player so that my friend could easily take a _lot_ of music on car trips and jogging, without needing to also take along an armful of CDs (or other removeable media). Price wasn't really a concern (although I hoped not to have to pay more than $300 for what I needed). He already had a computer with a CDROM burner, and Adaptec Easy CD 4.0. He had been using this setup to burn ordinary audio CDs for use in his portable CD player (no MP3 CD capability). But he's no computer expert, so I didn't want something that was going to be more complicated. I figured that it wouldn't be much trouble for him to burn MP3 CDs for use in a portable CD/MP3 player. So, I first decided to check those out (before looking into the MP3 players with flash memory or other types of storage media). I first purchased the Philips Expanium. It seemed to have the features I needed. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that the unit would not be able to handle CDs created using Adaptec Direct CD. If it had, it would have been tremendously easy for my friend to create an MP3 CD (ie, even easier than burning ordinary audio CDs with Easy CD, as far as I'm concerned). But information on this limitation is hidden away in the Expanium's owner's manual (which is badly written. It gives you very little, poorly organized information on how to create an MP3 CD for the Expanium. It has only this diagram of folders with zigzagging dotted lines all over, and a couple brief notes. It's unfathomable. And given the Expanium's complicated scheme for MP3 CDs, this is not good). I popped in a disc, formatted by Direct CD, which contained numerous MP3 files. As expected, the Expanium did not even recognize its contents. Well, so much for this being easy. So, he'll have to use Easy CD (instead of DirectCD) to create a data CD. Well, at least it won't be any more difficult than burning an audio CD, or so I erroneously thought. I took a CD-RW disc and burned two MP3 files using Joliet file system (ie, created a data CD with one session in Joliet file system). I did not put the files in any folder. They were in the root directory. I did not finalize the disc. (I wanted to be able to add more files to it later. I figured that my friend would not have the time nor desire to fill an entire 660 Meg MP3 CD with files at one time. He would likely be building up a CD over the course of time, and yet still want to be able to play that CD during that time). I popped the disc into the Expanium. It would not recognize nor play the files. I experimented with various brands of discs. No good. I finally finalized the session for the CDRW, and then the Expanium played the two songs. Ok, so now he has to be dealing with multi-session discs. It was getting more complicated already. Now, I decided to add another session on this disc, added some MP3 files to that, and closed that session. For some reason, the Expanium would not play any songs in this second session. I added further sessions. No good. It only ever played the songs in the first session. I tried various brands of CDRW. I experimented with ISO9660 file system. I tried ISO9660 compatible file names. No good. And this was already far more complicated than what I wanted. I took the Expanium back. I next tried the unit made by D-Link. To be blunt, this unit was dreadful. It gave me even more trouble than the Expanium. It appeared not to be able to handle Joliet file system as well as DirectCD discs, nor multi-session. I didn't give it as extensive a test as the Expanium because, after it failed to even recognize 6 discs with various formatting, I decided that it was too much hassle to even test it further. It went back. At this point, I decided that perhaps there was not enough standardization with the MP3 CD stuff, and so I should probably investigate the MP3 players with their own proprietary schemes of flash memory and such. (I had initially hoped to avoid such proprietary things and stick with CDROMs burned using software such as Adaptec Easy CD. I use Windows 2000, so I'm sensitive to things that get too proprietary, and therefore often leave me out in the cold when it comes to support. I had to reject numerous of these MP3 players with their propietary software that listed only support for Windows 95/98/ME. What are you going to do with these things when everyone switches to XP? If their software doesn't run on Windows NT/2000, then it likely won't run on XP. And you know how companies are at updating bundled software with old hardware to run on a completely new OS).
Rating:
Summary: OTR Enthusiasts - This unit "kicks" at all Bitrates!
Review: Hey, ever buy a product that you'd heard was just "great" and would play all your stuff, then it fell short! I blew it on two units before buying the Rio Volt and I can't say enough good about playing Old Time Radio recorded at various bitrates. I have purchased various CDR's that have as many as 100-1/2 hour shows and they sound great on this unit! It's easy to find the show you want, click it to play and enjoy! If music is your thing then this one plays that just super. Note: the price just dropped ...e since I bought mine. A Great Unit and a Great price and you're "in business!"
Rating:
Summary: Make sure to upgrade firmware to version 2.0
Review: It's a great product. Does its job well, and thanks to the "smart spinning" its battery life is much better than its competitors. Make sure to download the latest firmware 2.0 upgrade from [riohome]for many enhancements, such as a much reduced gap between tracks.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Player
Review: I just bought the player and downloaded the new firmware from Rio's website. I put it on a CDRW so I wouldn't waste any money and put it in the player. It puts it in automatically and then shuts off. This is a great player. It has played all of my MP3's with no skips whatsoever. I used Music Match Jukebox to put in the ID3 tags so when the song plays, the song title and artist are displayed in the large LCD display. I have two complaints though. First, the case does not have a see through area to see the display, so I don't use it much. It does not come with a 4.5V car adapter so I can use it without batteries in my car. You can pick one up at RadioShack for $13 though. By burning the CD with folders you can navigate through you CD very easily. I put 10 of my Cds on one CDR with the folders for each artist. This makes it very easy to find the songs I want. This player also I fit 243 songs on one CD. has many features and combinations of shuffle and repeat. The sound is great, but I would recomend getting better quality headphones. The 10+ skip feature is also good so you can go through the CD fast also. Even though it says it doesn't, the player reads CDs with both analog music and MP3s. Everyone who is an avid music lover that has a medium to large collection of music should buy one immediatly.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing Player
Review: I bought this player since about 4 days and I'm still amazed about the great quality of this player. But first let me tell you something : yes it skips, I was climbing stairs, jogging, and it began to skip a little, but not very often, but I 'm sure most of the normal CD player skip a bit too. Anyway, I also upgraded the firmware to version 2.00 which work great and add a Menu-like function to navigate and change the settings of the player. Now, with this new firmware, the settings aren't forgotten by the player, and there's also a new EQ User Settings: you can set up your own bass and treble boost, which is a great feature. The remote-control seems a little bit plastic and fragile, but it's still a good thing to have when you're doing sports or just not near the player. I like the fact that you can upgrade it, and the longevity of the batteries is way over all of its opponents in this category: a 12-hour-full-music-without-pause. Antishock is good too, but the navigation through directories and files can become hard and boring sometimes. Well, I recommend it to everyone who likes music, and doesn't want to be restrain to only 1-2 hours of music. See ya
Rating: 
Summary: The Best One on the Market
Review: I recently had a chance to test-drive two different MP3-CD players, the RioVolt and the Philips Expanium, and in the end, the RioVolt came out the clear winner. When evaluating MP3-CD players, there are two things to keep in mind: first, that this technology is still in its relative infancy, and allowances will have to be made before the companies figure out exactly what works and what doesn't. Second, MP3-CD players aren't an industry-created standard; they are a response to something that consumers originally designed and made for themselves (MP3 encoding and the idea of storing loads of MP3s on a disc). Therefore, it makes sense that companies with relative inexperience in the market - Philips for instance - are going to lose out to Rio, who's been in the MP3 game for a couple of years. The RioVolt is a nice-looking package, pleasantly round and silver with blue trim. It's got all the standard features - a window so you can see your disc spinning round and round, a hold switch, and the option to choose a 10 second skip buffer or a 45 second skip buffer. There are several things that make the RioVolt stand out: it has a digital volume control, instead of an analog wheel, which is nice, and it has a backlit window, so you can see what you're doing in the dark (car trips, subways, etc.) In addition, it reads ID3 tags, which means you get to see the title of the song you're listening to - something the Philips player doesn't do. And, as a coup-de-grace, the Rio will read CDs made with Adaptec DirectCD - something other MP3-CD players will NOT do (and, unfortunately, often don't tell you they won't do on the box). I tested the RioVolt for two weeks, and it preformed well the entire time (and hopefully, it will continute to do so!) The sound it produces is clear, even on MP3s ripped at lower than 128 KBPS quality, and it has no problem reading up to 320 KPBS songs (for all I know, it goes higher, but I don't have any higher-quality MP3s to test it with). I tried it with three different kinds of headphones, and on all of them the higher-end sound seemed to suffer a little, especially on songs where there were rapid treble spikes. Again, that could be an artifact of ripping, and not the player itself. The RioVolt is also upgradable, which other MP3-CD players are not (I would highly recommend getting the 1.13 upgrade from Rio's website). Unfortunately, you have to waste an entire CD-R to upgrade, but it's a small price to pay for a product that changes with the times. Additionally, even on 10-second anti-skip, dropping the player from 4 feet in the air (a little higher than my waist) didn't cause it to skip at all. Of course, the RioVolt does have its flaws. The lid seems a little flimsy, and the stop button (located on the bottom of a "wheel" control panel, like some VCRs use) has to be pressed just right in order for it to work. If you change your ID3 tag, say in WinAmp (to remove "Various Artists" and replace it with the actual band name), the RioVolt still reads the "Various" tag, which is a bit of a pain. The biggest flaw, though, is the crummy headphones - you might as well leave them in the box and buy another pair. Mine only played correctly out of one side, and the other side died in less than an hour. The last item of note is the strange remote control, which I suppose could be useful, but adds another two feet of wires for you to tie in knots and catch on things. I found I didn't really need it anyway, as I just set the player to "shuffle" and let random effects take their course. Will there be better players in the future? Undoubtedly. Is this the best player available right now? Hands-down yes. If you've gotta have the latest and greatest, or (like me) want a way to make your massive music collection portable without having to lug 100s of CDs around, go with the RioVolt. You won't be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: Poot. All you people don't know what you're talking about.
Review: First off, nice CD player. A lot of reviews had some things wrong in them..... Battery life: 15 hours MP3 cds, 7-9 regular cds Shock protection: 120 sec for mp3's, however, to save batteries, the buffer fills up and then the disc stops spinning, and when the buffer gets low, it spins the disc up again. Therefore, there is little skip protection at the beginning of the song. And yes, this is not a joggable cd player. 40 sec or 10 sec (switchable) for regular cds. And hello people! FIRMWARE! YAAAY! And the firmware is the best so far. P>Overall, a very good cd player. Oh, the headphones "". Buy some good Koss ones.
Rating: 
Summary: not a very good unit
Review: this unit works and plays mp3, but here are the problems 1. the anti skip is very bad. you can not even walk with this unit! 2. It only reads one directory down. so if you have songs 2 directories down from the main you can not choose them. though the unit will play them in order. you just can't go to them manually.
Rating:
Summary: Great product!
Review: I was given the RioVolt as a gift because I have a bunch of downloaded and CD audio on CD-Rs. This was the greatest gift. I have CDs with 20 albums encoded with Windows Media Player. I love not having to switch CDs for a week or so. Great battery life too. I love how the CD stops spinning after the first few seconds of a song so you know it's not going to skip. What's with the dancing people on the LCD though?
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