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Rio One Digital Audio Player (MP3/WMA)

Rio One Digital Audio Player (MP3/WMA)

List Price: $99.99
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Surprising poor quality...even for the money
Review: I'll keep this short - this product is terrible. This was my first foray into a portable, and I went with the Rio name because I recognized it as one of a few industry leaders. I was mistaken. This product simply did not work - and I even exchanged it for another...and that didn't work either. The software was shoddy and inconsistent, - and when I did get it to work for a day it had unbelievably poor sound quality (a la the hissing you hear in the background that other reviewers have mentioned). Bottom line - this is a poorly designed and manufactured product, with incredibly bad website and customer support. Buy something else - like the Nomad IIc - it actually works and you'll be up and running in literally minutes.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Solution for Flashing USB
Review: I, too, had the flashing USB thing happen to me the day I bought my Rio One. After many many hours of searching the net and Sonic Bleu's website, I found that I needed to reinstall their firmware (which I somehow found through their obscure FTP site).

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: SonicBlue Should be Ashamed
Review: I bought this player (I only had if for 2 hours though). When I plugged the USB cable into my XP system, NOTHING.... What's worse, I went to riohome.com to find a new driver for windows XP, the website told me to install the software from the CD... NICE!! So, I tried to call(which by the way was a long distance call).... my call could not be transfered at this time, but they were so nice as to give me another long distance number that was busy for over 30 minutes. Sooooooo, I went back to the website to e-mail tech support, basically, they sent me a link to the FAQ in their web site, now if I hadn't already read the FAQ I would've been thankfull for nothing. In a nutshell, when you buy the Rio One, it isn't compatible OR supported. It seems like a nice enough player for the money but the company needs to stand behind their product, they pretty much have made the player extinct by not updating the software. You would think that with the advent of the internet, companies would want to control negative pub, but it doesn't seem to bother SONICblue. Good Luck!!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Rio One works nicely
Review: I found the Rio hardware to work very well, but the free software
that comes with it for the Windows environment is poorly
documented. I believe I followed the instructions but
only got it to install properly on one of two PCs running
Win98. The Real Jukebox user interface is a bit obscure, to say
the least.
For the price I think the Rio itself is a good value, works well and it looks cool!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: MP3 Lover
Review: I love MP3's. Always have and always will. Never had a "digital" MP3 player before, though. I just got this on Christmas 2001. I love it! Can't see why people are wasting time just to gripe and complain to blow some smoke. If you cry about the memory just buy a flash memory card. They are cheap! It's upgradeable to 160 MB with flash memory. As for something you buy that doesn't come with everything or is missing something, that's why they give you "reciepts." All in all if you get one that works like I and most others it's a great player. Specially if you've never had one before.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Flimsy, and DOA!
Review: The first thing I noticed when I pulled the Rio One from the blister pack (no easy feat in and of itself!) was how light and flimsy it felt. A strong wind (maybe) or a drop on concrete (definitely) would be the end of this device.

The second thing I noticed was that it does not support Windows XP.

Most importantly, however, was the third thing: it was dead on arrival. No display, no USB communication, no nothing. Changed batteries, pressed all the buttons, read the manual (!)... no luck. And reading other reviews, it sounds like I wasn't the only one with this experience.

Bottom line: Get something else. This one's a stinker.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: NO Quality Control
Review: Bought with Win XP promotion...Was it unreasonable to assume XP compatability? Can't use for WMA files using Real Jukebox. Media Play 7 doesn't recognize the device. Battery compartment cover pops open so I must use tape to cover it on my new MP3 player. Now I get the flashing "USB" on display which won't go away. Tried Email Tech support and Web support. Nada on both accounts. The headphones are the earbud variety but the most uncomfortable I have ever used. I like its size. Everything else is horrible. There was apparently no QC on this item. Unfortunately, USB problem happened after 30 days so return to store not an option. Hate to say it but I don't trust there warranty department due to the Cust. Service and Quality issues. I will buy another and repackage and return the original and hope for a "functional" unit but I really feel I got burned on this. The worst Electronics product I have bought P E R I O D. EVER.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Don't bother with this...save and get a better one!
Review: My RIO came without the firmware that runs the display... So I was never able to use it. I tried reaching Tech Support for a week by e-mail and then started the trek through SonicBlue's labyrinth of phone options. After running in circles and never actually reaching a human or a voice mail and always being refered to another toll number, I decided tell you all about it.

If you haven't already figured it out my opinion of the player is poor and the company is yet even poorer.

Good luck and Happy Holidays!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: RIO Not So XP Friendly
Review: The RIO One was a free bonus for purchasing Windows XP at Best Buy. Unfortunately, the drivers for the unit are not that XP friendly. The software included is an older version of real jukebox. It locks or hangs XP from time to time where the machine cannot be shut down, just shut off. If running XP do not buy this unit until fresh updated software is availble. The low rating is because of the lack of up to date software.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: TEN reasons to make this your first MP3 player!
Review: This is my first Mp3 player after several years of buying portable walkman style devices and being dissappointed at the size, performance, power issues and their eventual breakdown.

This particular unit is perfect for an entry level buyer who wants to become a casual user. There are several more units that feature huge storage amounts and can even record MP3 format from other sources, but there

(1) Size. It's small, fits in just about any pocket or can easily be stowed away in your lunch kit, notebook or briefcase. I've owned several portable music devices over the last twenty years and this is the first one that is small enough to be considered unobtrusive.

(2) Solid State. Moving parts break unless they are particularly well engineered. This device has no moving parts once the battery is installed and the selector pad is durable enough to last for years

(3) Sound Quality. Despite the other reviews claiming poor sound, I found the quality of sound to be really good. I usually record my MP3's at a bit rate of 192k, and never less than 128k. I did notice an improvement in the sound quality at moderate to higher volumes.

(4) One AA battery. This unit runs on ONE "AA" battery, which is important to me because I do not like having to buy batteries all of the time. I've listened to several hours of music at moderate volumes with one battery and am impressed with the battery life.

(5) Power display. One very unique feature of this device is that it has a simple power bar at the bottom of the LCD screen that reports the current status of your battery. You don't find this feature much on battery operated devices that use standard batteries, and it helps you maximize how much power you get out of each battery.

(6) Expandability. This unit comes with 32 megabytes of memory, which holds about six or seven songs that run a total of about 30 minutes. I bought a (current price)128 megabyte expansion card that really made the difference.

(7) Online Support. It's great, go to rioone.com and you will find everything you need to get your device up and running on any system.

(8) USB compatability. The software installs quick and easy and moving files from your computer to the Rio One is a breeze. Your computer will see the Rio One as an external drive that you can move, copy and delete files from.

(9) Informational. The Rio One can tell you the recording length and the frequency recorded at.

(10) Price. You can pick this unit up for less than what you paid for your Sony Walkman that was so big that you broke it and you don't buy cassette tapes anymore anyway.

So where do you get the MP3's to install here?

Everyone knows about the various (music download) sites out there that allow you to trade MP3's, but how about making your own? It's easier than you think. I record my own mp3's at 192kbps and use the free CDDB to automatically title my songs.


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