Rating: 
Summary: Be forewarned...
Review: Let me just share something with anyone considering this product: I am a pretty tech-savvy twenty-something, and I was disappointed with SONICblue's Rio products, not once, but twice.I purchased a Rio 600 (64MB) MP3 player a few months ago. I received the product, perfectly sealed in it's packaging -- missing an ON/OFF switch. Thinking that this would have been easily caught by any person in Quality Control, I was still openminded, and decided to purchase the Rio 800 (128MB) MP3. I thought it would be far superior to have more memory, and be able to recharge the player. It was a wonderful player... for about two or three weeks, until the firmware failed. After receiving tech support & uninstalling/reinstalling, they said it was simply a defective unit, and I returned that one as well. Perhaps I am particularly unlucky? Or perhaps the Rio product from this relatively unknown company is an inferior product, that has not really made it over all of the hurdles of quality testing? Not for me to say, but I thought I would warn other potential purchasers.
Rating: 
Summary: Nice Design, Durable and easy to use
Review: Recessed buttons are nice as you avoid accidental bumps and sudden changes while playing.
Visually nice design. Seems to be durable, I've dropped it several times without it skipping, stopping or breaking.
New 900 is out with more memory but not much change otherwise.
Rating: 
Summary: This thing blows don't buy it!
Review: After reading all the crappy reviews of this product I though maybe I'd be one of the lucky ones. I was wrong. I got this and transfered about 22 MP3s to it. As I listened to it as I rode my bike I realized that all the MP3s had a "hiccup" in them. Sounds kinda like a skip on a cd. All of the files I had on it came from a cd or right off my computer from being downloaded. All the files had this "skip" sound in them. But all the files, when I listend to them on my computer, where fine. I also tried transfering an entire cd using Windows Media Player. They were transfered by converting them to WMA files. When I played them back on the RI0 800 POS it couldnt even get through most of the songs without gettin all grabled and skiping to the next track. Dont buy this product. Too many people are having issues with it.
Rating:
Summary: Poor Design & Quality
Review: I purchased my Rio 128 only six months ago. The charger was designed poorly so by accidentally plugging it into the headphone socket, the Rio was damaged. Sent back and received a newly designed charger (which prevents plugging into the wrong socket) as well as a new or remanufactured Rio 128. It had numerous problems with sound quality from popping to cutting out, to skipping. I got authorization to send it back and waited 2 months for my replacement. What I got in replacement was a Rio 64. It has the same problems as the Rio 128 I sent in. E-mails to customer support get me no response now. This is the poorest quality electronic product I have ever owned. Definately not ready for prime time. Go back to the drawing board.
Rating:
Summary: Nice Features, Bad Quality
Review: This is the 4th Rio product in my household. I bought a Rio500, my wife has a Rio500 and now I have the Rio800. We also very briefly had a RioVolt 90 CD player. The quality on all 4 products has been abysmal. The Rio800 has rechargable batteries which they claim have 11 hours of use between charges. 5 hours is more like it for the first 6 months, now it's about 4 hours (a little over a year old). There is no option for replacing the battery. I've also noticed after a year of use (now out of warranty), I get these bizzare screeching or warbling noises in the middle of playing music or audio books. Now the thing stopped working all together. The features of this product were right on target, but Rio really has a lot to learn about quality.
Rating: 
Summary: Satisfied Customer
Review: I still remember the first time I saw a solid state MP3 player: the original Rio at a small side room at Comdex a few years back. For me, it was one of those "wow" moments, like the first time I used the Mosaic browser and clicked hyperlinks. Even though I was excited, I held off from buying a player because of the cost and the limited memory. Well, I finally bought my first MP3 player (Rio 800) last month and am pretty satisfied. I read all of the reviews and was worried that I'd have the battery issues but so far I haven't. My only beef is how long it takes to transfer songs with USB1.X (not a problem for just Rio 800). It takes me almost 30 minutes to load 128 MBs of music, so it's not exactly a spontaneous thing 5 minutes before going to the gym. I now understand the hype arround Firewire and USB 2.0. Things I like:
- rechargeable battery (that works). I hate having to swap out batteries, even if they are rechargeable. If you ever moved from a PalmIII to a PalmV, or if you use a digital camera with a built in rechargeable battery like a Fuji FinePix 6800, you know what I mean
- very light, nice form factor. no mechanical parts
- plays my r3mix.net VBR encoded MP3s
- can fast forward through long MP3 tracks. I ripped all my Pink Floyd albums each as a single MP3 track to avoid gaps and was worried that I couldn't fast forward. I discovered accidentally that if you leave the next track button depressed, it FFs. You definitely want to use another set of headphones. I'm also beginning to think that for my commute in the car I should eventually get a 20GB jukebox when the prices go down (and use the Rio 800 for the gym, office, and the great outdoors). Good luck if you get this device.
Rating:
Summary: 100% Satisfied
Review: After having a disasterous experience with the SonicBlue's Nike PSA 120, I was a little hesitant to give the Rio 800 a try. But I'm very glad I did. I'm using a Macintosh running OS X and iTunes. I took the Rio 800 straight out of the box, plugged it into my computer with the included USB cable, copied songs to it in iTunes, and was listening to them in seconds. That's the way technology is supposed to work. The player is lightweight and comes with a belt clip. This thing is great for the treadmill or lifting weights. The sound quality on the included headphones isn't as good as I would like, so I use some I already had. Overall, a great piece of equipment.
Rating: 
Summary: B.Y.O.B
Review: Bring Your Own Battery! I was having the same charging problems as many of you so I took the thing apart, put in a plain-old Duracell AA, and the thing works great. So far it's run about 5 hours and all is well... Granted,it's a money-eater over time, but if you're stuck with it anyhow, it's a valid alternative.
Rating:
Summary: It shut off and never came back on
Review: I loved the Rio 800... when it was working the first 2 days I had it. Then suddenly it shut off and nothing would get it to come back on. I even had the most recent version that supposedly had all the "bugs" fixed, with the newest power adapter and all. Unfortunately I bought it without reading all these reviews first. I would highly recommend this product if you can keep it functioning.
Rating:
Summary: Where is the...Quality Control????
Review: So, you think that MAYBE you might get lucky and get something from RIO that acutally has been through a QA process. Wrong!! Just got a 128 Rio800 w/ the new battery pack. Did the charge as directed (unit topped off w/150 min left) - did the firmware upgrade to vs156 - installed software, did download of audio and MP3....now the fun starts. Play the audio - it sounds like grinding glass w/static
Play the MP3 - unit locks up and you have to take off the battery pack to get it to turn off. Bottom line - it doesn't play. Now we will see how long Customer Support takes to give some support.......
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