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i'll just stick with my iriver ihp-120.

20gb, usb-storage class, not saddled with shitty DRM, plays ogg natively, decent battery life, and... ...doesn't look like an ugly pile of shit like that rio carbon!

i mean really, who the fuck keeps coming up with these retarded designs? every rio device is unusably deformed in some way or another. it looks like they always sorta start out with a decent design, then someone in marketing says "no, it's not fucked up enough" so they go around and bash all the design engineers heads with ball peen hammers until they're drooling idiots. then they come back with the ridiculous chiba design and suddenly marketing shouts "eureka!" and starts selling it immediately.

the iriver ihp is no work of art, but it's far less annoying than the chiba or carbon.

Also consider the iRiver H140. It has a 40GB HD and USB2.0, it plays MP3, WMA, ASF, WAV and OGG, you can use it to read text files (8 line lcd), it has a FM radio and a voice recorder,...

It's listed on Froogle for $356.00.

It comes with quite a bit stuffed in with the player in the blister pack. I like the remote myself, but the print and the controls are very tiny (need good eyes). It duplicates almost all the controls on the main player. BTW, in addition to all the above, it's also an FM radio. :) Formats supported: MP3, WMA, WAV, ASF, OGG. (Records in only MP3/WAV.)

The joystick is a little tricky to operate, especially with the player inside the carrying case. Once you learn it, it's very easy.

Negatives: no playlists creating capability in the player; you must create a Winamp playlist with either it or their included software if you want to pick a list of tracks to play. If using headphones (including their included ear-buds), they must plug into the remote if you're using it. If you're using third party 'phones from the remote, the plug is probably too big to fit the remote, so you need to hook up the included 6" flimsy extension cable. The battery is a Lithium polymer that while rated at 16 hours appears to be non-replaceable.

http://www.iriveramerica.com/

http://www.epinions.com/pr-iRiver_iHP-140_MP3_Play er

I haven't used a floppy disk all year. Mostly I use my iRiver iHP-120 as a portable storage device, when I can't just jack into the ethernet hub that all my friends have in their living rooms.

while you're making some gross oversimplifications and this is an obvious troll, i can't help but partially agree. i despise the stupid wheel, the non-responsive buttons (when i push a button, i like to feel it depressing), and the lack of an off button (no, holding down "stop" until i _think_ it's turned off is _not_ an off button). the on-screen UI is pretty well laid-out, but it feels more like a "ok, we have a limited number of buttons, let's see what we can design to fit into that restriction", rather than something designed in a less-restrictive manner. but hey, what do i know - it's wildly successful.

as for the fanaticism surrounding it, it's just your typical "in-crowd" fad. except that the in-crowd is a bit more geeky than usual. will something better come along? probably. but i don't really care. i'm just waiting until i can afford one of these.

Yeah, you're talking about firmware. So hpw many applications have you bought that came with ongoing, free software updates, despite the fact that I'm told such a thing is possible?

Well, iRiver's been fantastic in that department. After seeing that owners of the legacy iHP-100 and some other models got ogg support *after* those models were no longer in the stores, it was clear they don't leave their existing customers in the lurch. That was just another reason for me to buy from them.

-chris

I would buy an Iriver player, but they don't have tempo adjustment.

Maybe not yet, but iriver is probably still a good bet, since they have been very active with their firmware updates. They seem offer significant improvements with each update. Just take a look at the latest update. So who knows, maybe that's coming?

In any case I'm wildly happy with this player: tons of functionality over the ipod (radio, recording, built-in mike, standard usb-storage protocol so I don't need proprietary software to copy songs and it doubles as a general file transporter), and it already has 12+ hours playtime: here and now. I just flew over to Germany from California non-stop a few weeks ago and I couldn't help but gloat (quietly, of course) about a fellow passenger and his obvious disappointment as his shiny iPod gave out several hours before the end of the flight ;-)

-chris

This is exactly what I plan on doing when iRiver release UMS firmware for my IFP-790T. That will make it visible as a removable drive under Windows, instead of forcing me to use the nasty "copy a single file at a time by dragging and dropping" manager they bundle with the unit.

Pretty funny though, a actual example of where Linux's driver support is superior to Windows when using a just-released multimedia gadget!

• Price. My 256MB flash player - CAN$295. 15GB iPod (the cheapest hard drive player I can get here in Canada) is $450. These prices include huge Canadian sales taxes of course.
  
  
• Weight. My iRiver IFP-790T is 36 grams. The iPod mini (which I can't buy here yet anyway) is listed on Apple's spec page as 3.6 ounces, which is 99 grams.
  
  
• Non-skipping. The iPod has a 32MB memory buffer, which is about 25 minutes. I jog for longer than this (or at least I try to) so the iRiver is better in this regard.
  
  
• Battery. I've been running on the included AA battery off and on for 2 weeks now. It's only dropped one bar in the charge display, so I'm guessing it's going to last most of a month without me having to worry about power.

I guess the only niche left after that is if you need something even smaller than an IPod Mini...

Yes, smaller, better battery life, more features... like this unit.

It's about the size of a pack of gum, can store 1gb, has great battery life, has a built-in FM tuner, can record and encode MP3's directly at up to 320kbps, and can play ogg's, too.

With a mic pre-amp hidden in an altoids tin and a pair of stealth binaural mics, it's a great setup for making bootlegs at concerts. :) Try the same with a hard-drive based player, and the constant spinning of the hard drive will eat the battery down in no time.

Both players feature audio functions not seen in MP3 Player before, like SRS, WOW and TruBass.

At last check, my iRiver iHP-120 supports SRS, WOW, and TruBass in amongst its EQ settings. Don't know about their Flash-based players, but it would be surprising if some of them didn't.

the PMP-120 They call is a "Portable Media Player"...20 GB, runs linux, looks pretty cool. There's no price listed yet but I imagine that it's going to be pretty expensive.

I'll admit that the iRiver h120 isn't as convenient as the iPod with the iTunes Music Store (I have to convert all of my iTunes music to mp3 before putting them on mine), but the device itself is extremely nice. It is only slightly larger than the iPod, considerably cheaper, and lighter. It comes with the carrying case, a built in mp3 encoder, optical audio in and out, and a built in FM Tuner. It plays mp3, ogg, or wma, and is firmware upgradable to play new technologies as they emerge. Battery life is right at 16hrs. It's not marketed as highly as iPod, but I vastly prefer it.

If you want a hard drive music player that supports OGG then have a look at the iriver hp140 also includes an FM Tuner

The best, most rigorous listening test in the world results in the conclusion that the results are within the margin of error.

So, it would be fair to say then, that it is arguable whether AAC is really better than Ogg?

The tie-breaker is the fact that AAC is available and supported, while OGG is not.

That's funny, Ogg seems to be available for every computer platform I care about. There are many portable music players that don't support it, but there are a few now that do. My PDA plays Ogg files just fine, too.

It's interesting that you seem to interpret "AAC meets my needs better" as "AAC is better". AAC doesn't meet my needs better than Ogg, so for me Ogg is better.

steveha

I just ripped a few favorite CD's to .ogg(vorbis) with Grip (very easy, totally Free), and my wife is going to pick up her 256MB solid state ogg player in the morning to listen to them.

Why are some people so negative?

Actually, there seem to be pr0n pre-installed on the beast... wonder what piece that blonde babe will remove next :P

Funny you should say that; I thought the blonde model looked somewhat familiar from, uh, somewhere. A quick Google later:

Jenna Jameson ...
Will be appearing in a series of ads for iRiver later this summer, promoting the company's new handheld video player...

The thing around her neck is an iRiver mp3 player

Pr0n to go!

You could just get an iriver ihp 120. It has OGG support along with a built in voice recorder, longer battery life, an FM tuner, and other features that ipod doesn't have, for the same price as an ipod.

product page
(it looks better for real tha in the picture on iriver's site)

This would be interesting to me if it supported Ogg/Vorbis/Theora. I just bought the fantastic Rio Karma digital music player, and I chose it over the other offerings, specifically because it supports Ogg Vorbis. I'm in the process of encoding my entire CD collection in this format, for both quality and philosophical reasons.
Besides the Rio, there are two other HD based players that support Ogg/Vorbis, the iRiver H120 and the Neuros but I went with the Karma mostly because it's the smallest of the three, the price was right, and the sound is excellent.

I love my iriver igp-100. It's only 1.5GB, but it plays ogg, and several other formats. iRiver even plans on adding AAC support.

They do have ones with larger drives, like the H120, with a 20GB drive. Also with OGG Vorbis support. I like the blue backlights as well...makes it really easy to see when it's dark.

I love my iriver igp-100. It's only 1.5GB, but it plays ogg, and several other formats. iRiver even plans on adding AAC support.

They do have ones with larger drives, like the H120, with a 20GB drive. Also with OGG Vorbis support. I like the blue backlights as well...makes it really easy to see when it's dark.

The iRiver iGP-100.
Major Disadvantages: 1.5 gb drive. No firewire.
Major Advantages: It's slighty larger than a stopwatch. Costs $200, not $250 (before accessories). No Software Interface on either Mac, Windows, or Linux*. FM tuner. Flywheel navigation (just like a Blackberry), excellent GUI. Backlight. Firmware upgradable. Passes the Girlfriend Aesthetics Exam with flying colors.

For the size and craftsmanship of the device, I firmly believe that this player is the better deal, especially if you already have a full-sized iPod (or equivalent). It is easy to operate within a pocket -- just orient the flywheel, and you can navigate the filesystem with ease. The other buttons fit naturally beneath your fingers when you hold it in your hand. The player does not require any accessories to use fully; my girlfriend can exercise with it clipped on. It also comes with a case. I find the 1.5 gb drive is perfect for a trip's worth of music, or a few weeks of commuting. This is useful if you have a lot of music that is overlooked in your normal music listening, or if you aquire music quickly.

4 gb for $250 is clearly the better deal. But the....philosophy of design is an invisible modifier to that price, at least in my eyes.

1. * There is absolutely no need to mention it's ogg support. None whatsoever.

===---===

All but the lowest-end flash-based iRiver players include an FM tuner. Even the lowest-end ones include a microphone for voice recording (the format is mp3) and many of the models can record FM broadcasts and from a line-in jack.

I have the iFP-380T (128MB), the cheapest model with line-in recording. To be honest, I haven't used it a lot. Most of my time is spent at my home or office computer where I can listen to all my mp3s or radio streams but I do use the iRiver at the gym. I've also used it a bit for voice recording, just "notes to self" kind of stuff. I've been happy with the recording capability. Since the flash players are so small, they have to use just a few controls to do everything. This takes some getting used to but once you learn them, the number of steps required to do any particular task is not onerous.

I haven't tried firmware updates yet to add support for other file formats or USB Mass Storage support but I've very glad the options are there.

It's not mentioned in the review, but you can download firmware for the iRiver 390T to play OGG files.

I use an iRiver 599T and play mostly OGG files on it. I love it. Very long battery life. (~25 hours) Quick downloads. Very light and easy to use.

It really could be an iPod-killer if only it supported Macs -- all the software downloads on the support page are .exe files :(.

The review lists "dedicated software" as a minus for the iRiver iFP-390T. Wrong! Here is the UMS update. My 390T looks just like a disk drive to my Gentoo box.

The iRiver H120 and H140 are iPod-killers with better looks, cheaper prices, and Ogg/Vorbis support.

First, solder is quite adequate to hold a headphone jack in place.

Evidently a lot of ipod mini owners would disagree with you.

If it cracks, it means it's either a bad solder joint (possibly aggravated by an improperly designed PCB or case) or a badly designed jack.

And pretty much all 1/8" headphone jacks are badly designed because they rely on ONLY solder and typically do not disconnect themselves when stressed.

If you want to see properly designed audio connections look at pretty much any Mackie mixer. You note that ALL connectors are soldily attached to a METAL case.

Unfortunately, pretty much nobody makes consumer, portable audio equpiment whose headphone jacks are attached to anything but a PCB. It IS a crappy design, but it's pretty much the de-facto standard.

Still, it's a bad design. It's a routine point of failure for just about any portable audio device (read the other responses in this thread).

Personally, I have a set of Sennheiser HD-495 headphones whose cord will disconnect at the earpiece when subjected to sufficient force. This saves a significant amount of wear on my portable devices.

If the ipods are failing this soon, I would guess that's they have an especially crappy design.

Actually, now that I'm thinking about it......I would shell out a LOT of money for a Mackie version of the iriver ihp-120.
It would probably weight 5X as much, but it would have killer sound quality and good resale value.

Once I RMA this sucker for the 3rd time I will sell it and pick up the iRiver iHP-120 20 gigs of OGG, WMA, MP3, WAV, plus a remote with LCD, FM radio tuner, and can record into WAV or MP3 in realtime from a built-in mic or stereo line-in. Pretty kickass. Sure the Karma is about $75 cheaper, but for a unit that WORKS, it's worth it.

I would also reccomend the iRiver 20GB equivalent

Battery life is excelent. It comes with a remote, which works well in a car--with shuffle mode, just hit one of the nobbers and it ffwds. It plays Vorbis files beautifully, and it has optical inputs and outputs--awesome to use with the home theatre system, voice recording capability (also works pretty damn good).

I just got one of these a couple weeks ago, and I'm very happy with it. I did my fair share of research, apparently Karmas' firmware was beta quality at best, and that's a big reason I went with the iRiver (and heck, for a gadget geek/wanna-be portable audiophile, it can't be beat)

I have had 2 of the lovely little Karmas die on me. RMA'ed the first one after an HD failure only to have it replaced almost a month later by one that skips while playing most of my songs and has repeatedly required formatting just to get it to shut down.

Once I RMA this sucker for the 3rd time I will sell it and pick up the iRiver iHP-120 20 gigs of OGG, WMA, MP3, WAV, plus a remote with LCD, FM radio tuner, and can record into WAV or MP3 in realtime from a built-in mic or stereo line-in. Pretty kickass. Sure the Karma is about $75 cheaper, but for a unit that WORKS, it's worth it.

Plus, the Karma only has a 90 day warrantee. The iRiver has a 1-year warrantee.

For what they do (and what they are) iPods are extremely expensive. Like all Apple hardware, you pay for the design (which is undoubtably nice) and the "cool" factor (helped by the marketing people). If fashion is more important to you than value and/or functionality then iPods are great (and I'm not criticising, some people value fashion highly and I have no problem with that). But if you want something which just plays music well, is functional, and is much better value, you should look else where.

iRiver iHP-120

Practically the same size (2-3mm thicker), exactly the same weight and capacity. about GBP40 cheaper than the 20GB iPod here in the UK and it comes with a built in FM radio and a great LCD remote.

It plays OGGs and WMVs but not AAC (plus MP3s obviously).

I actually have one of these ridiculously overpriced pieces of pop-garbage. Here are my thoughts about it.

I consider myself a power user of gear. I'm an older geek with some disposable income, but I hate wasting money. I usually take weeks to shop for and decide on a new toy. I have an older flash player and before buying the mini, I purchased and returned many other players currently on the market. I found that they were all either poorly constructed, or suffered from poor interfaces.

For example, the battery cover on the Rio Chiba falls off at the slightest touch. You have to snap the player into the belt clip if you want to keep your battery cover.

The Nitrus seems nice until you start using it. The volume buttons are mushy and don't always work. The only button on this player that works and feels nice is the "Riostick." But even that doesn't hold a candle to the clickwheel on the mini.

I have also used some of the RCA players, but Music Match is a horrible, crashy piece of software and getting files onto the player is unnecessarily difficult. My old flash player uses Music Match, and I found that as a result, the player tended to collect dust. I only went through the hassle when I really needed to. Usually only for long flights.

I did like the Rio Cali, even though the battery cover on this is a bit wonky too. But the player is $179. After adding an $80 256 meg SD card, I would be at $259. Why not buy better design and 4 gig for the same price? The marketing guys at Apple knew what they were doing. Though, if I were in the market for a solid state player, I would probably pick up the Cali or one of the iRiver players.

So, after trying many players, I decided to look at the iPod. When I first picked one up, I instantly knew that I had just moved into a new world. These things (minis and full-size iPods alike) are industrial design masterpieces. They feel good in your hand, they are solidly built, the backlight and display are beautiful, the wheel control is BRILLIANT, the GUI is transparent and iTunes is a simple pleasure to use. With the aluminum case, I feel like I could stand on this thing and not hurt it. The On-The-Go playlist deserves mention too.

The whole iPod experience is unobtrusive and pleasant. The mini fits seamlessly into your life. I have several gadgets that I carry with me. I wish they were integrated into one well-designed device. Until that happens, I need my pocket gear to be SMALL so that I can actually take it with me and use it. I can't even feel the mini in my front pocket.

I thought about getting a full-sized iPod, but I'm glad I didn't. The trade-off for size is worth it. I think the "for only $50 more" argument is silly. How many damn songs can you listen to on one charge? The mini holds 3 days worth of music! Your battery will drain after about 9 hours. With your firewire or USB 2 cable, you can quickly swap out music while you charge. iTunes is so easy to use, that the swappage is no hassle at all. And I have not found an easier way to rip CDs and organize files than iTunes.

For the record, I don't fit the "Mac Trendoid" stereotype (although I don't know many Mac users who do.) I have a beer gut, poor social skills, and I'm balding. I pretty damn practical and far from stylish. My wardrobe consists of jeans, t-shirts and sneakers and I only replace them once a year, if my wife is lucky. I'm probably one of the Curmudgeons mentioned above. But I do enjoy the finer things in life, and well designed electronics is one of the finer things.

This is also the first Apple pro

"There are several HDD based mp3 players out there which are just as small as an iPod, hold just as much (or more) data as an iPod, look like mp3 players (although I have no idea why that matters) and COST SIGNIFICANTLY LESS THAN AN IPOD."

OK, name one that they could have used to carry LOTR dailies (without a time travel device). There were HDD-based MP3 players that cost less than the iPod, but they are much larger. There are RAM-based MP3 players that are smaller than the iPod, but don't have enough storage.

For a little trip back in time, read Transportable FireWire Hard Drives from December 2001. The drives are larger and heavier than an iPod, and the costs are "Price: $219 (10GB), $269 (20GB), $349 (30GB), $699 (48GB)". The closest in size to the iPod is a Toshiba PCMCIA card for $399 that provided 5 GB of storage (and didn't play music, etc.).

Heck, even considering all of the iPod copies that came out since LOTR was finished shooting, the iPod is probably still the best choice, because it's a firewire device (i.e. much better than USB for playing video), and almost all other MP3 players are USB.

The only HDD-based MP3 player that's smaller than the iPod is the iRiver oHP-120 which doesn't have Firewire, and they "cheat" on size because all of the controls are on a remote control that they don't count against the size and weight. Still, it plays Ogg Vorbis, which is cool, even if they do calculate their capacity using 64 Kbps WMA's in order to inflate their numbers.

You seem to be under the assumtion that a lossless compression format would do anything with audio that would have to be heard on cheap, portable headphones or a small, cheap speaker.

This is speaking in general of all portable, small audio solutions, not a dig on any company, just before anyone decides to go on a tangent on me. :P ;)

With a small device like a iPod or a walkman, you can't bring the type of equipment where a lossless file would show any noticable difference. Hell, even low bitrates probably wouldn't show much of a difference. The lossy compression's artifacting would mostly be covered by the fact that the headphones or speaker can't cover what's being lost in the first place.

So, basically, why FLAC? Why waste that much space on something portable? Why wouldn't you convert that to a Ogg Vorbis (Ogg is a wrapper, not a format. But you knew that, right? ;) ) or other lossy audio file? It'd be a drain on the storage, and since there'd be more disk activity a drain on the batteries as well.

As for Ogg Vorbis support, the iRiver iHP 120s support it and are "only" 400$ or so.

while we're at it, we might as well compare those accessories with the iPod mini, shall we? Here's what comes with the iPod mini:

Earbud headphones, belt clip, AC adapter, FireWire cable, USB 2.0 cable

The whole package costs $250.00.

From the iRiver website:

* Backlit remote control with 4-line display
* iRiver earphones
* Carrying case
* Installation software CD
* AC adapter
* USB 2.0 cable
* Line-in cable
* External microphone
* Printed user manual

Furthermore, iRiver iHP-120 costs $399.99! *ahem*...

leather case...you mean pleather, right

No. Leather.

LCD wired remote...blech, I've seen it. Better than the iPod...ha!

I doubt you're seen the remote if you think it's not better than the ipod's.

Ooh, great you got all kinds of free stuff. Trouble is, it's all cheap-o crap you'd never use in public:

Are these the words of yet another apple fanboy in the throws of cognitive dissonance after paying too much for an ipod?
How do you like that nonexistent digital recording input on your ipod? Or how about the FM tuner, or the digital output?....wait you don't have those either.

external mic...yeah, if you like the sound of a hurricane every time you record!

As opposed to this gem for the ipod? I hope you didn't want to record anything in stereo......

The iRiver iHP-120 is an otherwise-great product and if they had software support for Macs, I'd buy one in an instant (it's currently Windows-only).

this supports ogg vorbis. And mp3. But i don't think it does AAC

I don't know how good their A/D is, but I've considered getting one for field & concert recordings. MiniDisc is not an option for me, due to cost and DRM restrictions.. Sony blew it.

I don't know how good their A/D is, but I've considered getting one for field & concert recordings. MiniDisc is not an option for me, due to cost and DRM restrictions.. Sony blew it.

I don't know how good their A/D is, but I've considered getting one for field & concert recordings. MiniDisc is not an option for me, due to cost and DRM restrictions.. Sony blew it.

iRiver's 512 meg solid state device, is probably about 1.95 cubic inches (I halved the volume of the rectangular prism, 3.9 cubic inches, formed by the dimensions, since it's closer to a triangular prism), or 68% smaller than the iPod.

The Rio Nitrus which is probably closest in terms of capacity, is 4.32 cubic inches, or 29% smaller than the iPod.

Surprisingly, the Rio Chiba, they're flash based 256 meg product is larger at 5.18 cubic inches, or only 15% smaller than an iPod.

Creative's got a player that's pretty comprable at 4 gigs but it's $300 and 5.4 cubic inches, or only 11% smaller than the iPod.

I could go on and on, but the point is that you're not going to get much smaller than the iPod mini for the capacity, nor the pricepoint . . . whether the extra $50 for 11 gigs is worth it is going to depend upon how you use it. Like I said earlier, for me docking and changing my playlists wouldn't be a big deal, and with 4 gigs, I imagine this wouldn't be necessary more than weekly (even at 256 kB/s, you'd have over 4 days of music). So for me, what someone else may consider a marginally smaller size, is something that I'd be much more likely to use, rather than leave on my desk because it doesn't fit in my pocket well.

As others have said, it's a matter of what you value (physical size vs. capacity), but the mini would meet my usage patterns much better than a standard iPod (which I feel is too big to add to my pockets)

But it is not particular cheap either. It's comparable to the other mini-HD based players.

Come on so how do you explain that people are paying 200$ for 256 or 512 Mo iRiver player?

You have a good point, but the numbers are probably better than you suggest.

I got an iRiver IGP100 for Christmas. It has a 1.5gb Cornice hard disk in it. Apparently you can get them for well under $200 after rebate from breast buy.

This gets my vote for best product on the market in the HDD MP3 player category.

iRiver iHP-120

Much more useful to me than an ipod.
Why? does your iPod have these features:
- plays .ogg .asf and .wma formats
- records .mp3 from live sources via external microphone (included) or optical input. (Belkin voice recorder for the iPod is NOT the same thing and it does cost extra)
- optical output
- Upgradeable for future formats

I've fondled one at Worst Buy; does anybody else have any real life experience with em?

And color me skeptical, but 800 songs (even at 64kbps) sounds like waaay too much for a measly 65-100 bucks. Especially from Apple.