Slashdot Mirror
iRiver Adds Ogg To Audio Player Firmware
Sesse writes "iRiver has just released firmware updates for its iFP-300T and iFP-500T flash memory-based audio player series. According to a news story on their site, this update includes features 'supporting the Ogg file format', so it looks like iRiver
can finally be added to the quickly growing list of
Vorbis-capable
hardware!"
Does it play ogg?
If Apple is so pro-open source, when are they going to add Ogg Vorbis to the iPod?
But producers of audio-playback devices are stuck with a problem: because the vast bulk of digital sound out there stored on PCs is in MP3 format, they have to support MP3, and both Microsoft and Apple are not helping by pushing users to their own particular patented formats, thus providing little incentive to support an open format. This causes problems: it encourages people to continue using the closed formats, and that in turn encourages manufacturers to only support the closed formats. This is wrong, seriously wrong, and serious issues of liberty - both personal and civil - are at stake here. For without an open format, the plug can be pulled.
This quagmire of open formats dying because they need to dominate the market before they can dominate the market will not disappear by itself. Resources need to be devoted, and unless people are prepared to actually act, not just talk about it on Slashdot, nothing will ever get done. Apathy is not an option.
You can help by getting off your rear and writing to your congressman or senator. Tell them that free and open music is important to you. Tell them that you appreciate the work being done by the open source and free software communities to create an infrastructure that will support truly free - as in liberty - music, but that if the problem of lack of commercial support for open file formats is not resolved, you will be forced to use less and less secure and intelligently designed alternatives. Let them know that SMP may make or break whether you can efficiently deploy OpenBSD on your workstations and servers. Explain the concerns you have about freedom, openness, and choice, and how patented file formats harms all three. Let them know that this is an issue that effects YOU directly, that YOU vote, and that your vote will be influenced, indeed dependent, on their policies on open file formats.
You CAN make a difference. Don't treat voting as a right, treat it as a duty. Keep informed, keep your political representatives informed on how you feel. And, most importantly of all, vote.
KMSMA (WWBD?)
You do not have to use Linux to appreciate Vorbis;-)
Help fight continental drift.
How is 500 kbps reasonable quality? It is damn close to the maximum it can go. As an example, I just encoded a pseudo-random song (okay, it was "Bring Me To Life" by Evanescence) and I only got 475 kbps anyway, using "oggenc -q 10" The WAV is 41.8 MB, the FLAC is 30.5 MB and the Ogg Vorbis is 14.1 MB (numbers truncated). I doubt that a portable player would even be able to output something with that kind of quality and not being in an quiet/acoustically perfect room, let alone using headphones/earbuds. Oh, and I use "oggenc -q 6"
Putting aside the fact that on a portable device you generally don't need really high quality files because of the listening situations you're often in...
500kbps is not 'reasonable quality' for Oggs. The encoder isn't tuned particularly well about about 200kbps, so anything higher is only giving marginal improvements and wasting a lot of space. Add to that the fact that above 160kbps Ogg becomes tricky to differentiate from the original, and certainly by 192 or thereabouts it's as close to perfect as it's likely to get.
...ogg on its face?
Tim
Please note that iRiver has actually had a multimedia player capable of playing OGG Vorbis files for quite some time now. I refer to their iHP-120, their 20GB hard drive player. Nevertheless, it's nice to see OGG Vorbis support on their flash devices as well now.
I bought myself a sexy iMP 350 about a year ago, and last night negotiated it's sale hoping to put the money towards a Creative Zen Xtra 30gb or MuVo2 1.5gb (anyone know somewhere in America that ships these internationally?) but now I'm having second thoughts.
I love to put alot of research into products before I buy them, and the iRiver is one of the few products I've come across with *very* few negative reviews. It makes changing to a newer player kind of unnerving, especially with the kind of dedication the Firmware developers are putting in. Actually listening to customer requests.
Incidentally, if any iRiver reps are listening, (IMO) you really need to redesign your HDD players, the features are so nice, but the design is so poor. Why an LCD on the main unit with the quality of iRiver remotes?
Here you can see a list of all the devices they want to implement Ogg support for sooner or later. For some of the devices, it's never going to happen because of hardware limitations.
:-)
As someone else here already said, the iMP-400 and iMP-550 (IIRC) will get Ogg support in January. I'm certainly looking forward to it. As soon as they release the firmware, I'm going to buy one of those devices, I guess.
It looks like some things didn't really go as planned, with the iFP-300 support coming so quickly. But hey, isn't that good?
I wish I'd known about this only 2 or 3 hours ago, I could have picked something up for my special someone.
Don't worry about Christmas. You can buy yourself a present anytime.