Slashdot Mirror
Rio Reveals iPod Mini Slayer
Remik writes "Rio has released a limited edition of its new hard drive based player called Carbon. Coming in lighter and denser (3.2oz with 5 GB of storage) than the Ipod Mini with the same price tag $249, twice the battery life, and nearly the same dimensions. Rio has only made 500 players available in the initial offering, so get one while they last. There's more info at cNet, Pocket Lint and Gizmodo. Highlights: Drag and drop file transfer, charging over USB and Janus compliance."
Well, technically it does work with the iTunes store, so long as you convert the songs to MP3 files, using hymn and an AAC to MP3 converter. Yes, the quality will drop but oh-so-very-slightly. (People tend to really overestimate the quality loss when transcoding a single time. Do it like five or ten times though....)
As someone who just had his Rio Karma die a sad, hard-drive clicky death, I don't think I'll be buying another hard drive based music player from Rio until they decide to up the warranty.
.ogg files, which is why I got the Karma in the first place. But if they can't produce something which lasts, I say don't bother. What were they thinking, putting exposed moving parts on something people will be putting in backpacks and pockets?
I had 3 Karmas die on me: the first after a month (under warranty; the power button stopped working). Then the replacement died after 2 weeks because an exposed wheel got knocked out of place while it was in my bag. It took over a month to get the third one back from RMA, and that one just died from hard drive failure, out of warranty. Overall, Rio had my karma in RMA longer than I had a working unit.
I've got most of my music as
"Once again the competition fails to grasp the fact that you cannot easily scan through over 1000 songs with a nub and your thumb."
Perhaps you failed to grasp that the Rio Carbon has a scroll wheel.
It's 500 for the limited edition Rio Carbon. The only difference between the limited edition and the regular version is a "collectors box", laser engraving, and a 3 month - 20 song pass on napster.r io/LE/
http://www.digitalnetworksna.com/email/
"Tread softly because you tread on my dreams"
Here's why:
All the components are (essentially) the same, except the hard drive. The hard drive for the iPod is a 1.8" part, and the mini uses an even smaller 'microdrive' that is the same form as a compactflash card, IIRC.
The 4GB microdrive costs about as much as the 15GB minidrive, hence the cost parity.
Rarely does speed/size equate exactly with price, there's a bottom-limit and a steep upward-curve as you move from low-cost to high-end electronics.
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
the blurb is very mistaken. Rio is only making 500 limited edition Carbons (with the laser etched back). The Carbon is widely availible (without the laser etching and the nice box).
They claim OS X support, but then on their software page only have the firmware as an EXE... Guess Mac users never have to reflash their player?
This sig intentionally left justified.
Rio has consistently had poor hardware and hardware that consistently fails. I bought 5 rio devices for friends/family some time ago. None of them survived over 3 months and all the work to get new equipment wasn't worth the hassle. The mp3 players in specific just consistently continued to fail. After a good three tries everyone just gave up. Just to be sure I didn't get a bad batch a couple of people also said their rio devices died on them.
I don't care what they make, I won't be buying rio ever again. Obviously this is just an observation of my experiences and other third party heresay. However that's a total of a good 10 people. Enough to tell me that it's not just me. Most of them got ipods already and my brother just got one as well.
So i'm gonna just get myself an ipod and see how it fairs. I'd do the whole christmas buy an ipod thing but this time around i'll just think of something else.
No, the small run is because this is the "Limited Edition". It's a promotional gimmick. They've already started the run of many thousands of regular edition Carbons that are currently starting to stock stores around the US (Some have already purchased units at a couple of Best Buys).
iTunes Music Store perhaps it, but since it supports MP3 and WMA it should support most of the PC alternatives out there. If anything it opens up more avenues, unless your already tied into iTunes.
actually, janus was the god of beginnings and endings. yes, he had two faces, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. his two faces was often used to symbolize dichotomies in roman social and political life; e.g., the Janus Gate symbolized both peace and war, peace when it was closed (which was quite rare prior to the Pax Romana under Augustus) and war when it was open.
interpreting janus as a symbol of duplicitly is a more modern cast of the roman god.
The ipod is a box, Joeseph. The ipod is a box. A white, shiny box, but still a box. I see people still walking around with CD walkmans, and I laugh at the large size and general bad battery life, but those chrome disc looking things still look better than a friggin box.
I mean, sure you can store more music on an ipod, but where are you going, oh Cain from Kung Fu, that you need 2000 of your favourite tracks resting on your hip? I use a nomad muvo, 60 tunes, size of my thumb, battery life is exremely good, and it uses generic AAA batteries, rechargeable.
Oh yeah, and can you say no moving parts? But still, if lugging a hefty hard drive around with you suits your taste, go for it. Chicks may dig apple, but they come over all curious about the muvo, heheh...
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
Apple isn't licensing the iPod to HP because of low manufacturing capacity, they're actually manufacturing the players for HP and then selling them to them. The iPod has been licensed to HP simply to increase the distribution channel and reach a new demographic. Also, HP is marketing the iPod like crazy now, so it just adds to the marketing hype around the product. There are many good reasons to license the iPod, but manufacturing capacity isn't one of them.
Additionally, iPod mini supplies were limited due to the limited supply of microdrives. The manufacturer of the drives (Toshiba I believe) has now ramped up production substantially. One of the reasons this thing is selling in low quantities is probably because they can't get hold of any drives. Besides, who do you think will get the drives first. Apple, who are ordering in massive quantities to fit the mini, or Rio, who just released a small number of fugly iPod wannabees.
Same here.
Pluses:
Ogg, MP3, and other formats, no DRM, no fancy software, looks just like a drive to my linux box. Good battery (haven't run it down yet), and sounds great. Probably missing a few more goodies...
Minuses:
I don't like the feel if the rocker switch, mostly because of my fat fingers. The new menu system takes some getting used to, not all that easy to get aroung in.
John
I dream in binary.
... because it is small handy and unlike the bigger model it is not so heavy that it pulls my jacket pocket down to my knee, I usually only listen to a few tracks on each CD so there is plenty of space for my favorite music, it is out-of-the-box compatable with OS.X/iTunes and ... well ... yes, I suppose it looks kinda cool. The only complaint is that that white belt clip that comes with it can not be trusted. On the positive side my iPod mini has fortunately survived two trips to the floor and is still ticking.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Or you could not use hymn and just burn the files to a disc and re-rip into mp3.
Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey trousers.
I've just ordered an iAudio M3, because IMO the iPod is useless. Why? Because it doesn't have many of the features I want in a player.
The iRiver, iAudio etc all have customers because they provide something different to what Apple is offering. Obviously it is not what the masses want because the easy interface and pretty looks are clearly appealing to most people.
But for some of us, it's just another player that isn't what we're looking for.
WMA support which is, regardless of what Apple maniacs might say, much more useful than proprietary AAC support
AAC isn't proprietary.
WMA is.
It supports Janus, you know, DRM and all that.
Are people still going to buy this product? Do you put action into your words, or are they just empty threats?
Janus was custodian of the universe and guardian of keys, locks and portals. Had two faces to indicate watchfulness and also to represent looking both into the past and future.
I used a pre-production unit for a couple months; it rocks. It was very small, very responsive (unlike the Nitrus, which was sluggish), could be trickle-charged through USB, and had the option of convenient driver-less file transfer or using various MP3 programs. Sound quality was excellent (I've used many MP3 players - Apple, iRiver, RIO, etc).
However, it doesn't support gapless playback, Ogg, or FLAC (like the Karma) and the pre-production unit didn't come with a case (dunno if the consumer version does or not).
Overall, it was the best hdd-based player I've used (beating out the Karma due to form-factor). The iPods' wheels (I've used 3G, mini, and 4G) are better than the Carbon's, but that's the only advantage the iPod has and the Carbon wheel is adequate.
But as good as the Carbon is, I think I'll go back to solid-state for my next player. The Carbon is light at 3.2 ounces, but the 512MB RIO Forge is under $200, weighs 2 ounces (the difference is noticeable when jogging and biking), comes with an arm-band, has an FM receiver, and has almost no lag whatsoever. Add a 512 MB SD card, and you've got a GB for less than the cost of the Carbon... given the convenience and speed of USB2.0 driver-less file transfer, that's enough storage space.
Anyway, before buying any RIO products, check out the forums at http://riovolution.com/
Actually that's a good thing because one of the problems of the Karma was that when it fell on said wheel it would tend to break because a 20GB player still weighs a lot (relative to a solid state/mini-hd player)
If you read some reviews or try a rio for yourself you'll notice that they've got an interface that's just as easy to navigate as the iPod interface, often there's more than one way to do something right
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
Sounds like you want an Archos. Popping the cover off and replacing the internal AA's is easy when they don't hold a charge anymore. The drives are big, the format is standard, and the screens are respectable, especially with the video-capable units. You'll have to keep wishing in the FM radio department.
I totally agree, by the way, about carrying my whole collection with me. Right now my laptop is my primary music player, and with a 40 gig drive, it happily holds everything I could want to audition for someone. It supports all formats, and the screen is generous, and touch-sensitive. The only thing it's missing is battery life, but for listening on the jobsite I can usually find an outlet.
And why did they not include OGG and FLAC support? OGG plus the battery life were the main selling points that got me to buy the Karma.
Always go to other people's funerals, otherwise they won't come to yours.
I noticed several things about the Carbon which makes me think Rio has taken a step backwards.
1) USB Transfer...the Rio Karma has a cradle which allows network transfer over ethernet...plug it in and it gets an IP from DHCP server.
2) No support for Linux...the Rio Karma came with Java-based music manager which works splendidly with Linux.
3) No OGG-Vorbis support (that I can tell from their site)...the Rio Karma plays MP3, FLAC, OGG, and WMA. After I ripped my entire music collection to OGG, I'm not about to revert back to MP3. The downside is there seems to have been some early problems with the Karma...my replacement unit has been working fine for 7 months...the original lasted less than 12 days. I hope they've worked out all the kinks on the Carbon.
No, no, no, no, no! Maybe if you're deaf, stick with the crappy stock headphones and encode at 64Kbit/sec. but otherwise, you will definitely notice. Buy yourself some Shure E3C's/Ultimate Ears/Etymolics, or, if you don't want to spend that much, spend $40USD on a pair of Sony NUDE MDR-EX71SL Fontopia's, then encode your music at at least 196Kbit/sec. You'll be amazed how much better your music sounds than with, say, the rubbish Apple white earbuds. Now transcode them from AAC to MP3 and listen to how crap they sound. But anyway, back to transcoding:
Lossy encoding works by stripping out the sounds that the encoder thinks your ears won't hear, using fancy psychoacoustic techniques and other assorted magic mojo. You get 10:1 (or better) compression, and it'll sound pretty good because most of the 4th gen. encoders (Apple AAC, Nero AAC, Vorbis, WMA9, etc.) do a good job of guessing what you won't miss. HOWEVER, when you then transcode this to another lossy format the new codec'll try to do this *all over again*, except it won't have much source material to work with this time (well, 1/10th of what it had before) and as a result will mash the sound terribly.
To use a variation on the good old "baking a cake" analogy:You start with your "source", which is a fully baked crusty cake (your 44KHz 16bit CD).
You want to make it "lighter" but appear visually the same, so, to do it in a vaguely similar way to what an encoder would do: you pull the cake into many pieces or so, then hollow out the middle bits and stick the outer crust pieces back together with some similar coloured icing. Flip it back over and, to most everyone, it still looks fairly like a normal cake (this is your encoding to AAC or whatever).
Now you want to "transcode" it. This would now be the equivalent of smashing this hollow cake up again, trying to take away another 10th of it, then trying to reconstruct the original "shell". Good luck, but it's going to look (sound) rubbish
(Yes, that analogy is pretty crap, but hey!)