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."
Does it come in pink?
Indeed, this looks AWESOME, but it's lack of the magical iPod Click Wheel will be the singular feature that kills this product. The click wheel really is the best hardware UI, ever.
They missed one thing though. The iPod Mini is pretty, this one looks like someone drop a clump of dough, and stuck a display and some buttons in it. But I guess some people like the look of dough!
"copy" looks like a decent piece of machinery. but how lame is it that they've copied so many design characteristics from the ipod? look at the "commemorative" packagaing, which looks almost exactly like the ipod's packaging. and laser engraving on the chromed rear cover of a music player? wow, innovative.
Highlights: Drag and drop file transfer
Let's just hope it's scratch resistant and shock proof!
Because it's aimed at a different market! The mini is aimed at people who are considering a solid-state player: ie size is even more important to them than masses of storage space. It's also aimed at the more style conscious rather than us geeks: hence the multitude of colours for the mini and the choice of any colour as long as it's white for the ipod.
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
Once again, the competition needs to realize Apple's success is not due to its technical dominance but rather its popular dominance. The iPod (mini) is a part of mainstream pop culture. This new device does not look to replace the mini anytime soon.
Exactly what I was going to say. The iPod is now a status symbol. There may be more functional MP3 players (iRiver...debatable) and cheaper MP3 players, but the masses don't want the better player, they want the iPod. Besides, no one has really gotten user friendlyness down except Apple (the click wheel is perfect and the UI is amazing...my dad could figure it out after about 10 seconds and I once got a call from him asking how to open Word..).
Unf.
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"
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.
I registered an account just to post on this topic. For Rio to beat anything at all they'd have to have equal customer service. As it stands they don't. I own a karma. The shitty rio stick broke. I am a real careful guy so I don't know how it happened but the piece of shit broke. Literally broke right off. I don't want to lambaste the mechanical design but the workmanship just seemed shoddy. Then the rio wheel slipped off. All within 2 months of ownning the thing. Fine maybe I got a shitty one whatever I'll RMA it. First thing I noticed customer service is outsourced and is area code 650. Meaning I had to pay to talk to someone who can only handle tier 1 problems. Fine, that's the way it's down now. Sure enough after 3 15 minute phonecalls and two messed up RMA numbers given to me on " accident " I got my RMA number, sent the package in. To an address in Texas. Paid for priorty mail. Fine. Package got lost. Of course. Called Back to 650 customer service. Had it escalated from call center in India to something called legacy support - another third party CS agency. Within the span of one month they had done nothing to return my calls so I began emailing them They intially explained the lack of calls as they had gotten the wrong address and phone number for me; someone in India took my information down incorrectly. They (Rio Customer service) ended up discussing my situation with someone who they thought was my wife. I am not married, and don't even live in the same state as the person they called. They then got the tracking number I e-mailed them wrong 6 times. I wanted to document to them that I emailed it but they got it wrong 6 fucking times. I put in the number in the title the signature, everywhere. They still got it wrong. Mind you they never once called me back. Eventually I cut and pasted it from the USPS website. Magically they then learned that I was in fact telling the truth, but that no one at their texas RMA office could be found to sign for the package so it was never documented as being recieved. Finally I got the matter escalated to a supervisor. At this point it had been one and half months. They not only refused to give me the supervisor's e-mail. They refused to return my phone calls. This lasted two weeks. I finally faxed a copy of every e-mail to their coroporate office, two days later I got a response via e-mail my karma would arrive today. It did. So after nearly two months and 30$ I got it back. Yay. Sorry I just had to rant and wanted to warn peopel about RIO. I'll be making a webpage filled with e-mails and dates and times documenting the veracity of my claim. So it's not that I wish to drum up support here. Please note though that when you buy from a company you buy into their customer service. I own a ibook. I've had amazing customer service from apple. I have had the worst customer service expierence of my life with RIO. That in my opinion is why Rio can't be an Ipod Killer. They don't have the customer service for it.
If I slapped a nice LCD screen on top of a cassette player and stuck in my sneaker, could I get /. to call it the next iPod obliterator/dominator/masticator? How about taping a transistor radio to a toothbrush (get all your favorite music AND good dental hygiene!).
Seriously, every single portable media player is touted as an iPod killer. Can't something be a competitor, or alternative, or just hanging out having a smoke?
Not that I really care, I don't own an iPod, but these "killer" headlines are starting to sound like the "BSD is dead" troll.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
It seems to be that millions of people "beyond apple fan-boys" already have, considering the ipod is by far the most popular portable mp3 player in the world. This is despite the fact that there are alternatives with more capacity and battery life than ipods. The interface is the distinguishing feature.
Would you buy a car that you had to steer with two buttons rather than a wheel? If not, why not?
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
Sorry to post twice, but I forgot to mention this before. Here's your study in contrasts.
I bought an original Apple iPod back when they first were introduced. A couple of months ago the hard drive in it died, and rather than pay the $270 Apple wanted to fix it, I decided to spend about another $100 and get a new model. Upgrade and all that.
Well, wouldn't you know it, I got a bad one. It worked fine out of the box for a couple of days, but then it froze up and couldn't be reset.
I called Apple (I ordered my iPod online) and the guy checked my ZIP code and told me to take it to the Apple store at such-n-such address. I did, waited in line for about 20 minutes (during which I surfed the Net on the G5 at the store). I showed the guy behind the counter my iPod, and he said, "Wait just a minute, please." And he disappeared in the back with my iPod.
About a minute later, seriously in almost no time at all, he emerged and said, "Here you go." And he handed me a brand-new, still-in-the-shrinkwrap iPod box.
Me: "Huh?"
The Guy: "Here's your new iPod. Sorry for the inconvenience."
Me: "What's the catch?"
There was no catch. If your iPod breaks and it's under warranty, take it to an Apple store. They will hand you a new one and send you home. No Bangalore call center, no RMA, no waiting 2-3 weeks, none of that. Just "Here's your new iPod. Sorry for the inconvenience."
That was just cool.
I write in my journal