HOT: Best CD/MP3 Player in the Market $199

[aerialcombat]

iRiver Website

I think this is a very hot deal. I've been shopping for a good MP3 for months, and I've finally found it!

iRiver(very trust worthy), OEM maker of the Rio Volt series, just came out with a new design that will blow you away.

The price is $199, a bit pricey price, but you will absolutely love this player. comes with a sack and a bag. And earphones, of course.

I definitely think it's the best player in the market.

Some Specs List (compiled myself)
---------------------
Long Rechargeable battery hour 9+hr play back (30+hours with the battery expansion pack)
8 minutes anti skip protection
firmware upgradeable
built-in FM tuner
supports lyrics
plays mp3/asf/wma, even VBR mp3 files.
supports CDRW
Back-lit LCD remote (no need for LCD on the unit)
easy navigation
SLIM design (about half-inch thick)
multi language support

Hands down, this is the best mp3 player in the market. a hot deal is not just a cheap price, but when you buy a good product.

If you can read korean, their official korean website is here.

 

[luv2liv]

their ordering page is not secured. i wonder if it matters...

 

[jtallon]

For what it's worth, the hardware discussion boards at www.mp3.com are flooded with talk about iriver - all positive from what I can tell...

 

[AznRyda]

duh! everyone knows about the slim x.

 

[jamautosound]

I'll tell you what's a hot deal. That little mini-movie on their web page. Action packed, great acting and sexy chicks.



. . . ok, ok so there's no chicks.


Thanks, aerialcombat for the post.

 

[xcoldricex]

anyone know if and B&M's carry this yet? i'm going to get one, but i really need a replacement plan because i use my cd players everyday, they go with me everywhere... and get a lot of abuse. "extended warranty! how can i lose?!"

 

[AudiPorsche]

is it $199 American dollars???

 

[howhao]

sounds very convincing...where do i buy this?

what is B&M?

 

[WiseOne]

yes american dollars. you can order from

http://216.110.169.168/

 

[icer]

Their homepage in English

 

[kelvingk]

I just bought one of these things a few days ago. I actually drove down to San Jose to pick it up personally. This thing is awesome. It is well worth the $199 in my opinion. If you guys want more info, check the Sony MP3 CD player thread. Another person wrote an email to a CS rep at iRiver and received a lengthy, detailed reply that he posted up. PM me if you need more details.

 

[geckojohn]

Hey, Where in San Jose did you pick this up at?

Thx

 

[aerialcombat]

There's a company address on their homepage http://www.iriveramerica.com

I heard they are contacting a few B&M places for sales, but for now, use the website. Even though the homepage doesn't look so slick, you can trust them. i think. I'm pretty sure.

 

[ander]

Sounds cool, not sure if I want to get a solid state mp3 player or a mp3/cd player...dang.

B&M means Brick & Mortar...the actual store/building.

Someone find a deal on this thing!!!

 

[jandaman]

I'd rather get the sp250 @ $150
http://www.us.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10310798
I have the sp150? and love it. Gonna try to sell it to get the sp250

 

[nikko]

I thought the 250 was just an iRiver with a Rio logo on it. What's the difference between the iRiver model and the Rio 250?

 

[iluvdeal]

<< I thought the 250 was just an iRiver with a Rio logo on it. What's the difference between the iRiver model and the Rio 250? >>



It is basically. The Iriver 2 is the Rio 250 as they licensed to distribute it from Iriver. I guess Iriver now wants to distribute their products for themselves in America starting with the Iriver 3 (slimX). Hopefully some major online companies will start carrying their products so we can use coupons.

 

[LucJoe]

Ok, I really want to order one, but my feeling of online safety was completely shattered when I didn't see the little lock icon at the bottom of the screen on the order page.

Is it dangerous to order from this website? Would it be better to try and call and place an order?

 

[chexi]

The Rio 250 is the IRiver 250, but the Rio has some functions disabled (from what I've read elsewhere). Personally, I paid the extra and have a SlimX on the way.

 

[aerialcombat]

After using iRiver 350 for about a week now, I absolutely love it and I carry it with me anywhere I go. The thing's so slim, it fits in my pocket and the shock is so awesome, I was running with it without any skips. In fact, I've never heard it skip during the first week of using it. If you are worried about security problems, you can always call them to order. This thing is awesome.

 

[angrymaxx]

anyone know how long this takes to ship? I'm traveling outta the country next week and I could use it for the flight...

 

[marschw]

<< I'd rather get the sp250 @ $150
http://www.us.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10310798
I have the sp150? and love it. Gonna try to sell it to get the sp250 >>



The SP150 isn't released yet. If you have it, i'd love to buy it.



<< I just bought one of these things a few days ago. I actually drove down to San Jose to pick it up personally. This thing is awesome. It is well worth the $199 in my opinion. If you guys want more info, check the Sony MP3 CD player thread. Another person wrote an email to a CS rep at iRiver and received a lengthy, detailed reply that he posted up. PM me if you need more details. >>



Yep, the thread is here. IMO the insecured transaction is not a realistic concern unless you're on an insecure lan (such as a school network). Their American HQ which sells these B&M is 1716 Ringwood Avenue, San Jose, CA 95113, USA. There's also one other B&M that sells them (also in San Jose), it's on their iriveramerica.com site, but it's also $199. Anyway, here's the email exchange I had with their customer support that kelvingk mentioned:



<< Marcus, I apologize for taking so long responding but I've been swamped with emails and some of your questions I had to do some research to give you accurate answers which are in red. >>



Redness is, as you can see, removed.




<< Christopher Lee Papazian
Marketing Manager
iRiver America, LLC
Direct: 408-452-7960
cpapazian@iriveramerica.com
www.iriveramerica.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Marcus
Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2001 4:24 AM
To: contact@iriveramerica.com
Subject: Further IMP-350 info

I'm currently looking at getting a portable mp3 cd player, and I would
like to go for the IMP-350, but there are a few important questions
about the product which I have not been able to find any info about,
some of which should probably be added to the product's web site:

1. Most importantly, I haven't been able to find any reviews or
third-party information about it on the web. All I could find was
http://www.designinteract.com/news_d/10565.html which is just the press
release, which mentions cnet awards for this product. However, I
couldn't find any mention of iRiver or IMP-350 on cnet. Are there any
reviews out there that you know of?

In January dmusic,cnet, mp3.com, and a few others are releasing their product reviews of the SlimX to the public. So far I have talked to a few of them and everything is excellent so far in their analysis.

2. Are there any major retailers that carry this product? If I'm going
to be paying list price, I would prefer to not have to order online.

Right now TRG & Wintron are working on final negociations with the chain stores carrying the SlimX on their shelves. I expect mid-January to see it in stores.

3. Does it have a built in battery recharger? I see that it comes with
rechargeable batteries, but the specs do not explicitly state that
plugging the IMP-350 in to the AC adaptor will recharge the batteries.

There is an internal NiMh flat battery recharger in the unit itself, all you need to do is plug it in to a wall outlet and select the charge feature.

4. I couldn't find any pictures of the external AA battery pack. What
does it look like and how does it attach to the main unit?

It is like a 6? cylindrical tube that has a wire with a jack at the other end of the wire that plugs into the main unit in a labeled port.

5. What material is the chassis made of? I'm worried about the
durability of such a new product.

The top is made of a durable aluminum and the bottom is plastic. Rest assured it is very durable. You would be surprised what tests our QA people did to the unit before it was released to the public.

6. What range of bitrates can it play in one vbr file? Many players
have difficulties playing vbr mp3s which have some frames at 320kbps and
some at very low (e.g. 32kbps) bitrates. The IMP-350 specs say that it
supports 8-320kbps, but I assume that is referring to cbr files, since a
vbr file should be invalid if it includes frames both that high and that
low.

iMP-100/250/350/150 supports VBR (Variable Bit Rate) MP3 files range between 8~320kbps not to mention CBR files.

Definitely, supporting VBR means player can decode VBR files without failure regardless of bite rate change within the file. ( 320-->160-->64-->8-->160 ) It's not a characteristic only of iRiver products but the majority of MP3 players do support VBR recognition.

However, if the file is non-standard (non-Xing format ) VBR MP3, playability distinctively matters.

WinAmp runs in Pentium CPU PC may have not much difficulty in arithmetic calculation for seeking and decoding VBR MP3, where as many portable MP3 players based on DSP solution lack of MIPS performance hardly decode, to be more specific seeks the proper tracks within such files.

In case of iRiver products with Cirrus' EP7212 or EP7312 can recognize the file displaying message of "VBR file" on the screen and play up to the certain point of arithmetic calculation available within the chip's MIPS performance allocated for MP3 decoding, usually maximum 50 MIPS at current with the iRiver products.

7. The specs say it supports id3v1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, but does it support
v2.4 and v2.3, which is the most common 2.x format out there?

iMP-100/250/350 supports ID3 Tag V1 1.0, V2 2.0, V2 3.0 which may refer to what you have stated as ID3 v1.0, 2.0, and v2.3 .

In case of V2 4.0, the latest version, which has an enhanced tag information, is somewhat meaningless for iRiver product or for most of the portable players compared to PC based S/W applications as the LCD display provides the same basic information of filename and artist name.

8. Are there any particular types of mp3s which have been found to NOT
work with the IMP-350? For example, those which are made with certain
encoders or certain settings. I use many of the obscure encoding
features of the LAME encoder, so this may be a significant issue for me.

As mentioned above, not perfectly for non-standard (Xing format) MP3 files which are comparatively rare in these days.
Other than these are files mixed with MP3 and non-MP3, badly corrupted files, some odd or typically encoded files, etc.
If such files with basic encoding argorithsm determined iRiver engineer can work on them to be playable within our products respectively.

9. Is the unit really inoperable at 0 degrees C? That's an unusually
high minimum temperature. Where I live, it will often be below freezing
this winter, though probably not by all that much -- has the unit ever
actually been observed to fail at ~0 degree C temperatures?

The typical operating temperature recommended is between 0~40 C, normally refer to room temperature.

Player may used below or over the range, may not fully guarantee the functional consistency if it is left for considerably long period time. i.e. Delayed LCD display response time , delayed power on, less continuous playtime, some malfuction at button operations, etc.

Please be noted it does have sensitive electronics parts.

10. And lastly, are there any plans to add support for Ogg Vorbis
format? Additional formats I'm interested in are MPEG-1 Layer 2,
uncompressed WAV, and possibly some of the RealAudio codecs.

Latest CODEC of interests are MP3Pro, Ogg Vorbis, Real Audio codesc, MP4, etc. which are under consideration and under progress to be supported.

However, besides the developemnt leadtime, as it requires licencing issues at certain business condition we cannot say at current when will be the exact time to release the upgraded firmwares.

MPEG-1 Layer 2 and uncompressed WAV can be played with current iRiver players

P.S. Are the shoulder bags you were giving away to the first 300
customers gone yet?

I do not handle orders myself, I just handle marketing and dabble in tech support. >>

 

[aerialcombat]

mine came in abut 3 days with second day shipping.

 

[amdmaxx]

Brick and Mortar = actual stores, not online sales..



<<
what is B&M? >>

 

[anxman69]

I have to say ... that simply because this company took the 2 minutes to reply to an email with such depth, that they have gained a mountain of credibility with me. 85% of companies these days do not reply to e-mails, and to me, it's just like they're hanging up on a phone call. I feel comfortable buying from these guys when I know I can always reach them (even if just by e-mail).

cya l8r