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"In many ways better than the Ipod Mini" on by ethanw
Pros: Replaceable AAA battery, battery life, comfort, size, expandable
Cons: Software, manual, earphones
Summary: I have the Forge 256 and 512 and an I-pod mini. In many respects, I'll take either Forge. I may only be able to get 200-350 songs on the Forge, but they can be in any format, and I'll be able to listen to all on a 6 hour flight from NY to SF or SF to Maui. The Ipod dies after 4 hours, maybe 5 if you're really lucky. With the Forge, I just carry a couple of extra AAA batteries, and it only takes one that lasts 10+ hours. Using Sony earphones, it might even sound a bit better than an Ipod.
The software is more complicated than it has to be. I don't mind that it's slow. And the earbuds are terrible. I use Sony MDR-EX51LPs for all my players and my laptop. -
"Great MP3 Player" on by dmichalopoulos
Pros: Great sound quality. Good batter life. Expandable memory. Good playlist features.
Cons: Slight delay when shiffling on the expandable memory.
Summary: I really love this player. I like the fact that it has expandable memory (my decision was cinched because I already had a 1 gig card). The sound is phenominal and the ability to create playlists by any category imaginable is great. I can create a jazz playlist in no time flat, which is great.
The fact that this is a flash based player with expandable memory is very cool. There is no skipping, and with a 1 gig card, it has jukebox player capabilities.
Di I mention the sound? The preset sound options are nice, but being able to set the equalizers to my taste is a very strong option.
Most of the negative reviews are related to an earlier version of this player. The short-out bug has been fixed, as has the FM receiver difficulties.
If you are looking for a flash player, this is the one. -
"Not a bad unit." on by Deathbringer
Pros: Easy to read face. Controls pretty easy to use. Good sound. You can add more memory via SD card (nice if you have more then one unit that takes SD. Nice looking
Cons: Initial hassle getting it to work right. Writes to internal memory first. Software that comes with it sucks. Plastic door that covers battery compartment seems overly flimsy.
Summary: Originally I received this as a present. And I had the same problems people here describe. It would shut off by itself for no reason and then not turn on for a couple of minutes. Once I thought the thing had given up the ghost and I asked my brother for the receipt to return it. While I was waiting for that I visited Rios website and down loaded the latest firmware upgrades ect for it. Since those updates have been applied I have not had one issue with this unit. The FM doesn’t really work as a radio receiver outside and I really think it was designed to be used in a gym more then anything else. You know, so you can tune into the TV stations you may be watching. I have used it for this and have not had any issues with the FM at te gym. All in all (now that it works) this is a nice little MP3 player. It is not as loud as I would like…batteries really only last half what’s claimed (they last 10 hours). I think this unit is way over priced at 160. I would pay 100 maybe 110 for a working unit. The fact you can add and swap memory is a big plus for me. One thing I do not like is there is no way to designate what memory you want to write to if it is in the unit. The songs first go to the internal 256 memory then to the card. If your trying to swap songs between units it is annoying because you cant really. The software that comes with this works…but barely. I just use windows media player now.
Updated
Wow...I suggest that the price should drop and it does ! Do I have ESP or something? Anyway...I recently had to return my unit because it fell out of its holder and hit the ground…it still worked but the power button disappeared. I am writing this to tell you to beware. If you ever have to deal with RIO’s customer support they could really careless what you have to say. They were going to try to charge me $70 to replace the player but I talked them into sending me a refurbished unit for free. Big mistake. The unit came notably scratched and the SD card went in …but wouldn’t come out. Something was wrong with the spring. I figured out a way to get it replaced with a new unit but Im not going to tell you how. It wasn’t through RIO’s support though.
In the end this is a nice little player. So much so I went out of my way to replace it when I needed to. I think most units in the store have the firmware upgrade now so at $110 it’s a great buy. Pray to the Gods that be you never have to deal with the support line though. -
"Stay away from this one" on by xirias
Pros: small, works okay while it lasts
Cons: flimsy product and utterly abysmal customer support
Summary: We got three of these units for kids for Xmas. Battery covers fly off. Volume button completely failed on one within a few weeks. USB interface is unreliable with USB 2.0, we had to reconfigure a port to 1.1. Repeatable on different PC's.
These things are bad, but that's not why the unit is rated 2 out of 10. The reason for the poor rating is Rio customer support. Among the worst. They kept asking the same questions over and over, no matter how many times I answered it. Basic stuff like what model I have, when I bought it, its serial number. I started to feel like a prisoner of war where they were waiting for me to change my answer. Then after several emails back and forth, they had utter amnesia and sent me a link to start the whole process over. I finally gave up since even if the unit were replaced it would not be worth spending hours and hours of my life trying to get Rio to fulfill their basic obligations.
In the interest of honesty, their "customer support" group should be called Sales Prevention since that is what it's good for: ensuring that their customers will never buy Rio again. I know that I won't. -
"Best MP3 player ever!!!!" on by forbidden73
Pros: Battery life is awesome for a single AAA....Very small...Awesome sound...Earphones are very comfy
Cons: None so far
Summary: What can i say this play is great...The review mentioned poor FM receptioin but i only have that problem when its in the preset mode...When i switch it to the manual mode the reception is great...
If you work out or run this is the player for you...
Rio Forge Sport user reviews (256MB, Silver)
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