plays MP3, WMA, and Audible (#2 and #3) formats * slot for optional SD or MMC memory cards * upgradeable firmware * backlit LCD displays MP3 ID3 info * 512MB embedded memory holds approximately 16 hours of music at 64 Kbps, or 8 hours of music at 128 Kbps *
1 Originally Like It - But Not Anymore
My first review of this product was very positive, although it felt kind of "junky" in ones hand. Over the last 45 days or so, the device has destroyed two of my Internal SD Cards (a 512 and a 1 Gig).
This device appears to have serious problems with the internal card slot. Once the device is left without the battery for a half hour or so it starts working again, but the transfer of Audible Books or Music (really big files) locks up the system and then it won't turn on. And then you discover that the Internal SD Card is damaged.
This wouldn't be such a big deal but I'm going to CHINA in FOUR DAYS. Now I need to buy a decent MP3 player for all the flying that this trip will include to, from and while in China. This has been a real pain!
2 Getting Windows to recognize Rio Forge May drive you crazy
I drove me nuts to get Windows XP Professional to recognize Rio Forge 512MB. I had to be on phone with tech support for about 20 minutes to fix this problem. It will work only if you plug the device in back USB port and also you must disconnect all other USB devices from your computer!!! In sense of good engineering, this is crazy. Obviously the design of flash card RIO is using needs to be improved. However, once you have spent your own money calling tech support (guess what RIO does not have a toll free support at all), then it works like a charm. The palyer is very good and worth it once you have jumped the hoops created by B+ grade computer interface design.
3 Died After 1st Use
This is a fairly solid unit and both software and controls are easy to use.
The "plug cover" for the USB port will be lost within 5 minutes (terrible design) but not really needed anyway. The arm band clip is a terrible design and does not stay attached well. The ear-phones are fairly cheap.
I probably would have rated this item 4 stars if it were not for the fact that after the 1st use, it quit working whenever I had a memory expansion card inserted. The Rio Tech Support seems to recognize this problem, but I could not get corrected so I had to return the item. Other than this flaw the unit functioned fine.
The iPod mini is only slightly more expensive and a much, much better unit with considerably more memory. Cheers!
4 Connecticut Runner
I'm a long distance road runner and I purchased this item from Amazon a couple months ago and have been happy with it. Positives - Its easy to copy songs from my CD collection to the Rio Forge 512 mb using the Rio Forge music manager. I have about 120 songs with about 20% capacity remaining. The directions are straight forward. I haven't tried to copy songs from the Internet, itunes or dogpile, etc. One AAA battery lasts a long time - maybe 10 hours of play. There is an indicator on face of the device and when only one little bar remains (I think theres 3), I replace the battery. Music doesn't skip or get slower when I'm running. The device is very comfortable on my arm and doesn't bounce around. The random shuffle feature of the songs is great for long runs. I did replace the earphones with Sony ear buds - I think they stay in my ears more reliably, are easier to figure out and operate without static. There's a radio, but I haven't tried that out. I purchased a 'beamer' thing from Radio Shack and now I can listen to my Rio Forge in my car by tuning my FM radio to 88.1. Negatives - I did duct tape the USB port - there's a little removable rubber door over the device USB port and its only a matter of time before that falls out and water gets into the device:(. If I have a major complaint it the arm holder for the device. It's lovely to look at (quite stylish), but does a poor job of holding the device in its holder. It would be fine for walking on a treadmill, but I'm out running with the cars on asphault - I ABSOLUTELY can NOT have it fall out of its holder onto the road with cars all around me or during a race with thousands of runners around me. I fixed that with a strip of duct tape. The duct tape works great:) (If there is a Rio Forge designer reading this, a small loop on the device would work well - I could loop the earphone cord through the loop and if the device got lose when running, the ear phone cord would keep the device from hitting the ground.)
Overall, I've been wonderfully happy with the Rio Forge 512 mb and would tell anyone that works out intensely (with lots of sweat, bouncing, etc) and doesn't want a PhD in MPs, this is what you want.
5 Annoying Software, Flimsy Construction
I have been using a Rio Chiba 256, and despite it's flimsy construction, have had pretty good luck with it. I added a 256Mb SD card for some extra storage, and integration of the card was no problem. So when I saw that Rio was making a "ruggedly constructed" 512Mb player that could take up to a 1GB SD card, I bit. . . and I'm sorry I did! First of all, the Forge is of even cheaper construction than the Chiba. The battery cover seems to barely hang on, and there is a tiny "plug" that covers the USB port when not in use...this plug is not attached to the player and is extremely easy to lose, even when it is in place but the player is bouncing around in your pocket. In fact, mine's gone already! In addition, I purchased a 1GB SD card to bring the Forge up to an impressive 1.5GB of flash memory, enough for hours of songs and every episode of "The Shadow" or "Dragnet" or "Sherlock Holmes". Then, while loading them and attempting to get them each on their own playlists, I kept getting an error that the "player was out of space"! After several emails, the response to which was always short and useless, I finally called Rio on my own dime. I was on the phone with them for about 90 minutes. I'll say this. . . the support on the phone is much better than via email, as the techs at least tried really hard to solve my problems. Eventually we determined that the "Playlists" have to be saved on the internal memory, not the SD card. This really cut down on the amount of error messages I got, and eventually I was able to load the Forge up to almost full capacity. But another problem is evident here as well. When you load new material, or shift playlists around, or basically change anything about the way the Forge is loaded, it takes about 10 minutes after you turn it on to "integrate" all the new information! That's a long time, so make sure you have batteries that will last for the whole "initialization" (because the backlight STAYS ON too...good thinking Rio...NOT), or you'll be waiting again after replacing them. The software is a bit strange too. If you want to play music based on "Playlist", you've got to navigate down a couple menus. But playing by year or track number are way earlier on the menu than playlist. . . seems backwards to me, but I guess you can't please everyone. Overall, because of the trouble I had initially getting it to work, and the strange behavior it exhibits even when it's working "properly", I can't recommend this player to anyone.
It does have a few good points. . . it doesn't use a proprietary rechargeable battery. Since I travel alot, using a regular AA or AAA (it uses the latter) was a prerequisite, and battery life is quite good. It also uses USB 2.0, thank goodness. Sound quality is ok (as with most MP3 players, get a decent pair of earphones yourself, the included ones are mediocre). The finish of the Forge (the 512 is dark blue and silver) looks nice until you have it in your hand for a few seconds, then the shiny finish is all smeared with your grubby fingerprints. They should have tried a more matte finish.
Okay, my rant is almost finished. . .my recommendation if you want a capacious flash based player is to wait until Jet Audio or someone else gets the memory up (they're at 1 GB now) and read reviews on those machines.
6 Meets expectations
I tried to do a lot of research before purchasing an MP3 player. I weighed the advantages of a flash-based player versus a drive-based player, and after settling on a flash-based player, debated sometime between the Rio Forge and various models from iRiver. Despite much more glowing reviews for the iRiver models, and quite a few disparaging reviews of the Rio Forge, I settled on the Forge. It seemed as acceptable as any other flash-based player, and its expandability was very attractive.
I haven't had any issues with using the player since I got it. I've used two different sets of headphones with it, and both have worked adequately, including a set of Sony headphones. There is indeed a slight delay between tracks, especially in shuffle mode, but to me it's not much worse than a CD player. The sound quality is good, ripping and encoding songs as WMA files at a compression rate of 192 kbps. Slight variations in song quality have been due to varying quality in the actual CDs.
The software is pretty intuitive in my opinion, and pretty easy to use. It's probably worthwhile to read the instructions that come with the player, though, both on the instruction sheet and on the CD. I also like the fact that I can use drag-and-drop to add or remove songs from the player. My WinXP computer had no problems communicating with the player.
The sportband is a bit unusual compared to the bands that come with the Rio Cali models. My player has already taken a tumble at the gym, dropping 2-3 feet, but it was not damaged in the least. The player seems to be a fairly sturdy, reliable device that has met my expectations.
7 Good deal
I use this for biking running and weight lifting (sadly no underwater MP3 Player yet). The battery life is good and the sound quality is also excellent. Only complaints are the armband which is poorly designed.
8 Forge is great
I have had no problems with my Rio Forge. I cannot understand where the bad experiences come from. Either they have old players with production problems that have been corrected, or they work for Apple :) Easy to use, nice looking, comes with a clip and armband, and best of all for me, an SD slot! I have 50% loss of hearing in one ear and cannot listen to my car stereo anymore due to the background noise. With the Rio, I can hear music perfectly. I did however purchase a pair of Shure E3C sound isolating headphones to further reduce the corruption of the sound caused by the hearing loss and the background noise in the car. Bad idea? I'll let you know.
9 Risky buy - problematic player
Unfortunatly I didn't heed some of the reviews on this player.
The audio quality is inconsitent - sometimes it sounds great, other times the same file/song is horribly mangled sounding. Not something I expect from a brand new player.
I like how small and lightweight this player is. However for a "sport" player it is has a flimsy, plasticy feel too it. The headphone jack is of low quality, with my brand new Sony MDR-EX71SL headphones (actually with any headphones except the ones that come with the Rio) the connection isn't consistent - you have to jiggle the connection to get audio.
Very disappointing.
10 Don't buy this product
I am a runner who occasionally needs to be out there in the elements. I love to listen to Audible audiobooks and music as well. I currently own an IPod which works very well, but I don't want to expose it to rain.
I figured that the Rio Forge Sport model would be just the ticket. I purchased one in December and promptly found out it was defective. It kept freezing up, it would not download content and finally gave up the ghost completely.. I was asked to send it to the manufacturer.
Five weeks later I just received my new one. I follow all the directions.. it freezes up on me, it does not download content. I downloaded two books from Audible and they are not to be found on the unit. It locked up my computer. When I tried to turn the computer back on the screen was black...
Rio wants me to send it back to them so that they can have me wait another five or six weeks for a new unit that will undoubtedly be defective again.
Please ... don't bother with this product. I am sure there are others that work much better. Certainly the IPod installation was flawless for everyone that I know.
11 Good little player, even for Linux users
This is my first mp3 player and was kind of an impulse buy, but I am pleased with the size, weight, and easy usability - the control buttons have a nice, solid click so you know when you've actually pressed hard enough to make a selection.
I was unsure how I would get music onto the player since the Rio Music Manager software is Windows only and I primarily am a linux user, but this is surprisingly easy just using any file manager. I used a two-pane version like Midnight Commander called Krusader (KDE-ified Midnight Commander) so I could just drag folders (albums) from cd of mp3s to the "Music" folder of the Forge.
Actually, if you are using a newer Linux distribution with a 2.6 kernel (i'm using Mandrake 10.1), its easier to access the player than it is in Win98 (my other OS). When plugged into the USB port, an icon is automatically put on the desktop and is even called "Forge". The kernel just sees it as any flasy memory type device. Click on it and you get the contents of the player Win98 just puts a drive letter in the Windows Explorer window, AFTER you install a driver.
I copied a cd worth of ripped files (ripped from within WIndows Media Player on WInXP) to a cd and used that cd to copy to the Music folder of the Forge. I was surprised, but all the ID3 tags were copied correctly as well and I could use the built-in menus of the forge (play by album, artist, genre, etc) to play what I copied. I should say that since I didnt rip the files on my linux box I dont know if the same is true if I were to use Grip to rip the cds. That's the next project.
There is minimal instructions included in the package, and the armband has NO pictures of how you should attach the holder to the band, so good luck. I guess there's always duct tape.
The firmware upgrade couldnt be easier (must use windows or Mac to do it though) - no goofy steps like holding 3 buttons while simultaneously plugging it in or anything. Just plug it in, launch the executable.
With the $20 rebate, this player seems like a good value.
12 DO NOT BUY!!!!
I WANT A REFUND!!!
Ever since I bought my RioForge 512 in October 2004 I've had nothing but problems. I've been patient and thought these problems would be solved with firmware updates, but they have not.
My issues are the following:
1.) I turn the player on and quite often it will go through the start up, and then shut off.
2.) when going from tuner mode to player mode it takes at least 10 seconds for a file to play.
3.) it takes at least 5 seconds from the time when one song ends and the next begins, this is most annoying.
4.) The player will shut off for no reason, even with a fresh battery. When I turn it back on, it has lost it's memory, and the date and time have to be reset. I use my player 6 days a week, for about 2 hours each day - and this happens at least 5 times per week.
5.) the SD Memory card is not recognized sometimes when I connect it to my computer and try to download new songs with Rio MusicManager.
6.) The armband and clip are very poorly designed. Last week while I was at the gym the player came off of the armband and fell from a height of about 2 1/2 feet onto a rubber matted floor, the battery cover broke, the Rio website states:
"The Rio Forge is designed for people that like to play hard and use music to play even harder. The new design integrates the protective rubber grip from previous models with a stainless steel face plate for added durability."
this just doesn't seem to have the durability that the website hypes. It seemed very "flimsy" when I first bought it, and now it's confirmed.
I've tried everything the Rio website suggests and have been patient hoping a firmware update would fix these problems, they haven't. Also, the Rio website does not make it easy to contact them, they tell you to try everything under the sun before e-mailing them, could it be that now that I've given them my money they want nothing to do with me? I want a refund.
13 Five star player with 1/2 star software
The Rio Forge is really lightweight; it uses an AAA battery and it's battery life is much better than an I-Pod; it holds enough songs for a weekend of hiking. It's only failing so far (4 months) is the software. Sometimes my Rio software doesn't recognize that the Rio is connected. It certainly isn't intuitive, and some things I haven't figured out yet. I have the previous Rio, a mini ipod, and the Forge. Dollar for dollar, though, this is one of the better MP3 buys. I'd take the Rio over the ipod if I were going for a weekend of outdoor stuff. The ipod holds more but the Rio is lighter and battery life much better. The earphones are even worse than Apple's. I use and highly recommend Sony earbuds if you can get used to the short left and long right bud wire.
14 AAC Playback???
According to Fred Mertz in the previous review, the Rio Forge "handles MP3s, WMAs, and iTunes AACs without incident".
According to Rio, this product does NOT handle AAC, proctected or unprotected. As far as I know, Panasonic was one of the few companies to have made a player that handled AAC.
15 Died after loading one set of files
I bought this MP3 player as an alternative to my old 40 gig iPod after its battery died, thinking that a flash memory-based player with a user-changable AAA battery was a better way to go. Unfortunately, my Forge Rio 512 malfunctioned after I used it only one use, when I successfully loaded and listened to a batch of MP3 and Audible.com files. It was sweet while it lasted, but after I erased these files and loaded another batch, no matter what I did (e.g., removing and reinserting a 512 MB memory card I bought in order to boost media storage to 1 gigabyte, attempting to load it using different music library managers including Musicmatch and MS Mediaplayer, etc.), my Rio Forge 512 absolutely would not recognize the media I loaded into it. When I used a card reader to see if the MP3 files that I loaded onto external memory card were really there, I could see that although they were indeed there, this lame product would neither display them on its screen or play them. It also has a cheesy, breakage-prone plastic cover for the space where the battery and card are inserted. I would avoid this product. It is a lot harder to use than my old iPod, which worked well for a whole 5 months until its battery died.
16 Perfect for Linux users...
The Rio Forge is a great player, even more so if you are a Linux user.
You don't need to use the provided software since the player mounts as
a flash drive, and you can just copy your MP3's over to it, put them
in directories, and everything "just works". I previously had a Rio
S50 and I am even more impressed with this unit. I believe in flash
players and the idea of "no moving parts", and Rio is clearly on top
of this segment of the market. Right now (January 2005) the units are
shipping with the 1.30 firmware and this seems to have fixed the
problems other people here have complained about. So if you are in
the market for a flash player you should definitely give the Rio Forge
strong consideration.
17 Don't be afraid to buy the Rio Forge
I read a lot of reviews, here and elsewhere, and many spoke of a lot of specific problems related to shutting off, and various other things. I can happily say the Forge worked without a flaw. I primaraily use it for audible.com books and it works perfectly. I must note that I just got it a week ago, and the firmware version is 1.3. Maybe Rio has fixed the bugs that existed with the earlier versions.
I have already dropped it on a hardwood floor a couple times, and it still works perfectly. I even tested the FM recorder, and it also worked great.
I rate it 5 stars because it does everything it says, and does it well. However, I wish the FM recorder could be set to go on and off at a specific time and channel. I also wish the audible.com books would be listed along with the songs (you have to go to an option on the menu system). Finally, I haven't figured out how to create my own folders using their software.
To sum it up...if you were like me and were scared to buy this because reviews you might have read, no worries...buy it!
18 Sweet MP3 player - tiny, powerful, with expansion
(1 week report) 4.5 stars.
This is the best MP3 memory player I could find for my Audio Books. I didn't want a hard drive unit such as iPod. It is Audible compatible, and I fit 10 books in it straight out of the box. They sounds just fine. I have an expansion card ordered which will bump my player capacity to 1.5 gb.
The FM tuner works well, and the FM record feature is cool -but you cannot 'schedule' recordings, which would be incredibly cool (I'd schedule recording of Woodsongs Old Time Radio Hour and All Things Considered, for example.) You have to turn the unit on and hit FM RECORD at the right time. If it would have allowed scheduling, I would have given it 5 stars.
This unit does not have a voice record feature on it, which was on my old Rio. I actually used it pretty often.
The headphones that come with it (and most MP3 players) are not very good - so I use my Sony (bought seperately) behind the ear headphones.
I love the tiny size of this thing. It's almost as small as a large key-fob.
Another great feature is the fact it uses regular AAA batteries. Available anywhere. No more being stranded on the airplane or a walking trip without being able to charge.
The display is small, but very high contrast and easy to read. The controls have a wonderful back-lighting for easy location at night.
I'll report in again in about a month.
19 Disappointed
I was very excited when I puchased the Rio Forge 512 MP3 player because of it's small size and high storage capacity. Well, IT DOES NOT WORK!!! The transferred songs sound warped! I called customer service (waited for 30min. for them to answer) and they were not surprised to hear my problem. I am currently trying to fix the problem online and am downloading their "firmware updates"...etc. This is very annoying considering i have not even used the product and I am already trying to fix a problem with it!!!!!!!!!
20 THE BEST MUSIC PLAYER EVER!
I didn't buy this MP3 player from Amazon, I bought it from Walmart. They have a $20.00 Mail-In rebate which makes the final price 156.97. This MP3 player is great for the younger crowd. You can record notes for school on the easy-accessable voice recorder, you can scan on the fm radio, or you can listen to the hottest music at your fingertips!
21 Owns its niche, certainly.
I would file this under "interesting/ nearly compelling", and actually deserving of five stars despite the 512Mb limit (other flash players go to 1Gb today). The keys to the Rio Forge's success are a very functional user-interface, nice "other-than-music" goodies, and support for SD/MMC cards.
The user interface uses the LCD real estate quite well. Songs have full ID3 tags displayed, scrolling when necessary. Title, artist, album info is stacked, so scrolling is minimal unless you have long info in all fields. The navigational system is intuitive, and while it isn't a clickwheel, the tiny joystick/ button combination works well once you adapt to it.
The music output is more than acceptable, but not quite equal to Creative's quality or level. It handles MP3s, WMAs, and iTunes AACs without incident. This makes compatibility fairly broad.
The best points illustrate the marked evolution of the Forge from its earlier Chiba/Cali roots. The device no longer requires proprietary software in order to copy files; the device is recongized as an external drive with all rights and privileges afforded to them via USB. A nice feature is the aggregation of the optional flash card into the removeable drive storage total. This allows you to copy a full 1.5Gb of music over to the device, assuming you have a 1Gb MMC or SD card inserted.
You can also format/copy/delete the aggregate; this might be a bit of a problem because you lack the ability to segregate, say, device content from flashcard content. I would tend to say it's not that much of an issue. Smart use of folders on either will help identify which content is removeable.
The device uses a single AAA battery and will go twelve hours easily at mid-volume. You can also specify the kind of battery (Alkaline or NiMH) and it adjusts the battery meter accordingly. This is actually a pretty good idea, considering the ubiquity of AAA batteries.
Some things I like are the FM tuner and stopwatch. It is designed to be a workout companion, and these two features make it especially appealing for big club members; televisions broadcast over locally-based FM, so your cardio workout is now accompanied by sound to go with the visual. The stopwatch is, well, a stopwatch. It also handles splits, so it's decent for running, not at all useless.
The usual expectations (presets for FM, inline recording, ID3 tag support, multilingual) all apply. It has a very good case with armband, and reflects its workout partner design philosophy throughout. Earbuds are decent, but if you're like me, you have a favorite pair already. No suprises on the input, as it takes the standard miniplug.
In all, it truly owns its niche for flash-based players. Hard drive based players cannot withstand the rigors of active running or quick movements for very long; any electronic device might break when dropped but the likelihood of inoperability is much, much less with the Forge. It certainly isn'g coming out of its armband holder without 20g of force. The ability to accept SD and MMC cards makes it more expandable than any other flash-based player as well. iRiver and Creative can't match it in this regard.
Finally, it's the intangibles that cement its primacy. It sits in your hand very well, and it looks pretty sharp. The cool blue backlighting only enhances its looks, and the outer cover is a big improvement over the Army Green of the 256Mb Cali. For a workout, this is my MP3 pick.
Fred
22 READ THE FORUMS FIRST!
Before putting down some hard earned cash go to the rio forums at riovolution.com and rioworld.org to see if the this 512 unit has all the problems from the previous 128 & 256 Forge models fixed. There you will find informative and up to date posts about these issues and whether or not this is a good buy.
The Forge line does offer some great features - that's probably why you're looking at it right? The biggest of which is the ability to put in a 1gb SD/MMC flash cards and vastly increase the memory capacity! This works for all Forge models.
Good luck and READ UP.
