The RioVolt SP90 is the simple solution for anyone looking for a versatile portable CD player. The RioVolt SP90 plays CDs with MP3 and WMA files as well as standard audio CDs. That means you can fit over 20 hours of your favorite music onto a single CD. Plus, the large LCD makes it easy to navigate through song titles and menus. With 120 seconds of skip protection and a battery life of over 15 hours, it delivers the rock solid performance you've come to expect from Rio Digital Audio.
1 The best CD/mp3/wma player ever.
I've had this CD player for three years and it just recently quit working. It wasn't just three years of use, it was three years of use and abuse. You could kill a man with this and it'd keep on truckin and truckin ain't for sissies.
2 Durn Good Unit
I have had my unit for 3 years now and the only problem in all that time is when the lid button to indicate closed position broke off. It was an easy fix and the unit still works to this day. Running a lens cleaner every now and then helps to keep the sound quality and readability up to par, also.
As for battery life; 12 hours using alkaline and 10 hrs with nimh, average. Higher bitrates tend to increase drain so I suggest 128 to 192 as the best range for battery life and sound quality.
WMA support is excellent and yes, you can use VBR for mp3.
I am planning on buying another one when this one finally up and dies on me.
3 Good deal at first....until it breaks
I got this player about a year and a half ago, used it mainly for travelling at first, then around the apartment instead of stereo (nice especially when you want to listen privately or not wake up neighbors). BUT, after fairly light use during this time, it now doesn't work....most of the time I'll pop in an mp3 cd, and it will 'choke', and display will read "no disk" error message. Sadly, this appears to be a common problem with this model (search the net and rio forums). So, until it happens, it's a great player for the money...but be aware, it's NOT a long-lasting player...moderate usage will get you 12-18 months, I think, and heavy usage, mmmmaybe a year.....me, I'm replacing with a Sony ;)
If you do buy one, batteries in mp3 mode last about 10 hours in my experience, and only a few hours for normal cd's (2-4hrs). I used NiMH rechargables with no problem. ALso, there is a 'hack' on the web where you can update the firmware of this model with a version 2.10 which gives you more options....intended for the SP-100, I think.
4 Too hot=no play.
I received this CD player as a hand-me-down from an older sibling, and, at that point, it was in seemingly perfect working order. Turns out, it was in perfect working order, but only some of the time. It skips more often than Michael Jackson gets a plastic surgery and will short out if it is too hot/cold wherever you are using it. Furthermore, I timed how long it takes to load a cd, when it was working, and it sometimes took over a minute and a half. The buttons are too sensitive and the equalizer settings are less than grand. Overall, a great paperweight, but not a good cd player.
5 Almost 2 years and still tickin!
I bought this product from a local Best Buy after returning a couple of solid state mp3 players conked out on me. I was fed up with mp3 players, and decided to give this guy a shot: the ability to play mp3 CDs was appealing.
I have had this product for almost 2 years, and take it to Gym often. The good thing is that I have dropped this sucker many times and it still works. It certainly seems durable, at least with my experience.
The bad thing is this player is not motion friendly while skipping often. You can walk with it, even fast, but the minute you start running: skip, skip...Thus not very good on treadmills either. However, if you just want to read in coffee shop or stroll on the beach, this CD player works fine. The battery life is ok.
Finally, I have noticed that ever so often (very rarely), the player has a tendency to keep spinning while not playing the song. However, I don't know if it is because I have dropped it one too many times or it's just a faulty CD (even though it happens has happened with more than one brand of CD's).
All in all, this CD player is a decent product for its price, but it does have its faults.
6 good for about 3 months
I got this mp3 player last christmas..... about 2 months later, the anti skip barely worked, it would wit perfectly still on a table and skip.... after another month of putting up with that it broke down completely and I just gave up at trying to fix it... now I'm getting a new mp3 cd player if your rich and can afford to replace it every 3 months then go ahead and buy it, it was great while it lasted
7 Somtime a change is better...
I like my old CD player it was nice (way back then) but the new
RioVolt SP90 is good it has nice navigation system,good CD tracks
(just don't jack it in a car deck it will slow down), Not many like it some people do so pretty much it has the same standards as sony and panasonic so just go out and buy and see what i mean.
8 Don't buy it
Sound is bad (too much treble, too little everything else). Interface is annoying to use. MP3 and CDRW play back is horrible - it stutters non-stop. Regular audio CDs seem to work fine but the sound is pretty weak so ... punt. Waste of money.
9 sp90
i like this player, but i had it for 2 years, and now i want to get an iPod.. but i doubt that the iPod will have as good bass as the SP90 Earbuds, i was wondering if anyone had any recomendations on what are some other good sounding earbuds or headphones, ps. my rio volt also doesnt play cds like it used to and it skips like crazy even if you go for a walk.
10 Excellent, but not good for something to take while jogging.
I got this about 3 years ago and it's always worked wonderfully well. If you are transfering from one of those standard portable cd players with cds that hold around 15 songs, then you won't want to go back if you buy this. With mp3 format, you can go from that 15 songs to over 200, without losing cd quality. Keep in mind that some downloads may have low quality, so if you are unsatisfied with a track, it's probably not the player. If you shake it around alot(like when jogging), then you will have trouble with skipping. Thats the reason for the 4/5. Also, I don't recommend using this with heavy duty batteries because it will only last about 1 1/2 - 2 hours. I do recommend purchasing rechargable Nimh batteries, as they last around 30 hours. This also comes with a car adapter which allows you to play your cd player through the car speakers if you have a cassette player on your vehicle.
I hope you enjoy yours as much as I have mine.
11 Low battery life, not many other problems
Whoever says that this thing has amazing battery life probably doesn't own a RioVolt. They must be reading the product manual and just regurgitating it out there. The battery life on the sp90 is somewhere between 3 to 5 hours. It is nowhere near the 15 hours that they claim. However, I have had no problems playing CDs or mp3s, and no problems with skip (haven't really used it during exercise.) It's nice to have around and you can just switch around your mixes by changing CDs, which is nice.
12 RioVolt sp90
This player works well as a cd player. After 7 months it suddenly says "no disc" sounds like it is a common problem.....any advise ??? should I just toss it...
13 great
I bought the sp 100 wich is just like it and ive had it for 2 and a half years. It works great. Just make sure u dont loose acdc adapter o ull spend more on batteries then the actual thing. Im thinkin about gettn a real mp3 player tho. Like the i pod 15gb. In my opinion thats the best there is.
14 SPEND MORE MONEY ON BATTERIES THAN CD PLAYER
This was my first CD mp3 player that I purchased. If you are thinking about buying this CD player maybe look at getting something else, beacause of many things:
1- It has horrible batterie life due to the large screen and the moving text.
2- It can not play small CD RW's. It starts to play it but skips like crazy!!! When went to web site and called the custumer service was horrible.
For these reasons I ended up purchasing a SONY CD/MP3/ATRAC/FM/AM/TV/Weather for about 90 dollars. With this you can burn a CD with over 500 songs on it and the batteries will last days and days of continuded playing.
DON'T GET THIS PRODUCT LOOK AROUND!!!!!!!!
15 Great Little Player
Awesome little player. To touch on a few points brought up about it:
1) It eats batteries, Yes when you are playing STANDARD CDs, however, if you are playing an MP3 CD you made yourself it plays for hours
2) Anti shock for standard CDs is good. Not so good for MP3 CDs.
3) I've dropped mine several times and have yet to have a problem with it.
I would reccomend it to anyone that wanted a player that could do both, I love mine to death and have had it a year now.
16 Finicky, eats batteries, then dies for good.
I have been thrilled to have an MP3 player and this one did the job - for a few months. Yes, it went through batteries every 3-4 hours, but I got some NiMh rechargables and was not too unhappy to change them. I bought a radio shack power adapter, but it would not work right with it. Too finicky. And it seems to have no skip protection for MP3. I used it in my car, but on bumpy highways it would not work.
Now it is 7 months old and has suddenly failed. It keeps saying "no disc" no matter what disc I use. I went to the Sonicblue site and found this problem in the Frequently asked questions, so I know it's a common problem. I tried to find out about repair, but that part of the site is missing. So, I now must buy another player and toss this one.
Some people may have had better luck, but I think that it would be a big risk to buy from this company or any future version of them.
17 It served me well...
This was my first MP3 player that I used. I got a Nomad Jukebox (I think it was the first one released...)for Christmas, and it wouldn't connect to my computer. I decided that I didn't want a hard drive mp3 player and took it back. The Rio Volt was sitting in the display case at Comp USA, so I bought it. I think I payed $[$$] for it (it was a 1.5 years ago), which was better than the Nomad. It was easy to use, just burn the mp3s onto a CD. It took a while to load the disk, and it felt kinda heavy. The navigation was frustrating, but it worked. The battery life is amazing on this thing! I think two AAs would last me 20+ hours, which is much better than the 8 hours I get on my 10gb iPod.
If you are looking for a[n inexpensive] and easy way to get into mp3s, and have a CD burner (who doesn't these days?), look no further than the Rio Volt.
p.s. if you can fork over the cash, an iPod would be a much wiser investment.
18 Strictly for light use
I bought this this player on a budget after doing a lot of research on it. I might have waitied and got the sp-250 but i would have lived. FIRST, DO NOT buy this player if you're a sloppy person who might drop it a few times. Mine fell on a carpet from 2.5 feet, and it has not worked without exhaustively shaking and messing around with it. SO don't ever bother jogging with it either. IF you want the bare-bones player that basically plays a god-damn CD, then buy this, don't expect too much with user functionality though, there are EQ settings, i like bass, but the U-Bass feature had too much bass and the rock feature didn't have enough. Despite that, the sound quality is still decent. Dont forget, this doesnt have all sorts of fancy bells and whistels, very very very basic functions. But still a good budget choice. 3/5
19 Bulky Battery Monster
I have been using SP-90 for almost a year now and haven't experienced any major problem. After firmware upgrade, it "thinks" faster, plays from a playlist, and rarely skips. It comes with earbug style headphones, not very powerful but very comfortable to wear. However, this thing is pretty big fella and can really weigh on you if you carry it around all the time. The worst thing is SP-90 drains a pair of AA batteries every 4-5 hours and it doesn't use the standard CD player adopter. I find myself changing them at least every other day!
My 2 cents:
1)Spend a bit more and you might be happier getting the slim iRiver MP3/CD player
2)If you already own an SP-90 or if you have to get one, stock up on batteries!!
20 simply, useless.
at first it was working fine, but as little by little i realized that the player wasnt lasting for more than 4 hours. i was ok with that at first. but it started happenening EVERY DAY or so. by then, i was worried. so this one time, i put new batteries in, and i pressed play... and... it didnt go on. by this i was really [mad]. i left it on my table for 2 weeks, and tried to make it work again. it worked... but for only 1 month, with the other complications i had with this. on top of ALL THIS, there was that skip thing. whenever i walked, the player would stop playing, and i would have to wait for about 5 sec, before it came back on again. anyone looking at this product should stay away from it.
21 A fantastic player.
All the RioVolts in the SP line (90, 100, 250) are great. I have the 100. It's anti-skip is wondefully good. I almost never am able to get mine to skip, especially when playing mp3's. It's built well, has a great shape for holding in your hand, and sounds great, too.
I really don't see the purpose in getting the 250 unless you're absolutely sure the stations you'd be listening to will come in clear on it. You'd likely be better off buying a seperate little radio that would deffinately get better reception and cost you 1/4 of the price difference between the 90 and the 250. And the fact that the 250 is firmware upgradable and the 90 is not is not a big deal either; my 100 is upgradable, too, but it was fine before I upgraded it!
In any case, any of these RioVolts will make you happy to own one.
22 Rio must be short for RIp Off...
To market any CD that requires changing the batteries more than once every four or five discs (at minimum) is only marginally acceptable. To do so with one that requires it every other disc should be punishable by castration and stoning. The thing skips if anything larger than a mosquito flies by in a fifteen foot radius. The battery case opens by farting on it (yeah, i tried it). And what's with the fruity little running man? Kitsch is cool for bar signs and bowling shirts, not electronics.
23 Horrible Customer Service and Lousy Product
Learn from me and buy someone else's product because their customer service is horrible if you encounter any problems!
The company customer service representative informed me that they are undergoing an acquisition and cannot currently fill orders for their products. I have been waiting for my carry case, which I ordered over 3 months ago, and still have not received it. They told me on 4 occasions that the case was shipping the next day but I haven't gotten it. Now, they tell me that it is on back order again (when the last time they told me they would overnight it the next day) and I will have to wait another month or more, and they refuse to allow me to cancel the order to obtain a refund of my money.
Oh yeah, if you're still crazy enough to consider buying this or any other Rio product, the player is of less than average quality, very poorly built, and very poor performing. For example, the battery cover comes open with the slightest touch and although marketed as skip-free it does skip with even minor bumping when I am walking with it in my briefcase.
Do yourself a favor and buy another player!
24 satisfied
BAH!!...i dont see what everyone else is whining about.
I've had my sp90 for a year and a half now. I've dropped it multiple times onto concrete, and it still works like new.
It NEVER skips sporadically, but i will grant that the skip protection doesnt last 120secs anymore. It takes about 10-15 seconds to load, but only noobs should complain about this, as it can't magically read 100 ID3 tags in a split second!!
Anyway, a solid product, fills the needs of any mp3 user who also likes their cd colection. All for a great price.
25 Piece o' ....
A boyfriend bought this as a gift for me after I checked out the reviews on amazon.com and thought it looked pretty good. At first, it was great. However, within 2 months I was having problems similar to those others have mentioned on here, including: 1) CDs (both MP3 and regular) taking either forever to start playing or NEVER playing (spinning and spinning but never starting!); 2) the CD would start playing but would suddenly hang up in the middle of track, or at the beginning of the track. I called customer service; they told me to try cleaning the laser lens. So I bought a kit, did it over and over again - and, no improvement. In fact, the lens cleaning CD itself kept hanging up!! So I just called customer service again and they are going to replace it with a new product, apparently a totally different model although they wouldn't say which one. *sigh* Just hope the new one works better!!! I would stay away from this model....
26 It has its problems....still....
It was a good thing I got a year warranty on this thing because a month before its "first anniversary" with me, it wouldn't work properly. I couldn't even move it an inch without the CD/MP3 skipping sporatically. After it stopped working all together, I sent it in for a replacement. I know they replaced it as promised because my old one had a scratch on it, this one didn't. Well, it still has problems and sometimes acts like a miniature LP player where if it doesn't like a particular song it will become stuck. Silence ensues and I'm walking around listening to nothing. I am wondering if perhaps this particular model can't stand constant play, as I do listen to my MP3's constantly! but still, it's just a CD player and even on regular store-bought CD's it does this "help I'm stuck!" thing. Not even skipping a few seconds helps and I end up having to kick it across the room a few times before it behaves itself!
In spite of all that, I love it and use it all of the time. I go through a hella lot of batteries, but what else can I do? It does help to have rechargable batteries and about this 120 second anti skip?? All I can find to program on this blue beauty is 10 sec. and 40 sec. Lately it takes up to a full minute to load any sort of CD and I'm really wishing for something that won't have to use CD's at all, although, I hate the thought of converting all of my CD's into MP3's just to listen to them! Choices and decisions! I say, go for something different and perhaps RioVolt will discontinue this beast.
27 A fine product
I own two SP90's, both bought for my kids. The MP3 playback works great, you really can't get it to skip. Battery life is terrific on MP3's because you can set it to spin the cd only when it needs to read more data. Most of the time it plays from its own memory, which uses nominal power, and the cd is still. Despite the reviews of other users here I can't complain about skipping on normal cd's either. You've got to shake it pretty hard to get it to skip.
There seems to be a lot of refurbished versions of this player for sale. Both of mine are refurbs. I couldn't be happier with the players, but if you are considering a new one, rather than a refurb, better make sure you can return it just in case.
28 Quit working
This item worked for a year and then died completely. It only had light use and I would not recommend it to others.
29 don't waste your time
so i was all "hey rio rocks...lemme get this."
but no. it sucks battery power like a.... yeah. this thing angers me! i'm going to take a bat to it, like in office space. i have to put batteries in twice a day. TWICE A DAY. and i use it less than 3 hours a day. it skips constantly and ...i really HATE this thing. it is by far the worst purchase i have ever made. GO, SAVE YOURSELVES!!
30 You get less than you pay for
I was given a (new) Rio SP90 in August 2002. I was pleased with it, right until it completely stopped working in December 2002. I returned it under warranty, and Sonicblue sent me a refurbished Rio that didn't work properly from the moment I received it.
In terms of features, the SP90 is adequate but not exceptional. Navigation through directories is well laid out, and the supplied EQ profiles yield a comfortable sound. The headphone output is low hiss and the sound quality is generally very good, especially on high bit-rate MP3. There's no display backlight, though, and no remote control.
The design is also convenient. AA batteries mean it's quite thick, and it's a little large for a pocket. But it's fine on a table or in a bag.
The anti skip doesn't work well. "Up to 120 seconds" on MP3 translates to "not long at all" on VBR tracks which peak at 320kb/s, even though the average bit rate is more like 150kb/s, which is disappointing.
The SP90 has good sound and adequate features, but is ultimately let down buy its build quality. The MP3 player my SP90 replaced is back on duty, working fine after lasting much longer than the SP90 before the Rio was purchased, and showing no signs of failure. And to send out a basically broken unit as a warranty replacement is shoddy customer service. Approach with caution.
31 WARRANTY IS TOTALLY WORTHLESS-BE WARNED!!!!!!
This is a very decent standard player, though the earphones are chintzy and no A/C adapter. However, after mine died, I sent more than dozen emails to CS to try to get it replaced. All I got was a standard email telling me to try another cd! The machine absolutely refuses to recognize any kind of CD (including commercial audio) after only 3 months of use.
I also tried calling customer service (a toll call) but gave up after more than a 45-minute wait.
Buy a Sony, Phillips or something similar that has CUSTOMER SERVICE & PHYSICAL SERVICE IN THE USA.
32 just quit working!
Bought this as a Christmas present for my daughter and it has already stopped working - and we are not even at the end of Jan! Not misuse or dropping - it is just inferior quality. This was a second attempt at this brand. A previous RioVolt CD Player - different model also proved very unreliable. I am now going to attempt to contact the company and get reimbursed but I am not optimistic.
33 Short-lived
This player worked beautifully for about 8 months. It is now completely dead and non-functioning. I can't believe I paid all that money for something that only worked for 8 months! What a waste.
34 they break down aftera while
I have had now two different Rio Volt SP90 stop working out of the Blue. I probably used each for around 3 months and they stopped working.
The first stopped reading CD's, the second stopped spinning. It seems to be common for this product. Stay away! (While it worked it was very good, though it skipped a LOT, I couldn't even walk with it in my pocket).
35 great product
I would recommend this product for anyone....I've got one for over two years and it's still in perfect working order....if you want a CD/Mp3 player to just simlpy listen to music...then this is your best buy
36 Great player for the price
I've had this puppy for over a year now and it still works flawlessy. I've had no problems playing any type of recorded media and the sound this thing pumps out is pretty impressive. The anti-shock is really good, I can shake it around without it skipping. My major gripe however is the battery life. This thing sucks down batteries like water. Also, you can't turn off the anti-skip, which some companies let you do to preserve battery life. Another minor thing is that there is no backlit display. It's a nice feature to have, but I can get around it.
I now use the player in my car. I bought a power cord for it so the battery issue is no longer a problem. Solve that, and this player would be at the top of it's class.
Final recommendation: It was a great player for it's time, but there are now a lot of other lighter, less battery hungry players out there for the same price.
37 Good unit, no problems after 2 years ownership - simple tech
Sure there are new fancier units which can store more and are more compact, but if you are looking for a unit that will play regular CDs as well as CDs with MP3s and WMA files, this one does the trick. With only a disk to spin, the battery life is not bad and it uses trusty old AAs. Once the disk spins and the song is loaded into memory, the disk stops spinning to save battery life.The firmware is user-upgradable which is a plus, because you can update the unit for new sampling rates and get new features added by flashing the unit. It uses cheap and reliable CDRs, so no memory to keep up with. The Nomad would be the best of both worlds if you want a hard disk based unit and CDR/CD capability.
38 If you can get it to work!!
My RioVolt SP90 sounds great the few times I've heard anything from it. With any little movement the adaptor loosens and no more sound. The little dancing men are wothless.
39 FRAGILE
I've never had a CD player break so soon after buying it. I noticed as soon as I took it out of the packaging that the entire product seemed to be made out of cheap, thin, brittle plastic. First the latch snapped after about a month, allowing my cd's to fall out in mid-track. Then the electronics inside just died. (I still don't know why; maybe I dropped it on a pillow) I still have the headphones, almost a year later- they're starting to hiss and crackle now.
Excepting the serious physical defects, the player did do a good job. Sound quality was high, and it didn't eat the batteries. no backlight and no remote were minor annoyances. When I tried to open it up to fix it, it was screwed together so tightly, I enede up breaking the casing around the screws.
It's just not worth the hassle. Although it sounds like a deal, I'd be suprised to find a student who carried this one with him for longer than I did before it broke.
40 Poor Design
I picked up one of these when I had to fly across the country recently, after my old cd player died. Shortly after takeoff, I pulled it out of my carry-on bag and the brand new batteries were dead; luckily, I had an extra set of rechargables with my camera. The 'Start' button is large, and positioned right on top, so it must have been bumped while packing it the night before, and it ran all night until the batteries ran out. The sound was okay, and it played my CD/R's without a problem, but the volumne was really wimpy, and especially inadequate on a plane. Then I had to change planes, and when I was back in the air, I pulled out the SP90 again, and it was playing away again, in my carry-on bag. The only way to stop this was to remove the batteries, which were not easily accessable (inside, underneath the CD). I returned it.
41 An okay player for the price!
December 12, 2002
I have now had my SP-90 for 24 hours and have been able to check it out. I am using firmware 1.0. I have found that most of the bad reviews that I read after I bought the player really did scare me, but now that I have it and used it I find that those reviews have only some merit.
The battery cover does come off and I solved that problem with a little tape
I have run 5.5 disk before the Duracell (2 AA) batteries died.
Drooped the unit to see if it would skip or break, it did neither
Very little lag time between each song, I am happy
The volume is a little low, but who wants to go deaf
Used unit in noisy room with TV on, no problem with hearing the CD
The little dancing men on the display is dumb, but the LCD read out is okay
A back light would be nice as it is a bit hard to read is low light
It spins up in a reasonable time and you must remember it is storing 120 seconds of sound to keep the skipping from happening. Not a problem at all...
I am not a jogger so I can not tell you if it will work under those conditions
Can not say much nice about the "RioVolt Getting Started" institutions the player comes with. It is not well written and forget the online guide, it's not very good but anyone can figure out how to use it. The unit is user friendly and intuition should help you run it...
I am not sure I will do the 2.10 firmware update right now as the unit works just fine. If you do go to the hack sit and get the information, the author does not make the institutions very clear so if your a non-computer, programer person, it may be better if you get a friend in that area do the hack for you. I am a programer so I just knew how to do it and the hack is sooooooo easy to do if you know programming. There is a review that was done earlier in this review section that gives a very good outline of what you really need to do. I recommend you read it first.
As for those that had so much trouble with their SP-90 they either got a lemon or are CD player challenged!
I got my SP-90 from Amazon.com, and my final price was [$$$]counting the 20 dollar rebate if I get it back! You can not go to Wal-Mart a get one for that price so I think Amazon.com did a nice job. (no tax and no shipping charges)
Merry Christmas to one and all...
42 great for my mp3s
I listen to a lot of OTR (Old Time Radio), and the mp3s are hard to play on some players because the quality of the programs are so low (usually mono, and scratchy at times). My friends recommended this one for me, and I bought one and haven't been disappointed in the least. It plays all my CDs, both audio and data mp3s, wonderfully. The sound is really clear, and it comes with a lot of options. The file navigator is easy to figure out too. I never had to bother looking at the instructions. One other thing I was really worried about was it draining my batteries. It seems to handle 2 AAs for quite a decent period of time. I still wish I could find an AC adapter though.
43 It bites... unless you do the firmware upgrade!
I ended up buying two of these units! They're great - good on battery life, seamless song transition, good menus, great sound, etc... but Only if you do the firmware upgrade! The firmware upgrade can be a little tricky, but you'll be glad you did it afterwards. This unit is great to hook up to the stereo to play your MP3s, great for travel, or if you're just walking around and you want to listen to some tunes. A++
44 it is bad
i wanted this for ever and when i got it i took it out of the box.I listened to it for around 4 hours. then i walked away. i came back 3 days later and it doesnt work! i have changed the batteries and still nothing.
45 Good for amatuers
This was my first mp3 player.
It was my partner for about 6 months.(I currently own Sony's MD Player)
Sound quality is comaparitively average. I recommend you to go with sony's.
Its some what bulky.
Though great for amateurs.
46 Poor anti-skip behavior
I use my RioVolt SP90 to listen to music and audio tapes while walking for exercise. I have found to be quite undesireable for this function, due primarily to the short 120 second anti-skip buffer. Invariably, withing 15-20 minutes of starting my walk, it runs out of buffer and stops playing. From then on, it plays a few seconds, then stops for as much as a minute before resuming. Very frustrating. No matter how I carry it, I cannot avoid the severe interruptions in play. I guess it would be an okay player if you have it setting on a desktop or something.
47 You won't get the rebate, but it's no good anyway.
This is the worst electronic device I have ever purchased, and I have bought plenty. I wanted something to play both cd's and mp3's. I bought it solely on price at Best Buy, because it had a [X] rebate. Best Buy told me to make a COPY of the UPC symbol to send in for the rebate, or my warranty would be voided with them. I did so. After waiting about six weeks, I got a notice from Sonic Blue saying that I couldn't get the rebate because I didn't send them the original.
Even though they put you in this Catch-22 situation, it's a piece of crap. You can't find a cigarette lighter adapter that will work with it. When I finally MADE one, from a tip that fit and a plug with the right current/voltage, it would only work with CD's. MP3's wouldn't work at all.
It has no backlight, so forget about using it in the dark, unless you're blind and used to feeling your way around.
48 A Real Dud
I purchased this portable cd player for my son and already it has problems. First, we would put new batteries in the player and within 3 days we would have to replace them again (battery drainer). Second, it stop working all together. I am disappointed with the quality of the product. I have to replace my sons Rio with another player. [Money] down the drain!
49 Every thing is OK
Will be better if the player can manage folders in the disk
50 Horrible purchas
This was hands down the most disappointing purchase of my life
51 Cheaply Made, Sounds Very Good
I bought this back in late May of this year using the pick-up from Circuit City option here on Amazon (this works extremely well) because I wanted a relatively inexpensive MP3 CD player. Overall I am happy with it, but the build quality and not-so-good anti-skip are somewhat big drawbacks.
First of all, the firmware that comes on the unit stinks. It produces good sound quality but lacks a lot of features. As is common with owners of these units I followed instructions on how to install the version 2.04 firmware for the RioVolt IMP100. With this firmware this unit is quite nice. It has very little delay between tracks and allows for Winamp playlists among other things. The firmware, either original or upgraded, is quite easy to use once you get used to it and works well enough.
The display is only 2 lines with a rather stupid-looking dancing figure on the bottom half. But that 2-line space is used very effectively by the firmware.
As for sound quality, it is very good. It is a step above my SoundBlaster Live! 5.1 sound card in my computer for both MP3s and regular audio CDs. The equalizer isn't anything to brag about, but it is quite effective for getting the most out of small portable headphones. The earbuds that come with this thing are pretty decent, especially if you add some foam pads to them. But I highly recommend some Sony MDR-829LP earbuds instead, as these will provide far superior sound quality and good bass, especially if you double up on the foam pads with them and adjust the EQ a bit.
As for build quality, it stinks. Quite cheaply made and I doubt that I will be able to use this thing for more than a year or two without it falling apart. And the anti-skip function is not very effective if you have the CD player in a pocket in your jacket and are walking at anything but a snail's pace. Otherwise, the anti-skip works fine and should work flawlessly in a car or other place where it is sitting flat.
For the money this is quite a nice MP3 CD player especially in the sound quality department. But you get what you pay for in build quality, though. Maybe a little less.
52 Pretty good unit.
Sound quality is excellent! It looks and feels well-built, sturdy, somewhat on a heavyweight side. I found that when using while jogging, even fast walking or any other vigorous exercise, it skips badly, unless you set it on a maximum 120 sec. anti-skip protection. However, on this setting it drains batteries in no time. My advice: if you use it for active exercise, get good quality rechargeable batteries, set it on max. anti-skip and recharge batteries after each use, as they will be pretty much drained down.
53 BY FAR the Most Amazing CD/MP3 Player for Less Than $100
I truly have not seen anything better than the RioVolt SP90. And trust me, I've been researching these things for the past two weeks trying to find the best portable audio system for my needs.
The SP90 has one of the coolest designs in the world. It has very nice features, including five EQ settings (Normal, Rock, Jazz, Classic, and Ultra Bass), all of which make a considerate impact with good headphones. It has a multitude of replay modes, and an easy to use Program function. The most important functions on all MP3 players are here too. Navigation lets you check out the songs without changing your current one, and the +10 button skips ahead 10 tracks, in case you need to go from song 100 to song 200.
The sound quality is... average. Nothing too fancy. 20-20K Hz is pretty basic. I highly suggest buying anything from the Koss KSC or S/PortaPro headphone galleries. They're mucho powerful.
Now, the bad. Really there are two types of bad when it comes to inexpensive electronics: the bad for the average man and the bad for those individuals like me who are technology driven.
The bad for the average man: I honestly can't think of anything. It plays perfectly and has very nice features. Unfortunately, for those like me, there is a problem: the tracking system. Since the LCD screen sports the hilarious dancing dude at the bottom, it only permits two lines of text.
(i.e.)
| |2 |5 |5| | | | | |0 |2 |:|3|0|
| |M|a|r|v|i|n| |G|a|y|e| |
Notice how the track listing always starts with the artist first, and if the name is too long, the SP90 will need to take some time to scroll the name to show the track title. I personally like to put many songs by the same artist on one CD. My Progressive Rock CD has about 40 ELP songs, 30 Tull, 30 Yes, some Moody Blues, Gentle Giant, and Deep Purple, and if I want to groove to The Gnome and skip ahead to Lucky Man, I'll have to look through every ELP song until find it, or memorize the listing of 40 songs. The other problem with the navigation system is the lack of organizing your songs by Title, Artist, Genre, Year, Album, etc. Of course, this option comes with only very high-end CD/MP3 players, so I really wasn't expecting this from the SP90. But if you're the type of person who needs this option, look elsewere (I have a few recommendatinons for you guys at the bottom of this review).
The Good:
- Supports MP3, WMA, Wav and CD files
- Supports ID3 tags
- Nice looks
- High quality sound and EQ settings
- Many features
- Big LCD screen
- Hilarious dancing guy
The Bad:
- No real tracking system
- Takes a long time to load the CD and a few seconds to load individual songs
The Final Deal: If you're looking for the best quality for the lowest price, there is NO OTHER OPTION. I can't state it clearer than that, for 60 bucks I don't even expect the thing to work. If you're looking for something a bit more advanced in the navigation system, you might want to invest a few extra dollars into the SONICblue RioVolt SP250 or an iRiver SlimX iMP-350.
54 Great product.
This product is great though it typically will not give you more than 5 odd hours of battery life on an alkaline battery if you use forawrd /search mode often.
However It is still a great product and I would recommend that people use rechargeable batteries with it .
55 Excellent CD/MP3 player
After using this player I don't know how people use non-cd based MP3 players. The RioVolt SP90 has played almost every single disk that I have played in it, the lone exeption was the fault of my cd-burning software.
It has played almost all of the MP3's on a disc, but if the MP3 has ID tag's of a different version the player won't touch them.
Also the player is remarkably sturdy. I carry it in my backpack, I've dropped it several times while it was playing and it still works great.
Even the included headphones are of a decent quality and sound good.
The one problem I've had is that listening to CD's, there is sometimes a hiss or other noise in the background.
56 Great Value!
This is one great MP3/CD player, especially for the money. I recently got one, and I have used it non-stop for the past month. It handles file with ease, and the navigation system isn't hard to get used to. The 2 minute anti-skip works as advertised, and it is good on batteries (about 12 hours). It is finicky with burnt CD's though... it would skip on CD's that I burned at 48x, but that was solved by turning it down to 24x. I have had no skip problems after that. The volume is a little low, but its perfect to listen to in most situations. This is a great product, and I recommend it to anyone on a low-budget income (aka teenagers).
57 Worked 4 a while
mine worked for about 11 months then it just quit working
untill then i was really impressed,ooks good,sounds good,plays mp3 cds then it quit reading cds
it dosent read cds or mp3 cds any more its a giant paper wieght
58 Great Value
Complain all you want about the small features that it doesn't have, or are not good enough, but the fact is that this player is the best value for money I know - tags and folders support, very easy navigation system, good sound and very reliable (I've had it for about a year during which I travelled extensively).
The only problem (which isn't significant enough for taking off any stars) is that the batteries do seem to end earlier than I expected, even with MP3 CDs, but it's not too bad.
59 Good for the price, not for loud places
Good battery life, no back light, maximum volume is low. good price. Durable...I've dropped it twice still works.
60 Not as bad as you all make it sound
First off, for all of the people complaining about the extremely short battery life, USE MP3-CDs! When you play normal audio CDs the sp90 can't read ahead and will spin for the duration of the song. The skipping problem can be resolved quite easily also. Upgrade to 2.10 version. -download imp-100.hex either from iriveramerica.com or riohome.com -download a hexeditor -open the file in hex editor and change the character imp-100 to sp-90 -also change the file name to sp-90.hex -burn it to a cd -load it in sp-90 and ur sp-90 is now sp-100 without remote and backlight. This new upgrade supports playlist and gives better skip protection. It also lets you customize the equilizer and starts the cd where you left off. Another thing, with this upgrade, there is no longer a short pause in between songs. The only MINOR thing i do not like about this is that little dancing guy on the last line..no big deal.
61 Worth The Money
The RioVolt SP90 is the simply a versatile portable CD player. It will play all your favourite CD's encoded with MP3 and WMA as well as standard audio CDs. I bought this product a year ago and it's still going stong. For those looking for inexpensive, simple, easy to use MP3 player to play all your favourite MP3's, the RioVolt SP90 is the way to go. It does exactly what it's suppose to do, play music.
A little advise, don't rely on the batteries, buy also the AC & Car adptors when purching the RioVolt SP90. If there isn't enough power, it will not play, however, if it gets to much power, it will skip. People complain that there isn't enough volume, what do they want, a Boom Box in their ear? The volume is just good. Attach the player to your computer speakers, and you would be amazed. I'll recommend this product to any one.
62 Not the best choice
I bought this player to use in a car. What is good?
1. Reads all my disks with complex directory structures and names in different languages without problem.
2. Sound quality surprisely good for the non audi vendor.
3. Navigation within folder reasonable easy
4. A separate line audio out
What is bad?
1. Start disk from begining after turning off
2. Battery life isn't so good as claimed
3. Display is too small and some information not useful
4. No backlit
63 Broke within 6 months
About 75% of the time, it wouldn't be able to start playing my cds (whether storebought or home burned). When it did play, most of the time it would get stuck after a couple of songs. Save your money.
64 It was amazing. . . for about two months
I have to admit, when I first bought this piece of junk I was highly pleased. It had all of the features I was looking for and the price was right, even though it has sort of a cheap feel to it. Plus, I was so excited that I could fit 100+ songs on one CD.
Then things went very wrong. First I found out that a pair of AA batteries would last- oh- maybe through one CD. Then the damn thing started skipping. At first it wasn't too noticeable. Now, any slight move I make the thing skips. Forget walking anywhere with it, or even riding in a bumpy car or train. My friend had the same problem with hers, sent it back to Sonicblue for repairs and two months later is still waiting for a response. Now tell me, how am I supposed to listen to music like this? Now ($$$) seems waay to much to pay for this thing.
65 research other products before buying this one
i got this player for a christmas present in 2001. it broke in march of 2002. one day, i pressed play and it said that there was no cd in it. now, only one cd works in it. and when i do put that cd in, it skips and i can barely hear the song. i do not recommend this prodcut to anyone who wants to buy a cd/mp3 player.
66 the sp90 Portable CD-MP3 Player
This player uses up AA batteries really really fast. Not good unless you usually plug it in the cigarette lighter.
67 For the value, the best, period.
I have had this for a week now. With a ($$$) rebate, this is absolutely the best you can get for under ($$$). The sound quality is good enough both via my home stereo amplifer/speaker and with the accompanied earphones. It plays every single brand CD-R and CD-RW media type that I have. It plays regular audio CDs and my mp3/wma data CDs without any problem -- doesn't skip on either kind CDs while I am jogging or driving in the car. I am so pleased with its ability to play all kinds of digital audio format that I have. For mp3, it played all my collections encoded from 32 kbps up to 192 kbps. For wmas, I tested with Microsoft wma 8 encoder with bitrate settings vary from 64 kbps to 160 kbps. This unit plays all of them with very good quality and I really doubt for normal entertainment you will ever need to encode outside the bitrate range that I tested. With the firmware upgrade which you can hack from its higher version sp100, it can now play m3u playlist, loading time is very quick and track transition is superb, plus, now you can have up to 40 volume level adjustments as opposed to 20 adjustments from open box. Even before the firmware upgrade, loading a full mp3 data CD only took 20 seconds for me, and track transition took 5 seconds, not bad at all for such an economy version. So far, I have played mixed audio CDs and mp3/wma data CDs for more than 10 hours and my two AA batteries are still in good shape. I use my old Panasonic cassette adapter to hook to my car audio, and it works great.
This said, I do have some complains about this unit:
1. As some users have pointed out, the battery door is quite loose.
2. It doesn't come with an AC adapter or car power adapter, and the size of its DC power plug is kinda stange that most AC adapters for other CD players won't fit, you will have to get a universal AC adapter with a set of different plug tips from (local store), which will cost you another ($$$).
3. The display screen has a little goofy looking figure dancing which occupies one line of text -- I really hope this can be turned off with their future firmware upgrade.
All said, for ($$$) (after the rebate), this is the best value out there -- I don't see any other players in this price range that can play regual audio CDs, mp3, AND wma files. I have never written a review for anything but this unit really deserves an exception.
68 What a piece of crap, made in China
Well, I purchased this unit for two reasons: functionality (VBR mp3s and WMA) and price ($84 and $20 mail-in rebate). Well, it's true what they say: you pay cheap, you get cheap.
The first impression was pretty bad: the unit is made of cheap plastic, the batery cover did not hold properly.
Functionally, it worked fine for 3 days. It read audio CDs and an MP3 CD that I made (VBR encoded). After that, I start getting "NO DISC" errors on my MP3 CD. I tried an audio CD, the same thing. The behavior seemed to be completely random. At times it is able to read my MP3 CD, but it displays different numbers of MP3 files everytime.
Oh, well, never trusted Chinese quality anyway, unfortunately, there was no info on the Amazom.com website (where I bought this player) about where it was made.
69 Very cool
... it is a great MP3-CD player for it's price. I would rate this less than 4 stars, but it is actually a pretty good CD player with a lot of nice features. I just think it is bare-bones in comparison to the SP-100. The best feature about this player isn't even a feature, but the price. It is so inexpensive, but it is really cool. I wouldn't spend $$$ more for a remote, a backlit display, and a stupid looking carrying case that the SP-100 has. If I wanted to spend that much on a CD player, I would get the iRiver SlimX.
70 Too many flaws that can't be ignored
Riovolt's SP90 has the potential to be such a better CD Player than it actually is. There are many problems to say the least, and if I wouldn't of recieved this as a gift it would of been promptly returned. Not to say it's absolutely horrid, I can stomach living with it, but I have several gripes with it that just can't be overlooked.
First off lets start with sound quality, now if you listen to your music on headphones as I do don't expect the SP90 to blow you away, while the sound is clear it's certainly nothing to shout about. Clearly this Portable CD-Player was designed for listeners who were going to hook it up to their car stereos as opposed to those of us who prefer plugging into the headphone jack. The "special" sound modes do little next to nothing for you, I can barely tell the difference between "Jazz" and "Rock" mode. And while this Discman claims to have a "bass boost" I found nothing spectacular about it, as the actual boost itself is barely even noticable, this a downside for listeners who enjoy Hip-Hop and/or Techno. It's ability to play MP3's is a plus, however it too has an incredible downside. When you pop in your new CD-R full of MP3's expect a 2 to 3 minute load time, that sometimes actually doesn't even work.
With all of this negative information you'd think I'd give it a 1 star rating and leave it at that. Well, maybe I was harping on the downsides a little too much, but they do greatly effect it.
My final advice is you'd probably be better off checking out other Portable CD Players RioVolt has to offer. The SP90 isn't the worst one you could pick up, but I wouldn't recommend forking over your hard earned cash for either.
71 A no brainer. At 65 bucks it is worth every penny!
My younger brother gave me a gift certificate for my birthday and I knew I wanted an mp3 player. This is a workhorse. The fist and most important thing I found out is that you need the correct CD ripping software. If you have a sound blaster 5.1 and are running windows 2000 or windows XP then download the Creative Play Center. Using that software will allow the mp3 player to display the ripped cd's title, artist, song and track number to be displayed in the LCD screen. Nice feature! The battery life is not 15 hrs as said but closer to 10 or 11. That was not important to me because I use it in the car when driving. I also purchased the KOSS car adapter kit and that elements the battery problem for me. The sound quality is excellent and the controls are laid out nicely. It is a light weight unit which is also nice. I do wish the LCD was backlit but for the price, who can really complain. It has had no skipping problems when driving on a bumpy road. I am very happy with the unit and think that the price is ridiculously low. It is a GREAT BARGAN! Buy one today, you will not be sorry.
72 This is not an Anti-Skip player!!!!
I also purchased this based on it's anti-skip claim and it fails miserably in that regard. It skips at the slighest jarring and I will be continuing my search for a true anti-skip mp3-cd player.
73 It's great in combination with the right CD burner
It skips a lot with mp3 CDs burned on my venerable Sony CDU926S. This burner is more than 5 years old and has a 2X maximum write speed.... a fossil! But I have a lot CDs I've got in trades with people all around the world, and every single one of them plays in the Rio with no problems. Likewise, the newish HP burner at work produces discs which play perfectly in the Rio. This might explain the varying experiences people are having with skipping. See if you can test it with a CD from your burner before buying.
Other than that, I have had a bit of a problem with skipping when I'm driving at speed on a bumpy road, but it's tolerable. I bought an el-cheapo car kit, not the Rio brand one, and it's fine. Not needing to depend on batteries seems to help, as does positioning the player where it's less susceptible to bumps.
I've been acquiring mp3s for years, and a device such as this is a must; it changes the way you appreciate music. I used to like making 90 minute compilation tapes. With the same effort I can make 10 hour compilation CDs! I'm going to make 10 hour colection of kids' music to smooth out those long drives with my children. From now on where I go, my Riovolt goes.
74 Excellent for the price
You can get over 155 songs, or about 10 hours of music on one CD in mp3 format. Much cheaper that 128 meg cards at [price] a piece. Using the RIO, you can get 700 meg of tunes on a 50 cent CD, which makes much more sense. Only con - it could have more volume.
75 Good features for a lower end player
The SP90 is a fine sub-100 dollar mp3/CD player. It is approximately the same player as the Rio Volt SP100, only without an LCD backlight, AC adapter, remote, and external ESP switch. Note that all the SonicBlue mp3/CD players are rebranded versions of mp3/CD players made by iRiver. The SP90 is a downgrade of the SP100 for a reduced price.
The LCD screen supports two rows of text and two rows of miscellaneous information. The top row has icons displaying repeat, shuffle, and low battery warning. The second row contains track number and time. The third row has artist and title information or filename for mp3s and wmas. The last row is wasted by little dancing figures and an animated round thing that serves no purpose. This makes navigation of the file system limited to two lines. It would be nice if SonicBlue/iRiver had actually made use of the last 1/4 of the LCD screen for something like displaying the folder name or displaying artist and title info on separate lines. The lineout plug is affected by the volume control for some reason. In all the CD players I've seen before, they were constant. It's neither a good or bad thing for me, just kind of weird. The plastic buttons are sturdy enough. My only complaint with the controls is that they put rewind, fast forward, play, and stop on one large round button. It's easy to accidentally hit the wrong function if you apply any sideway pressure. The round pad also forces you to look at it when you use any of the four functions. It's very difficult to do it by touch alone, which is useful when you're driving or when it's dark; you'll have first figure out which way is up/down/left/right by the postitions of other components of the player. Buying the optional remote helps but then you might as well just get the SP100. The SP90 is opened by sliding the blue switch on the front. It only opens up partially on its own so you'll have to lift it up by hand. The included earbuds are low quality, which is about standard for most headphones included with a music player. You should be cautioned about DC-in on this thing. I tried two separate 4.5V DC car adapters manufacturered by Sony and Panasonic and neither worked. The plug might be proprietary, forcing you to buy power adapters from SonicBlue. iRiver is a Korean company so they might use some other standard that SonicBlue didn't bother to convert. This doesn't affect me much because I've got NiMH batteries and a one hour charger usable at home and in the car. However, it may be wise to check with SonicBlue on this.
I've had no problem with skipping as some others have reported. The SP100 has a firmware upgrade that reduces gaps between tracks and possibly reduces skipping. While the SP90 is not officially firmware upgradable, it can use use the SP100 firmware to get added features and improvements. All it takes is a simple renaming of the file and a hex edit to change the name inside the file. Instructions can be found on the internet. This probably voids the warranty so use at your own risk. Some new features as of version 2.10 are reduced gaps, resume for last 10 discs played, katakana font display, winamp playlist support, display of time remaining, and reduced disc recognition time. Also, ESP control for audio CDs is lost because the SP100 has an external control for changing it between 10 and 40 seconds while the SP90 has a menu option in the original firmware.
SP90 is a good economy player with solid features. You should know that iRiver recently came out with the ChromeX iMP-150 for the US market. It's an upgrade to the SP100/iMP-100 with better button placement and a much better LCD screen (smaller pixels and no dancing!). It includes backlight and remote, but no AC adapter. If you're considering buying the SP100 for its backlight and remote, definitely go with the ChromeX. It's designed by the same people and is much better at lower cost. If you're willing to spend more, go with the SP250 or iRiver SlimX.
76 Firmware upgrade not needed...
I received it today, expected to try it out and then upgrade the firmware. Well I grabbed an mp3 cd, plopped it in, and the first song started playing in 3 seconds! Lag between songs is 1-2 seconds. Okay, I thought this was a fluke, so I grabbed another mp3 cd. Same thing. Okay, I tried a cdrw disk and that took 5 seconds. Either way, even if you can no longer upgrade using the hack (I have not tried), the new models appear to work much better than previous revisions.
I don't have the best hearing, but it was loud enough for me... as long as your mp3 rips have decent levels. The earbuds are acceptable. Overall, I'm very pleased.
77 This is NOT a portable CD player
I purchased this CD player because of the anti-skipping claim and that others had recommended it for running. I can not use this player unless it is placed on a table and not moved. It skips at the slightest movement. Certainly can't recomment it to anyone. It was a waste of my money.
78 Didn't do what I thought it would do
This was a gift, and although I read it a few times, it was not a treue MP3 player. My grandson, although somewaht dissapointed, said that it was of very good quality and seemed to enjoy it very much.
79 Could be better.
I bought my RioVolt about 6 months ago and have had no problems with it. it plays my MP3 cds with 300 songs on them great. The battery life is decent, and the controls are very easy. I wish it had a resume function because when you have 300 songs on a cd its hard to remember where you left off. Also, if you are planning on jogging with this, look elsewhere. I tried jogging with it, and for the first 2 mins. it worked great, but once the anti-skip time was up i had to stop to let it catch up. Not something i want to do. But i am now looking at getting a small mp3 player for running. I have not had any problems with it. It doesn't skip while riding on the dash of the car. Its great for long trips. Just burn your mp3s as data to a cd. Its great, but i would recommend going with the more expensive riovolt. i think it has a resume function, and 8 min. of shock protection!
80 Nice unit, rebate makes it a no-brainer
Got this thing about 4 days ago...had seen a lot of buzz on the net about upgrading the firmware. Well, I know how to hack at the byte-level but it wouldn't work for me. I'm guessing this unit now has a slightly different setup going so the old IMP-100 -> SP-90 hack doesn't work. Seems to have firmware based on the 2.01 rev level.
Doesn't skip at all when playing MP3 cd's...which is all i'd ever put in this thing. I'm very pleased with this unit and with a nice set of external speakers (LabTec Spin-60 for [price]) and a AC adapter, now I have a small stereo for my room that will randomly play 160+ songs off of one CD!
81 Worst CD player I've ever owned
I looked around, I read the reviews, I followed advice. Never again. This cd player has failed on every level to live up to its expectations. The battery life is nowhere near 15 hours. The sound quality isn't even remotely as good as the last portable cd player I had for 7 years. It did not come with an AC adaptor. Half the time I cannot even get it to play a regular cd. The instruction and problem solving booklet that comes with it is archaic and remedial at best. If I still had the packaging I would find a way to return it. But I don't, so I'm going to have to spend more money to get a REAL player, and give this one away as a joke. RioVolt, never again.
82 Skipping, skipping, skipping.
This is a great little player with plenty of cool functions. It is only good, however, so long as you are sitting still. Even with the firmware upgrade, mine skips when I run, drive in the car, and even WALK. It is incredibly annoying. Whilst exercising with it, it will stop playing every few minutes, and I will have to stand still and wait for the file to load back up. The 120 second anti-skip protection is a total joke. I would not recommend this item unless you plan to go NOWHERE with it. VERY frustrating.
83 Riovolt player
This player is great! Sounds good, however, the volume seems to be low even when it turns on to it's loudest, as well as skips when you are moving? I dont know if it's the cause of low batteries or something else. Overall, this player works great!
84 Riovolt player
This player is great! Sounds good, however, the volume seems to be low even when it turns on to it's loudest, as well as skips when you are moving? I dont know if it's the cause of low batteries or something else. Overall, this player works great!
85 Great value for Money with excellent quality
It is a good product with considerable features. Sound quality is very good. Earphones need to be improved. Otherwise it is a really good product with a sporty look and wide features. Also it is better than others because it can play MP3, Audio and WMA files. Power consumption is less because it reads in advance and buffers avoiding any hiccups and shocks
86 Great product, well worth the money
If you need the best bang for the buck in a MP3 CD Player, this one is the one you want to own! Excellent job playing MP3's. Doing the firmware hack makes it even better!
Pros:
1. Great features for the price
2. No skipping while driving a car
3. Plays all my MP3's, including VBR (Variable Bitrate) MP3's flawlessly.
4. Sounds great.
5. Can upgrade the firmware unofficially.
Cons:
1. Skips if battery level is too low, don't know if therre is anything SonicBlue could of done to prevent this (I suggest buying a car adapter for using it in the car and rechargable batteries if you want to be truly portable).
2. Didn't come with AC adapter or car adapter.
3. No officially supported firmware.
4. Included headphones stink, spend the money to get a nice pair, it does wonders.
5. Why is the highest volume setting still sound low?
For those of you out there that want to make MP3's that sound so much better then all other MP3 programs out there (plus much much better then WMA files, don't believe Microsoft's FUD)...look around (or ask) about how to start making great quality MP3's. You'd be amazed how much better your MP3's sound.
87 Don't Listen to These Reviews
Many people on this site are crazy! I bought this product at least six months ago, and for fun, I decided to see what these intelligent Amazon reviewers had to say about my beloved RIO VOLT. Well, The 1-star comments are complete trash, I suggest you dont waste your time reading them. It is quite apparent to me now that some people have no clue how to use electronics. I wouldn't say I know a lot, but I know enough to be able to use this product! Come on, if you can't get this simple product to work IT IS YOUR OWN FAULT! There is no way that the RIO VOLT doesn't work. I could be happier with it. In hindsight however, I would recomend a higher model, because the SP90 is getting outdated. In conclusion, I recomend this Product if you know how to use a computer. IE; you can type a history paper on Microsoft Word.
88 SP-90 player, the best thing that I have ever bought
Ok let me break this down for you who are considering purchasing this.
1. The firmware is not supose to be upgradeable, but it is. Download the firmware upgrade from riovolt.com for the SP-100, this is the medium range model that is upgradeable. Look for instructions on how to make a hack for the .hex file.
2.When upgraded their is no gap in between two songs if u dont skid ahead.
3.My cd player does not skip.
4.The navigation button
5.A line of text taken up for a person dancing (ok thats kind of stupid, but that's no big deal)
6. New version of firmware loads much faster and supports multiple M3U files
7. The battery lid is not as loose as eveyone says it is. I think mine holds fine ( if you didn't say that others are loose, I would not have even considered mine to be loose)
8. The new firmware lets you turn off the cd player, open it up and it will still pick up back where it was at!
9.The 2.10 firmware lets your music fade in when you start it up so it isn't to loud at the second you turn it on.
10. Everything is great about it, no skipping and the upgrade makes the player even better. If you need any cd player, then I would HIGHLY recomend this one (1 year parts and labor warrenty).
By the way, do not buy sony cd players, they are great, but if the product breaks, they do not stand behind their warrenty. I know this from experience. The spindle shattered on it and they wouldn't help me at all. So if u buy any Sony product, then don't be suprized if it will cost as much or more to have the product fixed, they are a buy-at-your-own-risk company.
Go with Rio, they have a one year parts and labor, Sony just has 3 months on labor.
89 Heckofadeal!
I've had my sp90 for around 6 months now, and am still amazed at how great it works. Perhaps I'm a bit easier to please than some, but it might be due to my experiences with the first mp3 player I had (it was a Coby -- a cheap brand). It had next to no features, and it chewed batteries about 5 times faster than the RioVolt SP90. I sold the Coby on Ebay and bought an SP90 and have been very pleased with it since. In fact, I just ordered another two SP90s; one for each of my daughters.
Other reviewers have mentioned the downsides; irritating dancing characters on the LCD, battery cover that doesn't have a very solid-feel latch (tho mine stays shut unless I physically slide it), and no backlight. I gave it 5 stars anyway since the price (if you factor in the rebate) is extremely low given the high quality of the sound, the many features, and the excellent implementation (compared to my old Coby MP3 player) of the MP3 and WMA algorithms.
I disagree with some reviewers who thought it chewed batteries. Well, it does use them up quicker than my Sony CD player, but then again my Sony doesn't play MP3s. As I said before, my experience with another MP3 player was much worse. At any rate, I've switched to rechargable anyway, which work great and I recommend them for this and all your other digital-electronic playthings.
I did the firmware hack (from version 1.00 to version 2.10) and am extremely pleased. Now it remembers where at what point on the CD I turned the player off, and goes back to that point when you turn it back on (if I recall correctly, it will keep track of up to the last 10 CDs(MP3s) you had inserted into the unit. The many other features of the 2.10 firmware can be found at the SonicBlue website under SP100 support.
Unlike a few other reports, I've had zero skipping problems (but then again, I'm not a jogger).
Go for it! It's a super deal!
90 UnBeatable For The Money!
Got this one for my girlfriend. We have both been very pleased with the SP90. It has many features that you won't find in ...price range. The biggest is MP3 File naming. You can store your songs on CD's organized in folders and sub-folders. I usually save mine 3 layers deep: Genre Folders (rock,country,classical,etc.) -> Artist Folders -> Album Folders. The ReoVolt has no trouble playing these discs. Navigation is easy as long as you organize the CD properly before burning. The EQ presets are easy to use by touching a button once to show current setting,again to switch to the next and so on in a cycle. Battery life is excellent with MP3 discs. Not so well with regular CD's but acceptable(we never use regular CDs anymore). Make sure you turn your skip protection to the max else it will skip easily with regular CD's. My girlfriend is very active and uses it in the gym she reports no skipping at all. (note* she always and only uses MP3 discs) I always save record my MP3's at 128kbps and it yields very high sound quality near CD. I can get 170 to 200 songs on a single CD. The included ear bud phones have great sound, and they are decently comfortable. Yes the dancers on the display are annoying! Simple solution: Don't Look at It!
Up Side:
Great price, good sound, excellent file system lots of anti-skip
Down Side:
Not the best with regular CD's. Unit is built as and MP3 player first. Which works wonderful for me. I don't give a rat's a## about standard CDs anymore. I have the SP250 for myself and I love it also.
ReoVolt has put a little more joy in my life. I have had zero reliability problems from either unit. Thank You!
91 pause between MP3 songs
The player is a great value. I just wanted to let everyone know that there is always a pause between MP3 songs. This isn't much of a big deal unless you listen to live albums or electronic / trance music where the songs 'blend' together. Then, it is quite annoying.
92 Poor WMA Playback
The unit did not do well at playing back WMAs. I tried various bit rates and burn rates on the CD burner as suggested in the accompanying leaflet, but the thing would not play back without glitches. The WMAs played back fine on the computer.
93 BUYING RIOVOLT SP90
I like my newly purchased SP90. It plays my MP3s well compared to another player that I bought which kept skipping even when the MP3 player was in one place. The only one thing this player lacks is Firmware upgradability like the higher models. If the SP90 had this, and at this price, I would definatley give it five stars!
94 Too bad you can't get it open
The packaging is absolutely indestructible. You can't get it open. I had to stab the plastic shell with a large pair of scissors, and then step on it and pry the plastic packaging back, while it cut my fingers in several places. I'm sweating and bleeding now. Whoever decided to packag it this way is a total moron.
95 Good but not Excellent
I bought it to replace my old SONY DiskMan. Two additional factor make me to buy this one: Firmwire upgradable to 2.10 and [the] rebate.
Strength:
1. Firmwire upgradable.
2. Easy operation.
3. Excellent sound quality (don't use the attached earphone, try a high-end one and you'll feel BIG difference).
Weakness:
1. A little bit too big.
2. [plastic] construction quality average or below average.
3. Battery life not as long as it advertise. Basically it just stop running the mp3-CD after it prefetch some certain length of music. So if you skip between songs often, it [uses] power quickly.
Overall:
If you want a good one for home use, I recommend it. But that ends it.
96 Backlight
So far I like this product pretty well. The upgrade made some improvements which really helped! I was wondering if anyone had opened theirs up to see if there is a switch or something to turn the back light on. If there is I'd like to know about it! I like this one alot better than the Philips EXP 103 except I wish the AC adapter was included.
97 [Junk]
Thsi unit may start out good but if u use it alot stuff will start to happen. i sually listen to it while im walking and it's horrible it will constantly skip and the Anti Shock is a load of junk. I would recommend getting the RioVolt SP250.
Don't buy it
98 MP3 Player ...
I bought the RioVolt SP90 CD-MP3 Player mostly for the MP3 playing abilities and so far, it has met all of my expectations. If you're looking for a simple [inexpensive] way to play your MP3s this maybe the player for you.
I've only got two real complaints. First of all the thing not only is [inexpensive], it looks [inexpensive] too. The unit is light and has a somewhat flimsy feel to it. This is made worse by the matte finish blue and grey plastic used in it's construction. If styling is your thing you'd better move on to a different product. The SP90 looks and feels like one of the kids toys out of a McDonald's happy meal.
My second complaint is the battery life. In the few days that I've owned this unit, I've already blown through 6 AA batteries in about 20 hours of use.
These complaints aside, the SP90 does the job. If no frills MP3 playback is your thing, give the SP90 a look
99 Nice, now what?
I have just bought this player. Next day I upgraded it to a 2.10 firmware. It sure does make this player better in many ways. One thing that stinks is that nobody mentioned that if you upgrade to a new firmware you wouldn't be able to change the ESP (Electronic Shock Protection) for regular CD playback. If you check the manual for the SP-100 it has a little switch on the back that lets you change the ESP(10 and 40 seconds). One other thing, I burned a CD with Windows Media. I burned it normallly for my car, there's 15 songs on it, and the SP-90 can't load it up. I tried some other burned CD that I have (all with WMA, they also do not load up). If anyone knows how to fix that ESP, please post a review.
Besides all of the mentioned above, the SP-90 is very good and affordable MP3/CD player. Upgraded with SP-100 firmware it's a nice deal for anyone.
100 A great deal!
Ease of use:
It's pretty simple to use. One of my concerns was whether or not I could copy my MP3s directly from my computer to a CD-R with the directory structure in-tact, or if I would have to re-organize them all into the root directory. It not only reads all of the subdirectories but allows you to navigate through them.
Anti-skip features:
I bought this unit to use in the car and while I was working out. In the car it works perfectly. For low-impact exercise (walking, eliptical trainer, staionary bike, weight lifting) it works perfectly. For running, forget it, it's not that good. It skipped even if it was placed on the control panel of a treadmill (although suspended from the treadmill handle with a neoprene belt it works fine).
Disadvantages:
* Navigating is awkward if the CD is packed with music, but then it's a small display so I'm not sure how it could be done better.
* The level of the line-out is controlled by the volume which is awkward because the volume has to be readjusted every time I get into the car.
* The display has a goofy graphic of a person dancing at the bottom. This is a little annoying. I would have prefered that they spent the development money on something more useful than filler to make the display look more impressively large.
Overall:
This unit performs better than I had hoped for the price. Battery consumption is very low, and the price is good. This is a nice starter MP3 unit.
