OGG Support Anyone? Could this be the MP3 jukebox you've been waiting for? Listen to hour after hour of your favorite MP3, WMA or OGG files tucked away on the unit's hard drive. Or if you're in the mood for your favorite afternoon DeeJays, just fire up the built-in FM radio. A definite plus for folks on the go, the rechargeable battery lasts up to 16 hours on a single charge. How often are you away from a power source for longer than that? Ultra-fast USB 2.0 file transfers make uploading files a breeze so you can spend less time setting up your player, and spend more time actually listening to your tunes! Models H140 40 GB of internal storage Up to 16 hours of battery life Supports MP3, WMA, ASF, WAV and OGG music files Ultra-fast USB 2.0 transfers (up to 40 times faster than USB 1.0) Integrated FM tuner Backlit remote control with 4-line display Built-in voice recorder Intuitive music navigation Real-time MP3 encoding (no PC required) Store or transfer files of any type Extra-large, 8-line, backlit LCD Rechargeable Lithium Polymer battery Optical input and output Upgradeable firmware for future formats and features Compatible with Win98SE/Me/2000/XP Includes: Backlit remote control with 4-line display, iRiver earphones, Carrying case, Installation software CD, AC adapter, USB 2.0 cable, Line-in cable, External microphone, Printed user manual Dimensions: 2.4" x .7" x 4.1" Manufacturer Warranty: 1 year
1 My best purchase ever!!
Some people have been conditioned to think (by the media) that the Ipod is the ultimate jukebox-carry-along-music-whatever-device. WRONG!!!! I am of the opinion that the Ipod is highly overrated, so when I went looking for a hard drive player, I didn't even bother to check it.
But enough of the Ipod; this review is about the incredibly magnificent Iriver H120. The pros outweight the cons by a large and considerable margin: sound, user-friendliness, features, the gorgeously engraved leather carrying case, etc. I managed to equalize my Iriver so now it sounds the same, if not better, than a Bose sound system. The buttons only need 5 mins. to get accostumed to, and in the remote, everything is at your finger's reach, literally speaking.
The only problem I see with this device is the tangled cords between the remote and the earphones (which, by the way, are not that crappy as everybody says, once you equalize the sound to get the best out of them). Other than that, is the best spent US $250 ever.
I recommend this player with my eyes closed; it has been the best Xmas gift I could have ever given myself.
2 iRiver H120 20GB MP3 Jukebox
I decided to get this player for my christmas, previously thinking of getting the iPod mini because of the cool design and bearing in mind that I had never owned an MP3 player before.
After seeing this "iRiver" i decided to check it out. I was totally astonished at the features this player had to offer ESPECIALLY the fact that it was 20gb and that it's battery life surpassed the iPod mini by far.
Here's a tip to buyers who can't decide between the iPod and the iRiver -
If you want it for the music - Go for the iRiver
If you want it for the design - Go for the iPod
-Mike
3 Great Player, Poor Company
I decided upon the iRiver H-120 after looking at a bunch of various brands. I liked the fact that the player had 20 gig space (I listen to audiobooks mostly) and liked the remote feature; with the ability to pop the player in my pocket with only the remote and headphones hanging out. After having the product for 8 months here's my few observations-
1)Cords are tangly- I spent many minutes just trying to unravel the cords every morning. A retractable cord/headphone would certainly help this.
2) remote is finicky- that is, sometimes the buttons press as you anticipate, and other times they seem to have a mind of their own.
3) Customer service is ABYSMAL. Somehow the hard-drive crashed on me already and I'm chalking it up to bum luck. We'll see IF I ever get the replacement. I'm not sure how it really died, as it was working fine on my commute into work, and that eve it refused to boot. So, I returned it. Seems they don't tell you anything about what is going on with your return- ie: they've actually recevived it, when a new one is coming out, etc. I sent many emails asking for any update, and they don't even update a website help location they assign to you when you get an RMA. Trying to get through to their 800 number for phone support is equally if not more horrible. I've called at various times of the day, and have spent from 30 minutes to close to 2 hours on-hold- if I even got though!
In short- the player is good, but had I to do again, I'd explore Dell, or an IPod. At least if the product has an issue with them, they have the customer service to deal with the issues.
4 The best mp3 player out there
I bought this baby almost 2 years ago after doing extensive research on all the mp3 players out there. I'm convinced that people only buy the ipod because it is the best advertized and, therefore, trendiest. However, the iRiver puts the ipod to shame. Not only is it an mp3 player, but it is also an external harddrive. That means you can hold any files you want on it. If you want to transfer 10 movies from one computer to another, just drag em onto the iRiver and it's that simple. For those of you who want to know about the recording function (that the ipod does NOT have), I just bootlegged a concert last week. I was in the middle of the audience and I just used the external microphone it comes with, and the recording came out great for an audience recording! I had to boost up the volume a bit with a wav editing program, but the sound quality was good and clear without any maxing out. And you can record it either wav or mp3 format. Besides that, the battery life is great. The size is basically identical to the ipod, except the ipod is all white and feminine, while the iRiver is black and cooler looking with a sick blue LCD screen. All in all, if you want the best price for the best player out there, get the iRiver.
5 its good but there ARE problems
i bought this mp3 player for 3 reasons
1. the voice recorder
2. the built in radio/ gigage
3. its something different (other than an ipod)
things that are wrong about this product
1. the catagoization of the songs. an iriver is a drag and drop system with a DB scan that will enable you to browse through artist, album, ect. the only problem is if you dont have your mp3 files properly ID Tagged it wont even recognize it. (dont get scared they will still go on the mp3 player just it will be slightly harder to find which is a slight inconvience that is noticible) and even if your files are tagged sometimes the Iriver
still wont recognize it. that was frustrating, where as the ipod has a system through itunes i believe that is somewhat better.
2. the voice recorder. it comes with an external mic and a built in mic. the problem is with the interal mic. about every 30 seconds the iriver will sahy, "load" or "refresh" and that produces a noise. so if you listen to your recorded work about every 30 seconds a distinct wizzing sound will appear. and that was extremely annoying.
3. the button control is much more complex and at sometimes confusing. i applaud the ipod for staying simple.
4. the remote gets in the way with its LONG cord. plus if it is a remote why does it have a cord at all??
5. the earphones/carrying case is a piece of crap
6. although i havent timed it out i find hard to believe that the so called 16 hour battery life actually lasts 16 hours. dont get me wrong it lasts longer than my ipod. but not 16 hours.
THINGS I LIKED.
1. its not an ipod
2. the quality of the sound is DEFINATELY improved. much more than the ipod
3. the radio works great!
4. the radio/recorder combo if you want these in an ipod. you will have to pay extra $$
4. so some of my songs that skipped the iriver elliminated it.
5. its unique! if you buy this people will notice it and you can brag about it.
6. tech support always answers my questions within 24 hours
all in all i am pleased with this product
i would recommed it if you are a man who is very familiar with technology. if you a clueless simple guy go with the ipod. i still like it more than the ipod because it does more for me.
6 Best MP3 player out there
I have now owned this MP3 player for about 3 months. I love it! It is definitely a better value then the Ipod and most other MP3 players. I have had zero problems with it. It is very easy to transfer songs onto it, you just cut and paste. It couldn't be any easier! You don't need any software to do it. I love all the extra features it has such as the FM receiver and voice recorder. The sound is excellent, especially on the SRS (surround sound) setting. I felt very comfortable using this player after only 2 days. I think it is very easy to use. I have only one complaint, it does not come with anything that makes it easy to carry. It does come with a case, but it is pretty much useless. It has a belt loop on it (not a clip) so you must put your belt through it as you are putting your belt on. To take the case off, you have to remove your belt! I bought this mp3 player so I can listen to music while working out. I bought a cell-phone clip and attached it to the player. It works great. It is like a belt clip but better. You can get a cell phone clip from $5 - $15 from Amazon.com or just about any place that sells cellular phones. (I got mine from Radio Shack) I would highly recommend this player. The only other thing I would consider instead of this or any other MP3 player would be the XM Myfi radio. It is better than an MP3 player because you never run out of music to listen to. It is like listening to the radio but commercial free and with over 100 stations to choose from. The only drawback is that it cost about $10 a month. I probably would have purchased the XM radio instead if it came out earlier.
7 Excellent unit, clunky interface
I love the iRiver H-120! The sound quality is very good, both in digital files (e.g., mp3's) & the FM tuner. It has a ton of features not found in the iPod, including recording in a compressed format, FM tuner, mounting like a hard drive (so you can back up ordinary computer data on it), and more. The unit lasts forever on a single charge, and it charges very quickly. It also comes with extras, including an external microphone, a wired remote unit, and more. It's pretty small too -- roughly the same size as an iPod or maybe a tad bigger. Having reviewed user complaints about the included earbuds, I went out and bought some Sennheiser portable headphones -- they sound much better than the earbuds included with the unit. Note that I have higher-end Sennheisers too and the iRiver can push the volume very loud on them without distortion; this is impressive because my higher-end headphones have a lot of resistance and require a lot more power to drive than earbuds or my portable Sennheisers.
The drawback is the interface, which really stinks. I've had it for about 8 months, and I still haven't gotten it down (I haven't tried to master it though). No question that the iPod has a better interface. Another bummer is the lack of AM radio. It offers FM, but not AM. This is probably only relevant if you like to listen to ballgames. Due to the interface & lack of AM capability, I am giving it 4-stars.
Note that iRiver has a new model with picture viewing capability. I haven't checked it out yet, but it looks like they may have modified the interface. It's worth checking out if you are seriously considering the H-120 (aka iHP-120). Enjoy!
8 Line in WAV recording - Uncompressed Audio - Live Recording
OK. There are only TWO units that support the line in WAV file
recording. The iRiver H-120 (or H-140) and the Creative Labs
Nomad Jukebox 3. I am not interested in the MP3 features
of ANY of these devices. The new iRiver models, to replace the
now discontinued H-120 and H-140 do NOT allow optical line-in
recording, and do NOT allow UNCOMPRESSED AUDIO format (WAV).
This matters to me, and to some of you, I'm sure. I connect this
device to the soundboard output of my band (or any band or any
music I wish to record live)...It blows the old Mini-Disc I used
out of the water!
I wish they (iRiver H-120 / H-140) allowed WAV recording up to
48 kHz (DVD or DAT audio quality) as opposed to limiting it to
44.1 kHz (CD audio quality). The C.L Nomad JB3 allows up to
48 kHz recording quality, and man does that sound nice!!!
So, if you want an "MP3 player", go buy one of the myriad
lossy options (IPOD, Dell, Rio, etc..). If you are interested
in live audio recording, to uncompressed audio format
(IE, .WAV format at 44.1 or higher D/A sampling rate)
then your options are VERY limited.
Between iRiver and Creative Labs, I believe iRiver is a better
company, and supports their product more honestly than Creative
Labs. Creative Labs was offering "refurbished" JB3 units (20G
or 40G hard drive) with only a 30 day warranty! The new units
had only 30 or 60 day warranty. Not a good sign....That product
is now discontinued, and it seems no solid replacement has been
planned by Creative Labs.
I have asked iRiver tech support about the inclusion of WAV
format, and optical input on their new models, have not
received a reply yet. I will post their response when I get it!
So, I am getting an H-120 for Christmas, not sure if it's used
or new. They are tough to find!
Check eBay, check Amazon.com, check Google "Froogle",
check online mostly.
iRiver's online store says "sold out" and no more are expected!
9 iPod is not just a pretty face
I got to try both of these (the iRiver and a recent iPod) recently. Without re-hashing what others have said here, a few impressions:
1) I have to say that, despite the supposedly simple "drag and drop" music transfer to the iRiver, I don't want to manually manage my playlists on my audio device. I go through a lot of new music and have a number of so-called "smart playlists" in iTunes that automatically synchronize with the iPod. For example, I have a playlist that contains only "songs rated 4 or 5 stars" (I can rate them right on the iPod, or in iTunes, and the information will transfer the next time it's hooked up) and a playlist that contains "songs added to the library in the past month that I haven't listened to completely yet". And a bunch more. You have no idea how cool this is until you try it, and the iRiver doesn't supply the goods. This is the kind of thing that everyone is talking about here when they say the iPod software is better.
2) WMA and OGG support. OK, I really do wish that the iPod had OGG support- the iRiver does- I suppose Apple didn't want it competing with AAC (which, by the way, is about as good, and also a standard, specifically the MPEG4 standard). But who in their right mind would use WMA to encode their precious music and thus subject themselves to vendor lock-in? "Windows" Media Audio? Do you really think "Windows" is going to be around forever? (I should hope not, being a user of "other" operating systems myself). Have you really let Gates brainwash you *that* much? It's not like AAC stands for "Apple's Audio Codec" (the first A is for Advanced)- I'd have to be drinking some serious Apple kool-aid to rip all my music using a codec with a single company's name in it. Same goes for WMA. Stick to standard formats!! Stay away from crappy WMA!!
3) Many people seem to be under the mistaken impression that you can't mount an iPod as a hard drive. Uh, you are all wrong.
4) Even though the battery life of the iPod (12 hrs) doesn't match the iRivers', it charges a heck of a lot faster, and it also will charge through the FireWire/USB2 connection, which is very convenient.
5) Those of you who think USB2 is "plenty fast" obviously have never used FireWire. It is not just slightly faster, it is practically an order of magnitude faster.
6) the stock white iPod buds do suck, as do the stock iRiver buds. Get a pair of those new in-ear Sonys- they rock.
7) Many people are leaning towards iRiver simply because it's "not the overpopular iPod" or "not Apple". To these people I say: If you want to pander to an underdog, Apple was always the original underdog product maker. While you're buying an iRiver for the underdog-ness, why not check out a Mac to see if it has anything more to offer you than the ever-present horde of Windoze machines do?
10 The Optical Line Out makes this player!
You can read all the reviews about the specs and technical stuff, but in my opinion the ONE thing that makes this player worth every single penny is the Optical Line Out... Grab a toslink cable and connect directly to your Optical line in to your receiver! The sound is incredible! I no longer need to rummage thru my cd collection -- this is absolutely the best feature in my view and until other players include it, I'm sticking to my IHP!
11 So, are you into style or substance?
Alright, we have this little hard drive MP3 player market that seems to be getting a lot of attention these days, and lord knows the minute you utter "MP3 player", you'll be hearing iPod this and iPod that. Are there any other choices, or is it just useless to fight fate?
I, for one, was lucky enough to stumble upon the H120 in my quest for answers. The bottom line here is if you're looking for a slick, sexy MP3 player as some sort of status symbol, the iPod should suffice. However, if you really care about the music you're going to put on your new gadget, the iRiver is your ticket.
First up, I'd like to address the database difficulties. I, for one, don't see a problem, because the folder tree system works like a dream. Simply copy your CDs to appropriately prepared folders, and you're ready to roll. I have all my music arranged according to genre, with each artist occupying a sub-folder. This insures that even friends foreign to my music collection can easily find something they'll be into.
The number of file types supported by the player is staggering. OGG file support is a huge advantage over iPod, or you could copy your CDs with Windows Media player and transfer the WMAs to your player. What could be easier?
For a college student like myself, the recording feature works beautifully and is a huge boon. I record all my lectures for future studying (which is made even easier with the cool "study" playback feature), and the sound is crisp and clear.
Sound quality is absolutely staggering. Any self-respecting music lover should already have a decent pair of headphones, so toss out the ear buds and enjoy the H120 unchained. All the levels are customizable, and the volume is very good, with a 10 out of 40 working just fine in areas with little outside noise.
In terms of design, I have no qualms. I find the player to be quite sleek, and while the provided case does detract from its visual appeal, I'd rather keep the device well-protected. The joystick is sufficient for navigation, though not as intuitive as the iPod wheel.
I have very few problems with this player, but if you let me nit-pick, then by God, I will. For one thing, the joystick can be a bit slippery, and it might have been smart to coat it in a substance that would provide more friction. On-the-fly deleting has since been taken care of in a firmware upgrade, but on-the-fly playlists are still missing (but seeing as how iRiver's announced this feature and has come through with their other promises, I have no worries). And, if you insist on navigating by tag, you may have the troubles of which others have complained.
But nit-picks aside, I just don't have time to get into the great 16 hour battery life, or touch on the handy FM radio, or boast of the excellent connectivity, as there simply too many wonderful features to scrutinize in one amazon review. All I can say is that the H120 is not only one of the few products that has meet all my expectations, but has even surpassed many of them. If you care about your music, this choice should be simple.
12 Great customer service!
I've had my current iRiver for 5 months now and love it! The original player I bought 2 months prior refused to turn on shortly after I started using it. I called iRiver's customer service department and they gave me all instructions on how to return my player for a new one. Turn around time was quick! My replacement player works great and I love all the features. It may not be as slick as the iPod but I'm not one for looks over functionality and value. I'm also pretty techno savvy so I don't need as simplistic a player as the iPod. Unless you're one of those die-hard Apple fanatics (all the more power to you), I would highly recommend purchasing the iRiver Jukebox and get more bang for your buck.
13 Terrible Customer Service. Do not buy this!
I read reviews before I bought this, and many of them warned that customer service at iRiver was awful. I didn't listen, and I bought the unit. First one stopped operating after two days. I got it replaced, second one stopped working in less than 24 hours. I asked customer service for help, they refused to issue a refund. I finally contacted the BBB (other complaints against iRiver have been filed with the Silicon Valley BBB), my credit card company, and my state's attorney general. After a while, my credit card company got me a refund. This was not worth the hassle in any way. Please, don't make the same mistake and let the features entice you. Bad customer service and poor quality products will make you miserable.
14 Beware Long-term Durability
iRiver is known for poor quality. Buttons break frequently. You will be happy for one year(sound quality is good) but, then the device will break. iRiver does NOT stand behind their product. They, apparently, depend upon breakage to generate new sales. Additionally, they sell at higher prices than their competitors - and give lower quality.
Look at Consumer Reports November 2004 issue. It will be clear to you which products you should be considering.
15 I still dont understand why people go for the ipod.
Ive had this player for about 6 months now. It is absolutely fantastic and holds up tremendously well. I got this because Im a commuter and I needed to occupy my downtime. I also have the availability to listen to music at work too. This player lasts all day long with hardly a dent in battery life. Transferring music from your hard drive to this player is easier than learning how to snap your fingers. And it plays everything! No proprietary software necessary or converting files to play. The best part is the built in radio. It works fantastically and its a pleasure to change up my music tastes from my own collection once in a while. Personally, the radio capabilities is its biggest sell for me. I love listening to morning radio talk shows and then my stuff in the afternoon. The included remote is awesome too. What other company includes a remote this good? You can control everything on it and never need to take the player out of your bag. It comes with its own case although I dont use it anymore. The plastic and metal is very strong and scratch resistant too as Ive inadvertantly tested it by mistake a couple times. The last thing I have to say is customer service for iRiver is top notch. I had a problem with the remote after a while of heavy usage and they sent me a new one, no questions asked. Everyone was so professional and polite. See if you could get that from Apple after youve taken the product home.
16 Do NOT pass this up
Critique:
I've had the unit for about a week. I have LOVED it the entire time. Unlike many people that have posted negative responses, I have done my research PRIOR to purchasing this item, especially considering the price; about $340 with taxes. Using my Pros/Cons as guidelines, I will give you my opinion on this great item.
First, the File Transfer. People have suggested that it is slow. I don't understand this critique. It is USB 2.0, and without the faster Fire Wire transfer, I'm not sure what people are wanting?? I listen to Drum and Bass (DnB) (keep this in mind as this will be a recurring theme in my critique), many of the DnB files that I have added to the unit are 50, 60, 90, 200 Mb in size. They are live shows that are gathered using StreamRipper for WinAmp during the Live Show Broadcasts on various DnB websites. So the files are HUGE and they take no more time to transfer to the H120 unit than it would to write to CD-R or to transfer from one folder to another on the PC hard drive. Grouping many of these files together and then transferring them to the unit takes the time anyone with any computer savvy would expect a large file transfer to take. The database is supposed to need to be updated by going Start-> Explore -> then right click on the drive and select "Update DB." I had to do this the first time, but I did notice the 2nd go around I didn't have to do this, as it updated on its own. Also before, you weren't able to remove the files from the unit, but this has been remedied and it now works just like a regular PC HD and this alone is a MAJOR advantage over other players. Also, I don't have to add any silly proprietary software program to my PC. The LAST thing I need is to have space taken up on my computer by another program. Winamp, a FREE 4mb program can organize my playlists and functions quite nicely for assigning ID3 tags.
File capacity is massive. I know that this issue is dependent on requirements by the particular user. In my case (DnB, in addition to my CD and other MP3 collection) this 20Gb HD was a definite requirement.
The battery life of this unit is amazing. Many of the DnB shows that I listen to and Stream are 4 HOURS LONG!!! Meaning, in order to listen to the entire thing, I'd need time as well as battery life. I ride the train to and from work, so I am able to listen on the train, at work, and then on the way home again. The first day I owned the unit, I played it for AT LEAST 12 hours. I noticed that this is less than the stated 16-hour claim. I have discovered reasons for this: The MORE you play with the unit (changing tracks, adjusting audio, surfing etc.) the less battery life you'll get. Much like cell phones, keep them closed and use when necessary, the battery lasts a lot longer. I also discovered that the Backlight is a MAJOR battery drain. Fortunately, this can be turned OFF. I figure, I'm not listening to this in the dark for the most part, so I can see what's on the face of the unit, what do I need a backlight for? Other than for looks, it's pointless. I turn it off, in turn; the 2nd day of usage put me 14-15 hours. Also, the bit rates of the files have an impact. All of my MP3 files are 128 and above so this uses more battery power. Still 12 hours is NOTHING to frown upon.
Since the reason I bought an mp3 player is for music, I needed one that would sound good. With the music I listen to, it was important to have lots of power to the headphones. The H120 delivers big time. Everything is crystal clear, and powerful and LOUD! The way I like it. The system offers an EXCELLENT EQ that really does change the sound of the music. It sounds great "stock" but the tweaks for your likings make it absolutely incredible. But, as nothing is perfect, there are a few quirky things to go over, to give a fair and balanced review.
People have been complaining about the "joy stick" more than anything else. It really isn't all that bad of an idea. It takes a bit of getting used to but once you get it down, it's easy as anything else. Holding it down will get you to the settings menu for sound adjustments and the like. It's about practice with the "joy stick" and once you learn the navigation technique it will be fine. Also, the SCROLL SPEED is FINE. Sure, it's not a touch pad and doesn't go flying through the tracks, but can people even read that fast anyway? Furthermore, most of the time, you go PAST the track you want and have to backtrack to the proper selection (when using a touch pad) and the time it takes to do all of that, the H120 has it already selected via it's method. What I don't like is that it sticks up a bit and so when you try to remove it from the carrying case, it gets caught. Not cool, since it isn't exactly made of billet aluminum. So, it's more of a nuisance than a fault.
The unit comes with a remote; a remote that I used ONE TIME and was appalled by it. Yes, due to the size of the H120 the remote with the clothes clip would really come in handy. Except for one MAJOR detail: YOU LOSE HEADPHONE POWER. You have to plug your headphones into the remote unit, and it has about 60% of the power of the base unit. Trust me; I went back and forth a ton of times with the same part of the DnB song to verify this. There is NO WAY that I can use this unit because it detracts from the most important part of the music... the quality.
It is a little large, that's all I can say about that. But I was aware of that going in, so that really isn't a critique, more of a restatement of a known fact.
The ear buds supplied are WORTHLESS. ALL ear buds are worthless, for that matter. There is NO NEED for ear buds, unless you're working out or running and thus rendering regular headphone useless. Again, back to my DnB, it has TONS of bass, which is the point of this music genre.
Ear buds: Scarcely even have a tweeter, let alone anything that could be considered a "woofer." So there is NO SUBSTANCE in the ear buds and I find it quite hard to believe that any person that enjoys music would use ear buds, no matter which mp3 player you choose. They are uncomfortable despite the padding. The last thing I need is an oversized Q-Tip that plays music. So, people should deep six the ear buds and spring for a set of decent headphones. I have a $45 set of Sennheiser HD 457. Let me tell you *(and I know this isn't a critique for the headphones, but it applies), save for the vibration, and sheer volume of my car stereo speakers, these headphones pump some serious bass. Bass that you can hear AND feel! So, I lose nothing when listening to my DnB. Point is, don't complain about the supplied ear bud, go buy something that was MADE for music. Using ear buds is like trying to listen to music from your cell phone ear piece speaker. I'm SURE they're using the exact same technology, not designed for music as much as just for "sound."
The unit costs $300 or more. You can get it for cheaper, but factoring in any shipping costs, you're in the same boat. Is this a complaint? Yes and no. Yes because we all would like such nice items and not have to pay so much for them. However, no, because I could've just as easily spent $199 for a RIO 512mb unit or $249 for a 4mb iPod Mini, just slightly less cost wise than my unit, but WAY less in terms of storage and functionality which is the purpose of this player.
On a final note, people that have bought this unit and in turn, have spouted off asinine complaints and comparisons to iPod are clueless in every sense of the word. The reason is simple: They did NOT buy an mp3 player for music, they bought it as a status symbol or because it is socially popular right now. I mean read their complaints: "Not as sexy", "the iPod is just SO much prettier!" "Ugly looking", and "iPod SOFTWARE is better than Windows Drag and Drop"??? You're kidding right? How HARD is it to drag and drop? Even 90 year olds with NO PC savvy are able to drag and drop. It just goes to show the focus of the people that are obsessed with this iPod craze. I am attempting to steer clear of criticizing the iPod crowd, but let's be frank. iPod is for the McIntosh/Apple crowd. It is the same crowd that drives Saabs and ties sweaters around their necks.
All in all, this is a FANTASTIC player and I would highly recommend it to anyone looking to have an mp3 player that is priced in the same range as the rest, offers awesome power to the headphones, stores lots of music and plays on and on and on!
Thank you.
17 impressive customer service
We can read a 100 reviews on the quality of the player. This review is for people like me who have an iriver that may not always work as well as it did the day they got it.
I bought my iriver in January and by June the battery life was a measly 2-3 hours at best. Also, the unit would not work at all when it was plugged into my wall or the car adaptor I had purchased from iriver.com. So why four stars? Taking the advice of another amazon.com reviewer, I blew off the dust that had been collecting on my ihp and wrote iriver an email, then two days later I got a response and within a week I was shipping my unit back to iriver. I never even had my ihp registered, so don't let that stop you.
Yesterday I recieved my brand new unit, accessories and all. I have a sneaking suspicion that iriver has a whole warehouse full of ihp120's now that they have their new unit out. Also, I have seen the ihp for as little as $175 at a major retailer. Even so, I'm sticking with my iriver and am planning on downloading irivium, which seems like it will make it an entirely new machine.
Overall I am very impressed with the customer service and very excited about getting my new iriver and giving it another chance.
18 The ULTIMATE anti-iPod haz arrived . . .
Got it off of eBay for $289 (free shipping too). Don't get it twisted; this is the iPod alternative for those who want to get deep into this kinda hardware. iPods, like their PC iMac counterpartz, are popular becuz they come preformatted for people who like thingz organized for them. If you're not willing to learn and adapt to interfaces and do a little homework, then stick to the Apple camp. However, if you're like me and prefer to be at the helm in every facet, I'd def opt for this player. The USB transfers are incredibly fast, and if you have Windows XP then using this device will be almost too easy. The adaptability of that operating system allows it to assimilate hardware automatically once itz connected to the CPU, recognizing it as a "USB Mass Storage Device." No annoying software to install, no waste of time registrations or anything like that. Just plug in, drag and drop. I'd also head over to their official site to download the easy to install firmware updates and such. All of it's free and keepz your iRiver up-to-date with cool stuff. Though I don't, never have and never intend to own the 20 Gig iPod counterpart, I'm gonna go out on a limb and make this overgeneralization for anyone wishing to compare the products from an inclusive perspective:
iRiver: Sufficient mp3 Player meetz External Hard Drive . . . A Portable Storage Device for the Computer Savvy and those Wishing to Become Them
iPod: Preformatted mp3 Player meetz PDA . . . Tailor-Made for the Lazy Liberalz who want to "make a fashion statement no one wantz to hear . . . i mean just look at their commercialz and Steve Jobs . . . they just REEEEEEK left-wing self-expression".
"Just Break Thru . . . Buy an iRiver . . . "
19 The best HDD MP3 Player you could ever find
Ok, first let's get this straight: look NO MORE for options. This is the one you need, or maybe the 40 GB version. But it's iRiver the right choice.
The great things about this product are: excellent quality of audio, extremely great battery life (about 16 hours), it has a FM radio that works really well, it appears as an external hard disk drive in your computer (you don't need any software to install, just drag n' drop music files into it), it's software upgradeable, handles WinAmp playlists and it plays OGG, MP3, WMA! Also it comes with a really cool leather case.
A feature that I really like is the Line Out feature. It has dual output: analog and digital output. And since it's used as an external hard drive, I use it to transfer any data file to one computer to another, it's a removable HDD! iRiver H120 also has a database feature if you want to browse your music through the artists, albums, titles, genres, etc. (I personally don't use it, I like the files and directories browsing).
But of course it has some flaws: right now with firmware "1.60 US" the shuffle is not "that" random and some people complain about the gap between songs (1 or 2 seconds gap between songs). I don't really care about the gap but there are some people out there that listen to live albums and hate it with a passion. I listen to live albums too but to me it's not that bad. Those are the only flaws I have found in about 2 months.
Anyway iRiver agreed to solve these problems (BOTH: gap and randomness) in a future firmware release, nothing to be worried about for too long. People will get their bugs fixed in no time. I registered my product in iRiver site and I sent an email about these bugs, they answered it the same day. If you register your product you'll see iRiver's support is just great.
Don't worry: iPod has its flaws too, go read the reviews.
The only thing I would suggest if you get this product and want the best of it is to get good headphones. I got some Isolating Sound headphones (kinda expensive) and I know I can't get a better sound than the one I'm getting now with my iRiver H120. The iRiver headphones are ok but I hated the short cable (the remote has a long cable but I like to put my remote in a belt strip).
Why would you choose an iPod instead of this one? I haven't find an answer yet. iRiver is not only way cheaper than the iPod: it's BETTER. Some people only have to say: "iPod looks cooler", and you're gonna pay a hundred dollars more just for THAT? get REAL!
20 Could be better.
this is a reasonably good mp3 player. the only things i didnt really like about it were the facts that u couldnt make a playlist right on the mp3 player. The sound quality is great and i f you get yourself a really good pair of headphones(i can't use earbuds anyways so the horrible quality of the provided ones weremnt a huge deal to me.) its wicked loud. Its got a great fm radio. Me i personally like its looks over the ipod but whatever floats your boat. Another thing i didnt like was the remote. When i bought this i heard great things about the remote but its very flimsy and is much harder to get used to that the actual unit. Plus the earphone hole thingie is in a really weird place and at times the music can only be heard in one ear. thats on the remote. All in all its a good Mp3 if all u really care about is the music. Its most definitely worth it.
21 Owns the iPod completely!
I got an iRiver for myself and an iPod for my fiancee. setup on mine was easy- hers was a pain. adding music? click and drag. hers? deal with iTunes.
controls take a couple minutes to get the hang of, but even that wasn't any different than the iPod.
ogg vorbis codec shrinks mp3s way down; also plays wma and mp3. iPod only has AAC and mp3.
iPod battery's life is half what they say. i've gotten the full 16 hours out of mine.
i HIGHLY recommend this product, it was so simple and i've been enjoying it ever since.
22 The Best HD Player On The Market
This is the best HD player on the market today in my opinion, but is not for everyone. It is a bit advanced in comparison to the IPod with its numerous extras like a builtin FM tuner and the ability to encode mp3s on the fly. There is a few things I dont like however. The software that it comes with doesn't do a very good job of indexing your music files so that you can find them easily. I tried both the initial software and the Moodlogic software that they recommend, but neither of them indexed my .ogg files into the DB. (I recommend Irivium for $25). Also, the headphones are a little short in length w/o the remote and a little to big. But dispite this drawbacks, a great player nonetheless.
23 Good but not Great
The iHP-120 does exactly what it needs to do and no more. The display is functional, but unimpressive, and at times just difficult to read. In addition, the overloading of buttons is confusing at first, but eventually one can be convinced that it is actually convenient.
The battery life is great, probably as a result of the poor display.
Finally, the device does not support any media device functionality to manage (synchronize) the device with a media library. It pretty much looks and acts like a storage device, which is great until you are trying to manage 1000's of songs.
Don't plan on having your computer jukebox and iHP-120 work together,they won't.
And don't waste time with support, there is none. If you buy one, I hope you don't have any problems.
24 Excellent!
I absolutely loved the iRiver!
The interface is awesome, specially made for tech geeks like me ;p the acessories are excellent(except the headphones which came with uneven cables, but I bought new ones anyways, since i read the reviews) the options are varied, and the equalizer has no limits, you can change it to your exact desire.
I also loved the display!
The battery life is maybe the best(well, the zen has 24 hr battery life, but this mp3 player has more quality in other aspects)
Simply, flawless...the iPod has met it's match, and I can say..that the iPod doesn't stand up to it.
I gave it 4 stars for the crappy headphone, besides that, excellent buy, I recommend it a million times over the iPod!
25 Great player, great customer service
I purchased my unit in July of this year (04) and love this thing. I use the file tree method rather than the database method for locating/playing my files. I have structured my files by genre, album, artist and it works well for me. It is easy to locate my songs. I am a daily walker and set my player to shuffle the entire hard disk. I am amazed at how well this works. It is like having a new album(s) every day. If I want to play any particular album/artis I can do so easily. I will not bore you with all the details but I must dispell the myth that iRiver's customer service doesn't exist. I had problems with the battery in my unit, it would last only 4-5 hours. I called their support line and in turn advised me to send them an email describing the problem. This email would be re-directed to their return department that would immediately get back to me with an RMA number and instructions for returning the defective unit. The next day I received the email. I returned the player on a Thursday and I was literally amazed that I received a brand new player in it's sealed plastic case with all the accessories on the following Monday via UPS. I live in the Bay Area and the return location is also in the Bay Area so this is much faster than had I lived on the East Coast. However, what it did tell me is that the unit was packaged and mailed within 1-2 days from date the unit was received. I did not have to send them the accessories, only the player. They may be slow in updating their firmware but the service I got was outstanding. Please do not believe everything you hear about their customer service department (800 number). Hope this helps.
26 Wish I had one when I was a teenager. . .
I have owned my iHP-120 (same as the H120, just a different name) for a little over 6 months now. I just upgraded the firmware last night to version 1.60 which gave me the ability to speed up/slow down .mp3s which will work great for some of my audio books (haven't tested it yet). It also gave me gapless playback, something I am currently testing out, I haven진t listened to a live album since turning this setting on so I cannot comment. It gave me other stuff that I have little interest in as well.
I bought this unit after considering the competition (there were two other competitors who I now forget and it isn't really important at this point).
I would really like to have an iPod because of the Database functionality (helps to organize/rate your music). I also like the styling and the ease of use of the iPod.
This jukebox does it all, however, effectively blowing away all others. It has a built in FM tuner (important for me because I use this on my Motorcycle and like to get local news/events/weather where I go).
It has an included remote (important for me because of my motorcycle, the remote unit clips on nicely to my tankbag and has a long enough cord to hide the actual unit).
It has a surprisingly nice leather carrying case. From experience, I have found that the leather carrying case helps protect the unit when dropped on the pavement from a height of about 4' (about the height of the tank bag on my motorcycle). The carrying case really helps to keep the unit clean and scratch free (I am anal about that).
The sound is outstanding. I am using a cheap pair of Sony (MDR-G52) headphones and they sound great. I've used this with a pair of the latest generation Bose Noise-Canceling headphones and the sound was incredible.
The level of detail that is displayed on the playing song is very good, if you follow the Window's Media folder structure, you will be able to identify your songs quite well (if you use .wma's like I do).
This unit acts as a mass storage device when connected via USB to your PC (very nice).
Basic operation is adequate and somewhat intuitive. The unit has a lot of functionality that I just haven진t used. Unfortunately some of that functionality involves those two really cool optical ports (one reason for buying this unit). I had dreams of connecting this to my home stereo, something I have yet to do. . .
One thing that I was real upset about was the database functionality. During my research I didn진t uncover the fact that the database only pulls ID tags from .mp3 files only. If you use .wma (like me) you are out of luck and have to rely on your folder structure (which isn진t all that bad after all). The latest firmware added .ogg Vorbis tags to the list which doesn진t help me as I don진t use that format.
I진ve used this mainly for music, however, on a few long trips I have used this for audiobooks. The 16 hour battery life really helps on long flights/layovers/etc. If all you are doing is listening to one audiobook, you진re fine. Shut the unit off and when you start it back up it will pick up where you left off. If you want to listen to some music in the middle of an audiobook, you have to remember where you left off (wait for the end of a chapter) so you can get back to it. The addition of bookmark capabilities would be very helpful.
If you have a LOT of music, make sure you are certain 20GB is enough. I have about 30GB of music which means I have to 젠prune진 33% of my music to fit on this. That is NOT an easy task if you are eclectic like me (you simply have to have it all). For that reason, this unit will be going on eBay some time soon and I will be purchasing the 40GB model (either the H140 or the H340). I like the extra space for more music�?
Firmware updates are few and far between, release dates slipping by months at a time. If you buy this make sure you buy it for the capabilities it has and not for something you think will be added in the future (bookmarks, etc).
All in all, this is well worth the money. I am happy with my purchase and am planning on upgrading soon.
27 It's worth it.
I have this jukebox for almost a month and I've been using it every day ever since. In my opinion, the overall performance is great! I'd recommend it to other people simply because it's not as pricey as ipod, great features, and it comes with built-in voice recorder that works great. I also find it easy to navigate with the joystick.
Unfortunally the battery life for mine is more like 10 hrs (not 16 hours) and they could've came up with a better design for the earphones.
28 Worth Every Penny
I think anyone who is a tech and music junkie will love the IRiver iHP 120. There is a small learning curve to using the controls for the iRiver. For the first few times keep the instruction booklet handy and you have this player mastered in no time. The PC interface is simply windows explorer and the file transfer speed is exceptional. Being able to search your music by artist, title, genre is great but it does come with some overhead. All of your music files must be neat and tidy. By this I mean the tags should be correct and up to date. This makes the process much easier when it comes to organization of the files. The sound quality is just amazing! Recharge time is minimal and I have yet run the battery down to nothing in one sitting. Now I need to find a great car stereo with a line in port on the front because I have NO need to take my CDs with me anymore. I just love this player and recommend it. Worth the money!
29 Intelligently designed, high build quality, awesome sound.
I recently purchased an iHP-120 after researching many different types and brands of MP3 players/recorders on the market. It isn't too often when a product exceeds your expectations and it's advertised claims -- this one does. The build quality of the unit is very high, it comes with a generous assortment of accessories, the OS is well thought-out and easy to use, the feature set is exhaustive, the battery life is impressive, the OS is upgradeable via flash ROM, it supports multiple codecs, and the sound quality is awesome. I've been using the unit daily for the past week, and I have no criticisms to speak of. Although it may place a close second in comparison to an iPod for industrial design, I think that this baby is the best of it's kind on the market -- period -- in terms of it's design and function as a high capacity MP3 jukebox. You won't be disappointed.
30 Definitely THE BEST hard-drive player on the market
After about a month of endless research online (on CNet and the reviews here at Amazon) I decided on the iHP-120 for my new mp3 hard drive. I had previously owned a Dell DJ (which I found to be utterly and completely useless junk), and what drew me were all the features, the reliability, and the great sound. Well, I have tried 3 of the most popular mp3 players on the market now (the Dell, the Apple iPod, and now the iRiver) and let me just say that the sound is better on the iRiver than any other player available. The detail that came through even through the bad included ear-buds (I have a pair of Philips but will be upgrading to Grado SR-60's) was astounding--I had no idea such a complex and sophisticated sound could come out of a portable mp3 player, especially one so small (the player is tiny--the same size as the 4th gen iPod, but a little thicker). The included case gets the job done, although I will be upgrading to the Vaja leather case, or the iSkin when it is released. Another amazing feature is the connectivity/transferring of songs. The USB 2.0 is a joy, especially when coupled with the freedom to use Windows Explorer instead of MusicMatch or that piece of flaming s*** iTunes. But, if you're the sort of person who needs more guidance in the form of software, RedChair has made a download called IRivium Explorer that should do the trick. Also, the remote is good as well. It's much much much smaller than i expected (about the size of your thumb) and it's really handy, except for the cord, which is too long, and has the tendency to get tangled with the cord of your headphones. The equalizers that can be set up on the iHP-120 are amazing, too, and the volume that the player can go to without distorting the sound is very impressive. The FM tuner works great--no static, and the internal mic also fulfills my needs. The layout takes some getting used to, and, if you haven't already done this and your collection is small, I would recommend converting your files to mp3 format--the database function is a joy (although the recent firmware upgrade may support ogg/wma database files, i'm not sure). The controls aren't impossible to learn, though, and once you do, they make sense. Also, the player just looks great. It has a big screen and a very shiny black surface that feels as if it cost much more than it actually did. In my opinion, it looks much better than the Dell or the Rio Karma, and just as good as(if not better than) the iPod and the new Creative Zen Touch. I haven't found the joystick button to be a problem--on the contrary, I think it's a cool and unique feature. I have only 2 bones to pick with this player: the playlist feature and the shuffle feature. I'm sure you've read this before, but the shuffle isn't really shuffle (it plays the tracks in the same "random" order each time) and you can't create playlists in the field (you have to use winamp or IRivium, which I haven't tried yet), but these are minor gripes considering iRiver has promised to fix these in firmware upgrades--it can't be long now. But overall, I think this player has everything you could want in a portable digital audio device--room for 5000 mp3 songs, great features, and great sound, all packed into a very attractive package. So forget the repulsive and oppressive iPod franchise and say hello to iRiver!
31 Hard Drive Recording
I've had the Iriver H120 for a couple of months now. Bought some Sennheiser MX500 earbuds and improved sound quality by 50 percent. Noticing some complaints on various forums about recording problems with the H120 & 140 I would like to put my own experiences into the melting pot. I have used this little machine in our Buddist Centre (Jamyand Buddhist Centre, London) to record (using the tape out on a mixing desk) from a lapel mike pinned on the teacher, directly into MP3 format. The results so far recording at 128 bitrate are exeptionally good and so far we have not had any glitches in recordings of about an hour and a half in length. We also record onto CD but the MP3 is much more functional.
Hope this is useful.
32 Very good product with only one problem
They player looks VERY good and works just as well. All the pictures I've seen online of the H120 made me expect to see quite a large player when I opened my package, and I was astonished as to how small the player was. Overall I am quite satisfied with the player, but my only problem with it is difference with the volume when playing from the hard drive and playing from the FM Tuner. I am in Jamaica, and the fm tuner feature works excellently even without the remote being attached. The stations sound rich and full and the volume of the fm tuner is what i expected from the player when playing from the hd but its not. The volume of the player is adequate, but I would have preferred it to be louder or even as loud as the fm tuner. HOWEVER, as it is the player is tops. The quality of the audio is superb and dispite all the problems with iriver and the firmware updates, the player is good enought to beat the ipod AS IS. The player looks great and works great. I have never used the Database function because of how I organise my music I dont need it so i cant comment on that.
All in all, the best player out there.
33 Great MP3 Player
I have iRiver for 3 weeks now and it's amazing. After a extense web research and read a lot of reviews this is the best player you can buy. Forget the expensive iPod.
34 Tech Comments
There are more than enough reviews raving about this MP3 player, and I have to agree with all of them. This is a great hard drive player with an incredibly simple interface. A few things to consider though:
1) iRiver advertises this player as playing wma files and yet many user-written reviews say that they don't. I was really confused by this until I bought it and realized that for some reason, it plays some wma songs, but not all. I have no idea why, but that's how it seems to work. So if you plan on copying CDs thru Windows Media Player, it would also be wise to get file conversion software if you don't already have it. Once converted to mp3 files, you should have no other problems.
2) If you've read enough iRiver reviews, you've probably seen a lot of gripes about their customer support. As an owner of an iRiver CD player that fell on the floor and broke (it worked wonderfully before that...), I can tell you that their customer service really is useless unless you register your product. I emailed them at the regular support@iriveramerica email address before registering my products 2 weeks ago and still have not gotten a response. After reading from others that they don't respond to emails, I registered my product and sent them my question from my new account with them. It was answered in about 2 business days. That seems to be the easiest way to get your questions answered.
3) iRiver, as I found out from the previous experience, does not carry parts or do repairs. For defects covered by warantee, they replace the item. If it's broken though, they offer no services. So if you're the type of person who constantly and inadvertantly breaks things, this might not be the company for you.
Hope this has been helpful, and like I said, I would highly recommend this product.
35 Believe the reviews
Just about everything you read in the reviews here is right on. I love this player. So most of what I can add to the discussion are minor flaws: there's no equalizer in FM mode; radio reception is poor when the remote is used in-line (maybe due to my headphones?); you can't go from OFF to RADIO in one step--the device has to spin up the disk first; the charging port hole in the (otherwise perfect) case is misaligned--the plug still fits but doesn't go all the way in. Pluses: the battery life indicator is surprisingly linear for a lithium rechargeable device--awesome!; the internal mic has amazing quality! You won't believe it. (based on v1.30 firmware).
36 iPod? Are you nuts?
I'll admit it, the iHp-120 wasn't the first HDD player I bought...I opted instead for the Rio Karma - and don't get me wrong, it's a solid little player, but when compared to the iRiver, it's easily trumped in terms of features and durability. Anyway, I have no regrets whatsoever about exchanging it for this fantastic piece of equipment. Mp3 player, AM/FM tuner, portable USB hard drive, e-reader, personal recorder, you name it, this baby can do it, and do it better than any other player on the market.
The Good:
- FOOLPROOF. With all the features you'd think it would be difficult to use the thing...however, that's the furthest thing from the truth.
- PLUG'N'PLAY. No software needed! Just drag & drop. 'Nuff said. However, adding the database function can be useful. Also, all that extra space can be put to good use holding files you don't want cluttering up your hard drive on your PC.
- WHOA DAMN! Customize the sound to your liking, this thing sounds awesome...but the SRS and WOW EQ effects sound horrible and are useless in my opinion.
- BLING BLING...everything you could ask for and a whole lot more...including an in-line remote (the best of the bunch), line-in cable, adapter, case, & external mic.
- SAY WHAT? Record music or voice from almost anywhere! Just use the mic or plug the unit into a headphone jack or optical out!
- JUICE IT UP. Battery life is pretty close to what iRiver claims, and among the best in its class.
- TOO MANY TO LIST...
The Bad:
- The player uses Winamp (*.m3u) playlists, which is great, but lacks the tools to create or edit a playlist on-the-fly. A minor gripe.
- You need to connect to a PC to edit or delete any content. Again, minor.
- Joystick works well for navigation but it's a bit slippery.
- The included earbuds actually sound pretty decent with good bass response, but they are too large and don't fit well. And besides, they're grey and don't match the player at all! I'd recommend the Sony MDR-EX71SL's. Not only do they sound awesome, they have a shortened cord for use with the remote, they're dirt cheap when compared to high-end models like Grado and Shure...and they complement the iHP-120 perfectly!
The Ugly:
The worst thing about the iHP-120 is that it looks too damn good! I'm always wiping my fingerprints off the chrome, lol!
The Bottom line:
If you're looking for a HDD player then look no further, unless you're a conformist or if supporting Apple is some weird political trip for you. iRiver all the way!
37 Do your research, there is no better player available
About six months ago I bought an ihp-120 after a lot of research. While I consider the reviewers from the online publications a useful resouurce, I put far more store in the opinions of actual users. After looking around, I narrowed down my decision to the iRiver, the Ipod and the Rio Karma.
I decided against the ubiquitous Ipod because of the relatively poor battery life and lack of functionality when compared to the IRiver. The Rio Karma was very interesting but there were so many negative comments about it's reliability and supposedly poor customer support that I thought it was too much of a risk. The decision was therefore straightforward. The iRiver is easily the most feature rich MP3 player out there with a 20gb hard drive, over 16 real hours of battery life, compact size, very solidly built, remote control, FM radio, voice recorder and, it is most importantly, highly reliable. The only small downside was that the included DB software was quirky in that it didn't accept long track names; this was alleviated by manually truncating the titles.
A month ago I did someting really stupid and left my ihp-120 on a plane. In looking for a replacement I looked to see whether any advancements had taken place in this space. I took another look at the players I previously considered but the only change was that the Ipod had slightly better battery life but no additional functionality. I also looked at the Zen Touch which looks very sleek and has good battery life but, again looking at user reviews - there are already reports of it freezing up and there are numerous comments about the historical lack of support from Creative Labs.
So, with very little persuading I bought my second ihp-120 and, in addition to all the above benefits, I found that there is new Mood Logic software on the iRiver website which does away with the truncating issue!
If you look around, you will see, as "cynic1" has mentioned, that this is just an excellent player which is head and shoulders above the rest of the competition.
38 Owned for over half a year
I own this player for probably over half a year. I defiantly recommend this over the Ipod, and that includes the forth generation Ipod, and their mini Ipod. There's much more feature in this player then the Ipod, and from hardware to interface, you'll get more then what you'll pay for if you're deciding between this and any Ipods. For all the time that I had this player, it never fail me, expect when I shook it. With 20 GB of space you will never run out of room for storing music, I can duplicate all my music, and will still have enough room left over for installing Windows, not that I would recommend it though. One of the many features that this player has that Ipod lacks is the ability to record your voice and a FM tuner, may not be much use but who knows. You can also read text file from this player with the clear display. The interface is easy to use and has all the details. There's also other features that enhances sound quality, and I did notice a big different when it was turned on. It comes with a remote that can access all the features without taking out the player, even though I never use it, because I don't really mind taking out the player, and I memorized the keys on the player. It also comes with a case that I find really useful, since my player is kept in there 95% of the time; in fact I'm more use to seeing the case then the player. The only time I take it out of the case is when I want to look at it. All buttons can be access when it's inside the case, and I don't find it bulk when it's inside the case. The battery is out standing; I only charge it once every week if I need to, and charging the unit is extremely quick. Transferring files from computer to player is also very fast thanks to USB 2.0. This player can double as a backup drive, and no driver is needed for most Windows, just like a USB flash drive. This is rarely the only thing that I own that I have absolutely no problem with. The only thing Ipod has over this player is the looks, other then that I strongly recommend this player over all other players that's currently out there, buy it and you won't be disappointed.
39 Great!
I never really considered the iPod because it didn't have as many features as some of the other ones. I very nearly went with the Nomad but I was scared off by the reports that it breaks so easily.
After purchusing this mp3 player, I would say that I am fairly happy with it.
Pros: Good amt. of storage space, easy to charge, easy to navigate, easy to organize, good sound quality, great quantity of options, tracks do not skip, device does not break after being dropped several times
Cons: You have to play the playlists in alphabetical order, you can't delete tracks without being hooked up to a computer, you can't create playlists without being hooked up to a computer. Also, this is probably the fault of the CD ripper I downloaded, but in case it isn't I'll include it here: the last few seconds of the songs are cut off. I'm not sure if that's true for every song, but I sure notice it for tracks that "lead into" one another
Other comments: Why do you need the remote control if you have to plug it in for it to work? Maybe I got the wrong idea. LOL. Doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose of a REMOTE control? Oh well. The size is fine too. Some people say it's a little bulky, but you can still fit it in your pocket.
Overall, it sure beats the other players that have such high price tags! Very cool.
40 Update of the iRiver iHP-140 MP3 jukebox
Since Amazon won't let me update my previous review of the iHP-140, I'll list it under the iHP-120
Further evaluation of the iRiver iHP-140
Four months ago, (in April) I posted a review of iRiver's iHP-140 MP3 jukebox on Amazon. Since then, I have received many emails and questions about this great device. If this review is still on line, I would urge you to read it as a preface to this review.
Three weeks after mailing the email letter (sent to support@iriveramerica.com), and after sending it again recently (2004 August), I have not received an acknowledgment of the inquiry, let alone hope of pending solutions to the issues which I have discovered with the iHP-140.
Unlike other companies, iRiver lists no phone number or mailing address, either on their website or the user manual.
Therefore, I am hoping that readers who notice the same problems with this device will send email to support@iriveramerica.com to ask for support and solutions.
My evaluation of the iHP-140 may be summarized as follows
Hardware Awesome! Robust, compact and very capable. Not only is it a nice toy, but a 40 GB HD which connects to your computer by USB, encodes analog audio to MP3 and has a quick-charging, long-lasting battery built in.
Firmware Needs improvement! The issues are described below.
Support Poor!
Dear sirs,
In April, I purchased the iRiver iHP-140. Since then, I have recorded over 300 hours of microphone and line-in sound, and have done USB data transfer, becoming acutely aware of its strengths and weaknesses. Each is a separate issue and they should be assessed by your technical management and addressed separately, and hopefully improved with a firmware upgrade.
My background It might be helpful for you to be aware of my extensive experience in sound recording. During the `60s, I did considerable recording using reel-to-reel tape, in both stereo and 4-track. When sound quality became adequate in the `70s, I switched to cassette tape, recording in stereo including Dolby NR technology. In the late `90s, my medium for recording sound became the Minidisc with Atrac compression, using the Sony MZ-R50 recorder. This device failed recently, and after extensive research, I decided to purchase the iRiver. I wrote an evaluation of this recorder for Amazon (which is apparently still posted) and have received and replied to numerous email questions about the iHP-140, based upon my (not completely satisfactory) experience. This puts me in a rather awkward position of being both a critic and supporter of your product.
Programming issues
MP3 compression The algorithm used for MP3 compression is defective. Below 128 kbps at 44KHz sample rate, the sound quality is damaged by artifacts which sound like phasor-flanger effects, becoming worse as the bit rate lowers. Using computer WAV to MP3 conversion, I have extensively used 80 kbps satisfactorily, but the sound quality is not acceptable at that rate using the iHP-140, and is much worse at lower rates. The artifacts include frequencies which are NOT part of the original sound. This must be corrected!
Record pause indication As programmed, the iHP-140 indicates "pause" by flashing the tiny "elapsed time" figure. This is difficult to see under low-light conditions. It would make a lot more sense to flash the large RECORD indicator.
Record file-name indication When placed in record mode, before recording begins, no file name is shown. Because the recorder was built without any time-date indicator, I must write this information down, in order to maintain the dates of my recordings, and do not have the file name information available unless I hit the record/pause twice. This change should be exceedingly easy to implement. (It would certainly not matter if the track of that filename was not used)
[From information available to me prior to purchasing this unit, I did not recognize that it did NOT have an internal clock (as my computer, digital camera, cell phone, camcorder and MD recorder contain). The reasons for this are understandable, as iRiver did not choose to add the small amount of extra hardware to implement an internal clock, and felt the extra power consumed by it merited this decision. This was certainly the WRONG decision for my purposes, and I would not have purchased this unit if I have realized this omission.]
Playback error If the unit's function, using the record button, is changed directly from RECORD to PLAYBACK, after playing for a few minutes, occasionally the track being played will skip to the next track or just stop, even though the current track has no record errors. If the recorder is powered down and restarted, the track will play correctly. Bug!
Backlighting of display It was good design to allow the duration of display backlighting to be selected by the user, but when the unit is first powered up, the display backlighting duration is fixed, shutting off just a moment before the Record Setup screen appears, making it difficult to ascertain when the record button may be pressed to begin recording in conditions of low lighting.
Playback fast-forwarding Many of my recordings are over an hour in length, and the fastest rate available is much too slow to get to the middle of that recording session in a reasonable time. This is a tough one. I cannot suggest how to make this function manageable.
Volume control I discovered that the volume control affects not only the headphone output but also the line output. On all other audio devices I have used, "line out" has a standard level, unaffected by any volume controls. Somebody in your design team seems to have missed this.
Flow chart in the user manual would be useful It would be easy for an engineer (and useful for engineer users like me) to present the functions of the iHP-140 with a flowchart, showing which function results from which button pushes. I could suggest one, but would not offer this effort without a guarantee of compensation.
In summary The hardware of the iHP-140 is excellent, but it should have been user-tested more completely before releasing it to the public for sale. One reason I chose this unit for purchase is that the firmware is upgradeable. Please consider my suggestions for your first available upgrade and notify me by email when improvements are available.
[ drchick@mindspring.com ]
Chick Hebert
The Media Guy
41 Comparison of the iRiver/iPod
After buying an Apple iPod and trying it for a few weeks, I returned it and purchased an iRiver iHP-120 instead. Below is my comparison:
Advantages to the iRiver iHP-120 over the iPod:
The iRiver's battery lasts twice as long as the iPod (16 hours instead of 8 hours).
While I haven't actually held one in each hand to compare, according to the on-line specs, the iRiver is a few grams lighter (weight) than the iPod, in spite of it's slightly larger casing.
The buttons are more tactile and resistant. A problem with the iPod was that the buttons on the unit itself (not the remote) were so incredibly feather-touch sensitive, that unless I kept re-engaging the hold switch, I would accidently press buttons all the time just while holding it!
The iRiver has a much better remote. All the iPod's remote had was a play/pause button, and FWD and REV buttons. The iRiver's remote, while slightly larger, has full-functionality (you can actually get away with NEVER using the buttons on the main unit), and also has a backlighted LCD screen which shows almost all the info you would need while listening and navigating your music library. In addition, the iRiver's remote has a much better clip for attaching it to your belt, shirt pocket, etc.
The iRiver's carrying case is better. It has a clear-plastic window exposing the screen, and perfectly placed holes for all buttons and ports. Unlike the iPod, you never actually need to remove the iRiver from it's case if you don't want! Not even to charge or connect to PC.
With the iRiver, you can choose to either browse your music library by file tree, or by artist/album/genre (MP3).
The iRiver can record (right out of the box, not with an optional accessory!). In addition to the built-in mic for voice recoring, the package includes an external mic (with lapel clip). The unit also has analog/optical ports for line in/out.
The iRiver has a built-in FM radio with support for 20 preset stations (unfortunately you can't record from the radio).
One thing that bugged me about the iPod was that if the title of the song was long, only some of it would be shown on the screen. The name would just be truncated and you could never see the rest. The iRiver on the other hand, has a nice feature where if the title of the song is longer than the width of the screen, it will scroll over so show the rest. And on top of that, you can configure the speed at which it scrolls, and how it scrolls to the next "screen" of text (vertically, horizontally). I don't know why Apple didn't think of that. Mind you, things like that could always be fixed in a future firmware update...
The iRiver is shipped with everything you need. Including an AC adaptor, USB 2.0 cable, carrying case, headphones, external mic, remote, etc. There is no cradle, but then again you don't need to use the same cable for power/data as you do with the iPod. When I had the iPod I had to buy a USB 2.0/Firewire combo cable so that I didn't have to keep unplugging the firewire from the computer every time I wanted to charge the unit. The iRiver comes with an AC adaptor, and a USB 2.0 cable (which is faster than firewire anyway-- I filled my entire 20GB iRiver in less than 40 minutes).
The iRiver, in my opinion, has better sound. When I had my iPod I found that if I had any of the EQ effects turned on, many of my songs would be distorted. The iRiver doesn't have that problem, and also, unlike the iPod, the iRiver has a user-configurable EQ setting as well as the presets, not to mention SRS surround sound and WOW effects. Balance, treble/bass.
The iRiver can be used as a portable HD simply by connecting it to a PC (shows up as a new drive letter). Even though the Apple iPod can do this too, the difference is that with the iRiver, you can copy your music files back to a PC again. The iPod did not allow this, unless you chose NOT to have the music files available for listening on the iPod.
---
Below are the things that I liked better about the Apple iPod. Although some are great features, I ultimately think that the iRiver is a better unit:
The circular scroll wheel on the iPod is extremely innovative. It allows you to scroll as slowly or as quickly through large lists of songs (or scan forward/backward within a song) as you want, and be as accurate as you want with the scrolling. Although the iRiver has a nice joystick-type controller, and you can scroll quite fast, it isn't as useful as the iPod's scroll wheel.
The iPod is *slightly* thinner. While both the iPod and the iRiver are identical in length and width, the iPod is a tiny bit thinner.
The iPod boots up instantly. No wait time at all. Unfortunately, the iRiver takes about 10 seconds to boot up if you choose to browse your library by file tree, or about 30 seconds if you want to browse by artist/album/genre.
While listening, you can create an on-the-go playlist, queueing up as many songs as you want. Then save it to your computer later. The iRiver, by comparison, can only queue up one song (the next song) to play after the current one ends. With the iRiver, you can still create playlists, but must do it on your computer using Winamp (not included).
There's my opinion!
42 I-POD Killer....YES
I just purchased the I-River hp-120, and have to say this item is fantastic. It is simple to use and has great sound. It takes about 20 minutes to get everything started. And It has and FM radio and Voice recorder to Boot. Only promblem i have had with it is you can't use the music from I-tunes for this, or for that matter any mp3 player, as the I-pod uses the new MP4, so the other machines will not be able to play them....YET!! I highly reccomend this item, hey but don't liten to me see for yourself..You won't be sorry trust me....
43 buy the ipod
I own an older PC and thought the iriver would be the choice for me. I should have gotten the ipod. First off, there is no information saying that the player will not support protected content. So all the music I copied onto my computer is useless and would not play. So after a few days of copying cds, unprotected, I was able to play them on my iriver. BUT, since the files were .wma format, the player would not recognize them. So if I tried to search for a song by title or artist, it was not there.
I had to download winamp to make playlists which in itself is no big deal, but since most of my music was in .wma format, those songs would not be on the playlist.
Customer service is a joke! I emailed the company twice asking for help, and did not get a response even after a week. I called and was on hold for 15 minutes before someone came on and said there was not a whole lot I could do.
I thought this product was going to make listening to music easy for me. It turned out that over half the music on my computer would not play on the iHP120.
I returned it and am buying the new ipod.
44 Great little MP3 player
After weeks of researching, reading, looking, etc..., I decided to go with the iRiver 120 GB after seeing it on sale at Best Buy. I'm really glad I did - this thing is great. Nice and pocket size, and the remote makes it easy to control your music with the player in your coat pocket or bag. The 120 GB memory is more than I could ever need. My sister-in-law bought me a wireless transmitter that goes in the headphone jack, and will transmit to my car's FM receiver on the 88.x FM channels. I like this too on the way into work. The battery life on this is great and lives up to the manufacturers claims, and the built in FM receiver is a great feature too! (A feature that I was quite fond of and helped sway me towards this and away from the iPod).
I haven't used the in-line recording feature much, but some people might find this feature useful too.
The only issues I have with the device are the limitations on the file names (52 characters is short, especially if you use an auto-naming program with your music... and it's really 48, because 4 characters are used up with the '.MP3' file tag). Also, the file transfer process works fine, but if I make changes to my computer drive, I have to manually update the iRiver each time (there's no Sync feature except for just dragging and dropping all of your music over, which will take a good amount of time with USB 1.1).
Overall, though, I'm pleased with the purchase, and feel it was a better value than the iPod.
45 The most feature rich of the bunch.
BEST FEATURES: The ability to plug in the device and automatically start transferring songs, without software; Also, transferring songs from the player back to your computer or anybody else's computer without any restrictions. Recently, I was able to save some important documents and files onto it, just before my friend's computer crashed from a virus. It saved the day. The battery life is also robust. I'm able to get about 14 hours consistently. The sound quality is excellent. I've become an audiophile now, and only rip and download bit rates of 192 or more. You can really hear the difference. The in line remote with LCD is pretty neat.
DECENT FEATURES: Line-in and voice recording are also cool, but I don't really use them, though I thought I would when I bought the player; the FM radio is nice, but you can't record from the radio. The carrying case is nice and padded. The design of the player is also pretty slick and scratch proof. The digital/ anolog line in/outs are cool too. Just haven't really used them that much, except for the digital line out. The shuffle and repeat all work great. I'm not sure what other reviewers that harped on this are talking about.
ANNOYING FEATURES: The database on the player which allows you to sort through songs is decent, except for two big problems. One, filenames that have titles that are too long do not get stored into the database. Two, songs that are listed under Artist or album are not listed in any particular order. It seems like the database is only useful when searching for one particular song, not if you want to play multiple songs in a row. Also, the database only recognizes MP3 files, even though the player still plays most other file types. Because of this, I mostly use the file tree which lists all of the songs as they appear on the computer; Also battery drains quickly when transferring files and songs. I prefer to keep it plugged in to the adaptor when transferring; The headphones suck as with most mp3 players. Spent a few extra bucks on a decent one; The device is not that easy to use, not very intuitive. But I got used to it. You should read the manual though. I don't think I would have ever figured out all the features without it; The wires get tangled quite a bit with regards to the inline remote. They're just too long; Scrolling through songs takes just way too long. This and the inability to create playlists on the fly are probably the only gripes that I have with my player. The other issues were resolved one way or another.
CONCLUSION: I bought this player through Amazon 6 months ago. I avoided the ipod because of the cost, battery, and the perceived lesser value in relation to the iRiver iHP 120. My friend recently bought a Rio Karma, but that totally died after she went running with it. Before the iRiver, I had the Archos 20 Gb Jukebox. But that totally sucked in every aspect except easy file transfer. I returned that and bought this instead. This player does a lot of things I thought I really wanted when I bought it. But after having the player for 6 months, I've realized that those things aren't really all that useful for me (mainly recording). The feature I love the most, that other players don't do is the ability to transfer songs back and forth from different computers without restrictions and without software. This feature cannot be emphasized enough. Still I love my iRiver iHP 120. Probably couldn't live without it. I enjoy giving away all of my songs to my friends computers without hassle. There are a few things that are annoying, but I am not returning it. However, since the iPOD came down in price and increased its battery life, I would find less reason to purchase iRiver iHP 120 over the ipod.
46 Not as pleased as I thought I'd be.....
This is my first audio device of this type . . I hesitate to call it an MP3 player (although of course it is) because my files are .wma format . . anyway - I'm somewhat new to this technology . . so when the time came to buy either an Ipod or something similar I made sure I did a LOT of research.
I ordered the iRiver iHP-120 at the end of June 2004. I received it within 2 days from Amazon. I used it for 2 days. I treated it like it were an egg. Super careful. Didn't drop or bang it. I'm acutely aware of hard drives and how delicate (don't care what folks tell you to the contrary) they are. After 2 days it abruptly stopped playing ......and (I was sitting completely still at my computer reading a file) then displayed a "checking drive" message --- THEN (this is the part I am quite sure the iRiver customer svs guy just simply didn't believe) it entered "recording" mode and then froze up like it was recording and then had paused. I was floored. All this time I was just sitting at my PC looking at the display on the remote. At that point, I picked it up and tried to turn it off. It finally powered down. I let it rest for about 10 minutes. . . then tried to turn it back on - it powered up -- and then down all within a 30-45 second period of time. My review star rating lost 1 star for the iRiver being defective. The 2nd star was lost due to the "customer service" iRiver apparently reluctantly provides.
I was on hold for over 25 minutes. When the rep came on the line it was like I was interrupting his day....VERY off-hand "couldn't care less" attitude ....finally he said that (after I told him it was quite clear the drive had just crashed) I would have to return it to them or to Amazon. . . he was hoping I'd return it to Amazon I'm quite sure. . but I didn't want to as I'd heard that Amazon charged some sort of fee for returns - not sure if that is true if the product is defective and they're replacing it - but anyway - I chose to return it to iRiver. He could NOT give me an RMA over the phone - I had to email the request to him and then he'd forward it to the 'returns department' - - which is all unncessarily complex...and that in a "few days" I'd get a reply. Well - to their credit I got an RMA number in a reply email later that day but it said it would take up to 3 weeks to get the replacement. Which is outrageous. I emailed their customer service (through their website link) and asked if this was truly the turn time - they said no - it would be more likely to be a week (the online response was a lot nicer than the guy on the phone) .. and sure enough I got my replacement last Friday. I've had it now for a week .. SO FAR it is working just fine. I'm very pleased with the sound . . . but I couldn't stand the earbuds it came with so replaced those with the Sony MDR-EX71SL earbuds (~$32.00) - they're VERY good for the price. I mean VERY good.
Now - to the player itself. First off I am a firm believer in RTFM (reading the manual) -- so I have read it. And I've read it. And I've read it some more. It is not at all well organized let alone well written! The "joystick" thing on the front of the main unit is really not at ALL intuitive. If it weren't for the remote (which I love) I would probably not be able to still, today after a week, navigate through my files and folders! ;-)
I would like to use the database function, but can't because my music files are .wma ...but I had them extremely well organized in MediaPlayer/Media Library on my PC so I don't miss it that much.
I do like the volume - it is sufficient (and then some) and I was worried it might not be - I've heard that the iPod has a very low volume max and also heard that from several reviews here about this item. But I found it to be just fine. And I like my music pretty loud.
What I do wish it had was a REAL random play shuffle feature but it doesn't so I don't even bother with trying to use the repetitive shuffle feature that it does have. And I have to admit I knew this before I bought it.
Would I buy one again? Not sure.
Will I be in a hurry to download the latest (1.4) firmware? (My player has the 1.3v) .. probably not - as it is working now I figure I'll just not fix what ain't broke.
Will I download the Moodlogic H Manager? Uh----NO! I've read a lot of folks say it has hung their computer and trashed out their iRiver so I daren't even touch that.
Biggest complaint: the random shuffle that isn't there, AND the really offhand-bordering on rude customer "service!"
47 Great Player, but dont drop it
This player was probably the best buy i ever made.....until i dropped it. WARNING!!!! if you drop this it may delete all of your songs and files, i lost about 500 files after one drop, and it stopped working all-together, so i decided to buy the Creative Zen Touch, and I am hoping this wont happen again, but besides the dropping issue, this is a great buy.
48 Simple Review
I think this is a great product. The best aspects of this music player are battery life, lcd remote, carrying case, compatablity with different file formats, features (recording, am/fm, line in/out, ect.), and number of extras (usb cord, remote, case, external microphone, line in/out cable, headphones, ect.).
I am extremely happy with the performance of this product, and I don't have any complaints.
49 Review for iRiver ihp-120
Bought this player after comparing against iPod, creative etc. It was a cinch since it offered a huge set of features, is excellently engineered, and has great battery life. And oh ! by the way, it plays music REALLY well. One of the most satisfying features I found was that the iRiver plugs in as a hard disk on Windows/Linux without the need of any extra software with minimum of fuss. This makes it valuable for file transfers also.
50 iHP 120
I have had my iRiver for about three weeks and I absolutely love it. I have nearly 1000 songs and still have nearly 17GB left. I love that it can read OGG files which are good quality and space saving. From what I know of other mp3 player I have found that this is by far the best because it has an internal and external microphone and a FM radio. The only things I don't like are that once you put a song in it you can't gain space back once it is deleted (kind of obvious but still disappointing) and (this is why you shouldn't buy this product) that iRiver is coming out with the H300 series in America soon (is already released in Japan and Europe) which is nicer looking, a color screen, same space and I think that it will be the same price. The other thing I wish it had was the ability to create a play list anywhere with no host computer but that doesn't bother me much. Overall this product is great and I love it, but once I can get the H320 I will buy that.
51 iRiver H-120 is ALMOST a great MP3 player...
With lots of enthusiasm I spurned my wife's urging and purchased an iRiver H-120 instead of an iPod like the one she owns. The extra features (voice record and a built-in FM tuner lured me to the dark side). I called it my "anti-Pod" music player. Initially I was delighted with my purchase. And in some respects I remain reasonably satisfied. But alas, my dream of a perfect MP3 player remains woefully unfulfilled.
What bothers me about this iRiver player is the unfulfilled "promise" from iRiver of frequent and significant firmware updates which would unlock features, correct problems, and otherwise enhance the usefulness of my iRiver purchase. In as much as I am heavily involved in software development myself, I felt this was a tremendous advandage for the H-120 over the iPod. After all, Apple never plays up their firmware upgrade capabilities - even though they doubtlessly have this capability.
In April, after much talk about the lack of a recent firmware update, iRiver went to the trouble of posting a public notice on the iRiver discussion message board that they would be releasing not one, but TWO firmware updates for the H-120. One in May 2004 and another to follow in June. Much joy was expressed on the iRiver message board related to this promise. Exciptment built and enthusiastic buyers sought out the best deals on these players. Many were sold with this promise of firmware updates. Then May came, slowly passing day by day and what? No firmware update. No new firmware. Oh well, everyone talked it up that they would relase both updates in June. Alas, June came ---- and went... Still NO firmware. Now we're halfway through July, and still no firmware. Nothing. Nada. No revised promise. Nothing encouraging from iRiver. No nothing. The silence is deafening. The discussion on the iRiver forums has soured. Folks talke of returning their iRivers while they can... Makes you wonder if iRiver is unable to support the products as they have promised.
I'll not go so far as to say I'd never buy another iRiver product. But the odds of me doing that deminish with every passing day that no firmware upgrade is posted on the iRiver site.
So if you are thinking of buying an iRiver product with the belief that you're purchase will be well supported with firmware upgrades - as some products truly are - then thing twice and three times before settling on iRiver as your best choice.
The hardware itself (at least the H-120 I am familiar with) is first rate. But the lack of ongoing support leaves me feeling that so much promise is missing from this otherwise fine piece of equipment.
I'd love to report back one day soon that iRiver has kept their "promise." But at this point I'm pretty much resigned to the fact that they either just don't care, or are incompetent to do anything about it. Either way it isn't a good sign for iRiver and their customer base...
52 Amazing Product, Terrible company
This mp3 player is clearly the best that is available. Twice the battery life of an Ipod, line in/out, optical in/out, voice recorder, FM,.. the list goes on.
However, the flaws with teh player relate to the firmware.. there are some bugs that have been posted on the Iriver forums about 4-5 months ago. The company is very irresponsible and does not care about your once u've purchased the product. Take a look at their forums and you will see what i mean. There are at least 10 bugs which need to be fixed and iRiver hasn't released a fix for nearly 4 months, even though they promised to address these issues many many months ago. Bugs such as gapless playback, on the fly playlisting, delete feature, hard disk spinning issue, etc. These are all simple fixes that can be done very easily, but iriver decided to abdanon support for this series now that they have a new model that is color and supports video playback.
If you can live with these bugs, get the player, it is great.. otherwise wait for something else... iPod V.4???
53 Absolutely the best
For weeks I had been searching for an mp3 player that also recorded voice, and I kept reading really bad reviews on most of them. Finally, I went to an electronics store and saw the iRiver iHP 120 and immediately wanted it. I don't regret getting it. Transferring music is soooooooooo easy and just about anyone can do it. Searching for music is also easy if you orgnize your music, it has an internal and external microphone and comes with its own carrying case!The remote control works great and I have not had any problems with it. I give iPod a lot of credit, but if they had a voice recording feature, I probably would not have come upon this great item.
54 Non-biased Review
The ihp120 is the first mp3 player I've owned, but I have experience with the first gen ipod because my brother owns it. That said, any reference I have to an mp3 player is one that was made 3 years ago(?).
Hardware:
You read many reviews of this player that say the build quality is excellent. Nothing is perfect and there are hardware related problems. The US model uses cheap black metallic paint on the outside. It has already chipped off on many places around the front and sides of my player. The joystick is uncomfortable to use and to add insult to injury, the scrolling speed for moving down your music list is very slow. The analog line output is poorly implemented--it's still controlled by the main amplifier which is subject to the volume control. It's basically just another headphone port.
Software:
Where to begin? The database functionality is extremely poor. Many have already commented on this so I won't elaborate. You will be forced to use the file tree mode because of this. The display is cluttered with useless graphics making long titles unreadable. You are forced to see the folder name, song, and artist. You can't change folder name to something more important, like say album title. The only name that scrolls is the song title. And the scroll is ugly. You will have to use the default "scroll" which just refreshes the name to show the cut off characters.
One function that doesn't work that I wanted is a normal shuffle. The reason why I and many others bought a HDD mp3 player is becuase we have large mp3 collections. I wanted to be able to shuffle through my entire player or playlist so I don't hear the same songs/artists over and over. But the ihp120 doesn't have a real shuffle, so you will hear the same songs in shuffle mode over and over again. Pathetic. And this is an existing function, not some new function like On The Fly playlists. I'm scared to see how that will actually be implemented. Another thing I didn't like about the ihp120's playlist was that you could never see what songs made up a playlist. Unless you memorized how the playlist was created on your PC, you're out of luck on where you are in the thing.
And those wanting to use this to record will be upset to know that recorded audio gets corrupted regardless of analog or digital input.
Customer Support:
One word: NONE. The only customer support they provide is giving people replacement players. Getting a replacement player does not address any of the issues above. They ignore and mislead their customers. Just visit their internation website and check out their forum. If you are a die-hard Amiga owner and are used to non-existent customer support, you'll feel right at home here.
The POSITIVE:
Not all things are bad, and there are somethings that the ihp120 does well. Radio function is good--unless you want to record from it (which was advertised as a function). The digital outs work. The only thing I can recommend this player for is to use it as a 20GB removable hard drive.
So to summarize, this is not a good music player, but is a good USB hard drive. If music is your passion and the reason you are looking for an mp3 player, please look elsewhere.
55 Bad support!
Badly designed firmware.
The way the company lies is very frustrating, especially when you have to keep checking the website for the nonexistent promised firmware upgrade. It seems small and petty, but after owning the product for a while, trust me, you'll regret buying it."
56 iRiver iHP-120
This is an awsome MP3 player, this player is better than the iPod. It has built in radio,it plays MP3, WMA, and OGG. It has a built in voice recorder, line in, line out, opticial in/out. No other mp3 player has these many featres. one problem is that the support from iRiver is not the best, but its built well so you should need any support. New firmware SHOULD be coming out soon, or if it doenst.
57 Very Poor customer service
Although this is a good player, I am very disappointed about the customer service. Actually there is no customer service or feedback to users on the main website. They promised new firmware to fix some very serious bugs three months ago but as yet have not even told their customers when it will be out. They were supposed to release the firmware two months ago.
58 not worth it
The iHP 120's hardware is top notch (with the exception of the poorly engineered joystick), but the firmware is so poor that much of the device's potential is wasted. The iHP 120 still lacks a proper shuffle mode. Basic features like on-the-fly playlists and file deletion are missing. Recording mode lacks level meters, rendering this mode useless to anyone interested in decent sounding recordings. The optical input does not function properly and drops samples. The filename length limitation makes the database mode worthless. I could go on and on. Company support is virtually nonexistant. I can't see myself recommending this or any iRiver product now or in the foreseeable future.
59 Great product - but poor support!
Great product. But the way the company lies is very frustrating, especially when you have to keep checking the website for the nonexistent promised firmware upgrade. It seems small and petty, but after owning the product for a while, trust me, you'll regret buying it.
60 My new and faithful companion
I bought my iHP-120 two weeks ago, and I love it dearly. It has been at my side almost constantly, and while I feared when I bought it that it would be a waste of money, I have no regrets whatsoever. However, if you're reading this, you don't care about that: you want to know what I like about it. So, based on my own requirements for a good portable music player, here's what I think is good and bad about the iHP-120:
Pros
- Battery life: I've gotten mine to last for 14+ hours, and I think it could likely get the promised 16 if I was careful (i.e. not a lot of skipping around, turned off illumination).
- Ease of use: You see the term "learning curve" a lot in reviews of this product, but I had no trouble with it. It was confusing for an hour, maybe, but really, what isn't? For the most part, the controls are intuitive and well placed. I know the iPod's scroll wheel is the supposed Holy Grail, but I don't much care for it myself. I prefer the little iHP joystick, because it's responsive but hard to hit by accident.
- Transfers: I hate being forced to use proprietary programs like Musicmatch, so the fact that the iHP just plugs in and appears as a hard drive is perfect for me. I'd much rather handle my own syncing, thank you. Plus, this way it's easy to use the device as for back-up or transfer purposes. I don't have USB 2.0 on my laptop, but I was still able to transfer ~10 GB of music in 3 to 4 hours. That's more than good enough for me, since I can just do it overnight.
- Portability: The iHP is a pleasure to carry around. Sometimes I put it in my pocket, and sometimes I wear it on my belt with the included carry case. Either way, I barely notice it. I haven't bothered with the remote, yet, since right now all the cords seem like overkill, but I think that when I'm wearing more layers of clothing in the winter it could be very helpful.
- Construction and appearance: I like the way the iHP looks, and the way it feels. It's well-built, and you can tell as soon as you pick it up. Plus, it's still pretty unique. Everyone's got an iPod, but I've never seen someone else carrying one of these. If you want, you can claim that's due to the iPod's superiority, but I think it's just the herd instinct at work.
Cons
- Shuffling: I want to mention this because I didn't know about it when I bought mine. The shuffling algorithm on the iHP is very marginal. When I'm shuffling through my whole drive, it's not a problem, but if I use a playlist, it will play the same "random" order EVERY TIME. You can trick it, sort of, but it's still not random, and that's a pain. iRiver has promised to fix this in a firmware upgrade, but they're months behind on it, now.
- Scrolling: I like the joystick, but it's terrible for scrolling through long lists, because the scroll never accelerates (this is also an obvious flaw, and may well be fixed in later firmware). This can make finding specific files a lengthy operation.
- Start-up time: My drive is only half full, and even so my iHP takes 3-5 minutes to turn on because it has to read the files (this is exacerbated by the fact that I use database mode, which allows me to search artist, album, and genre). This irritated me until I realized that thanks to the battery life I could generally just leave it on all day.
61 Well.......
I thought this thing would be better than the ipod and dell dj, but it wasn't. To bad because it has a built in voice recorder, Radio, and a LCD remote (wich is awsome). The build quality is sturdy and it looks cool, all black with a bluish green screen. Also a great thing about this is that the batterys trully do last up to 16 hours wich is a LONG time. The sound is great too.
But this thing is hard, annoying, and slow to get to you songs. Unless you gave only like 100 songs, you will be bored just trying to get to a song because this thing takes about 10 seconds to get through 100 songs. Also the screen is allitle blury and hard to read. The headsphones that come with this is AWFUL. The FM radio comes in allitle bad. Also its allitle big and bulky.
Dont get me wrong, this is a great mp3 player. I would just suggest and ipod. I own and ipod but am not and ipod freak. I just like the ipod better because its alot easier to use and is more portable. If you want a mp3 player that has alot of features, get this one. If you want a easier to use, and more portable mp3 player then get the ipod. Both are good though.
Iriver fans feel freen to mark no at the bottom......
62 I'm about to return it for the second time
First time I purchased the item was because the battery only lasted 6 hours. Also the Wav. files took up to much space.
Second time around, battery life a littel better but the player can't read wma. files. I'm not really feeling this product because it's not living up to the good reviews that I read. I'm disappointed because I really want to like the player, but it's not working out for me
63 FIRMWARE UPDATE IS A LIE
Product is fine. But iriver's claim for "firmware update" is a total joke. They advertise one thing, but then ignores its customers after they have purchased it. Look up the firmware for this product at iriver.com. The last update was January of 2004. The company promised another update by June, and still no word. Chances are, the January 2004 update will be the last for this product. That means you'll NEVER have on-the-fly playlist, unlike the Ipod. Nor can you delete files from the player itself. Avoid this company. It won't last.
64 a very dependable, high-quality mp3 player
I haven't had a hitch with this mp3 player. Where you hear about various bugs with almost every other mp3 player, I've gone 2 months without running into a single problem. I'm somewhat of an audiophile, and the sound quality is very impressive for such a small machine. Plus, unlike most other high-end mp3 players, this can play un-protected songs, like songs you download off of kazaa or other P2P programs. So if you get most of your music through P2P, then this is a MUST-HAVE.
65 This is a great DAP
Well, I just wanted to say something about the "non-working" FM-Radio another user complained about. It doesn't work when you don't use your remote control, because your remote control is the antenna. You can't build it into the unit for the simple reason that it couldn't receive any programms inside that metal/plastic case. ;)
Other than that, the only disadvantage is the aforementioned lack to create a playlist on the fly. But I think to use WinAmp playlists is a good choice since you can get that program for free. On the other hand, I don't use playlists because I do mostly listen to an album after another. So no negative point on me for that.
The scroll speed could be improved, but it is no real negative point. After all, you can adjust the scroll speed in the menu.
ID3-Tag recognition works great, but I have 2 CD's out of 350 that it doesn't play when chosen through the ID3-Tag menu. Chosing them from the file menu works though. I don't know why it doesn't work, but both albums are 2 CD albums which are named like 1/2 and 2/2. Maybe a future Firmware solves this problem.
Another little thing is that artificial "half a second"-gap between songs. You don't hear it when you listen to "normal" songs, but since I'm a great fan of Prog-Metal/Rock and they usually produce concept albums which play on CD song after song without a single gap...
66 I looked for a long time....
and settled on the iriver. I have not been disappointed. After 2 months of frequent use I have this to say about the product: It has at least 100%longer battery life than my ipod. It has a great, durable feel to it. I like the fact that it acts as an external hard drive. I don't use the database function because all my files are in .wma format. I use media player as my jukebox on my computer and it does a nice job of labelling the folders the music goes in, so there's been little hassle organizing music onto my iriver. A word of advice, if your music isn't well organized it can take a long time to find things on the iriver. The firmware is upgradeable which means bugs can be fixed regularly, although I haven't yet encountered one. It also sounds great. I replaced the standard earbuds with Shure e-2c's and this thing sounds killer!
My cons list is short. I don't like the fact that I can't create playlists on the fly. I wish the database function worked with file types other than mp3. I also wish the player supported more codecs like flac and shorten. I am clinging to the hope that these issues can be looked at with firmware upgrades.
UPDATE 8.3.04
My unit crashed after less than 60 days of ownership and relatively light use!!! It is fried and iriver is in the process of getting me a new one. I am worried because of all the negative reviews on iriver service, but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt if they take care of me on this one. Nonetheless, this product is not as great as I first believed! 2 STARS!!!!
67 It's simply amazing.
I'm not one to give compliments easily but I would have to say that the iRiver is one of the (if not THE) best players out there!
I've got it from Best Buy and I have a killer warrenty! At first when I opened the package (which isnt that large) I was extremely dissapointed at the earphones!
Why?
The left earbud wire was considerably shorter from the right! I was furious! I wanted to return it right away, but BestBuy closed. I decided to check up on some support forums to see if anyone had this same problem and if it can be replaced....to my suprise, THEY ALL COME LIKE THAT, but it's for a very clever reason...so you can wrap the right bud around the back of your neck to avoid the wires being in your way! I thought that was sooooo cool!
Now for those who are worrying about not having a import program for the player, don't worry. It acts JUST LIKE an external hardrive, so you don't have to worry about pressing something wrong or clicking the wrong option, simply get the music file onto your computer (via any method you use) and DRAG and DROP, organize the files like you would in your regular hardrives (name your folder, files, ect.). I prefer this method over any program!
Make sure your file names arent exremely long, you really don't need them to be 52 chars long now do you?
Also the new firmware upgrade (v1.4) allows you to UPLOAD LYRICS FOR EACH SONG! Now how cool is that!?
I havent messed with the recorder that much, im to excited with copying 1GB movies onto the player and transfering them to my friends computer, its the ultimate machine! And if a new one comes out (That's better) best buy will give me back every penny I spent on this and put it towards that new player. You can't go wrong!
Don't take my word for it, go to the stores and ask, hold it, mess with it, you'll love it.
Alot of people want the I-pod because of the name, trust me, I had my heart set on the I-Pod, but thanks to the reviews at amazon and Hand-On Experience with it, it has no comparison to the Awe of the IRiver. THe fact that the IRiver had more that 2x the battery life span alone beats the I-Pod. I don't care if the I-Pod could mysteriously plays movies (it doesn't but still if it did) , you can only use it for 4-6 Hours (Iriver runs 14-18hrs) then it's not worth it, and I can't begin to fathom spending 300 bux on something thats going to die in less than 2 years in which I have to cough up 100bux for a replacement cause no stores offer a coverage plan, but the Iriver is expected to last 4+ years without losing longevity and BestBuy covers my next 4 Battery Replacements for free...and I can extend it for 40 bux more....AWESOME!
My advice: Try it yourself. But you WON'T be dissapointed.
68 I CANT PUT IT DOWN
I am so impressed with this product... Thanks to the other people for leaving good reviews on this product because that was what primarily got me to buy this. I can't describe the feeling you get when you open the package. You know when you hold something and you can just tell it's not cheap? Thats how I feel. The features are great, I love having a radio and a voice recorder. I spent the entire night last night putting music on it; and no that's not because it's slow. It is simply drag and drop like a hard drive would be. I just had to pick out the good stuff :) 5 Stars ***** !
69 Updated - Good but one problem
The buttons broke on mine. Other than that I loved it. iRiver has offered to replace it so I'm happy with that.
70 GREAT PRODUCT. ALMOST PERFECT.
This is a great product. I've had it for a week and haven't had any problems. Transfer speed, sound quality, and the optical out are all excellent. Battery life seems to be close to what's advertised. This review has some product comments and a tip or two in it.
I'm a little biased because I've been a fan of iRiver flash players for over 2 years. New users may want to find a store that has them on display so they can play with the navigation thingy, especially if they have used an ipod (I used my friends iPod for a while and didn't like the touch system).
The only things so far that keep it from being a 5 star are the lack of an accelerator for scrolling through your collection, the song database can only deal with files less than 52 characters in length, and one of the buttons needs to be reprogrammed. If you have a huge collection and need to scroll through 300 band names, it would be nice for the scroll speed to increase the longer you hold scroll down (this really does suck and i hope they change this). And the A>B repeat and Mode button functions should be reversed. It's too easy to hit A>B and loop a section instead of changing the shuffle and repeat mode (you have to hold A>B down to switch the play mode). The 52 character limitation isn't a huge problem, but it is annoying. There are great FREE applications out there for renaming mp3/ogg files based on the ID3 tags (freeware TagScanner is amazing and hella fast...Musicmatch supertagging is nice for 2 files, but takes days to rename thousands of file and is is crashy and sucky for big collections). I'm sure these are things that could be fixed with a firmware update.
I don't understand why iRiver didn't keep the buttons the same as their flash players. Adding a fourth button doesn't seem to have added anything. And it seems like they spent more effort on making text file navigation more convenient than searching through your collection. It's still an excellent product and I recommend iRiver gadgets to all my friends.
71 As advertised
It really should get 4 1/2 stars but .... It has a hugh hard drive, the fm radio works and you can record your on it using a built in mike or an external mike. I use a tunecast ii in the car and it works great. It does what it says it is supposed to do and does it well. It would be nice if you could make playlists on the device but ..... Also, much of the music on my computer was formated in Real Audio, which of course this does not recognize, but I have been transforming music to mp3 so it is not a real problem.
The sound (I am not an audiophile) seems fine to me.
In short, I like it and am glad I bought it.
72 Poor product
I wanted to like the I-River Ihp 120, in part because of the FM tuner. However, I have to recommend against buying it. The FM tuner stopped working on both the original unit and the replacement the company sent (I paid the shipping charge one way) after about two months use, except when the remote is in use. Often I don't want to use the remote. Something is wrong with this item, since it happened twice. I am trying to get my money back, but will not likely be successful. Do not buy this product. I also find it extremely difficult to move around the files and select just the music I want. Not at all user friendly.
73 Lots of Features, Memory, and Nice Sound
I just recently got this thing, and im loving every minute of it. I was making my choice between an ipod and this iriver, but I chose this thing, because it was about 100 dollars cheaper and has about the same features and is less than the ipod. Also this battery lasts 16 hours on a full charge, double the ipods battery life.
It has lots of features, An Fm tuner, not many other MP3 players come with an Fm tuner you have to buy them as an add-on. A cool little handy remote. When you upgrade the file manager at iriver.com you can arrange your music by artist, album, Genre, or Titles.
The memory size is great. I currently have 16 cds on here and it only takes up 451mb, i will be adding more. Also this thing doubles as an external Hard Drive. So you can drag and drop your pc files onto this player and transfer it onto another computer. Also the 20gb size allows you to hold about 5,000 songs.
The sound quality is great, even though i have crappy headphones, i can tell the difference from my other mp3 player. I suggest after getting this, buy a pair of nice headphones.
74 Absolutely Great!!
I've had mine for about three weeks now and LOVE it!
I will concur with what many have said here about the slight learners curve associated with the getting used to the controls but that in my mind is a very small price to pay for the ton of functionality, ample storage space and the great sound you get out of the device.
No, there is no ripping software and for me thats a good thing. I prefer using my own programs to rip my CDs thank you very much! File transfer just couldn't be any easier and it's fast too. Battery life is incredible, recorded files sound great and construction is solid.
The iPod I looked at probably would have been a bit easier to navigate out of the box but that's hardly a factor now that I'm used to the iRivers controls. The iPod offered me games. Games???!!! I don't want games! I want great sound and the ability to record too! The iPod had lots of accessories that were extra cost items. The iRiver's accessories were all included in the purchase price with the unit itself.
You'll have to weigh the alternatives for yourself and for your own individual needs but for me the iRiver HP120 was one of the easiest decisions I've had to make. I am completely and totally thrilled with it!!!
Hope this helps ...
75 I REALLY wanted to like this product...
Let me begin my stating that the iRiver hardware is simply top-notch. The device itself is compact, the battery life is great, the sound quality is superb (assuming you aren't using the included earbuds), the full function backlit 4-line LCD in-line remote is a godsend, the player can be accessed simply as a hard drive, it plays a large number of file formats, etc.
However, I am regrettably returning this thing to the store. Why? Because iRiver simply makes it too damn hard to get music onto the device from my CD collection.
1) There is NO included ripping/organizing software. Zilch. Nada. What you get on CD is drivers so a Win98 box can talk to it, and a small program to create the database file so your player can access the music by Artist or Genre or Album or Track Name. (Without the database, you navigate your songs solely with a directory tree.)
2) While you can easily download software that will perform what I am complaining about in 1), no one package will do it all for you. To rip a CD, you have to do the following: (using programs you scrounge up from the internet yourself. iRiver is no help)
a) Rip the CD with the program of your choice. This program will also need to sort them into sane directories, for when the database doesn't work.
b) Run another program to make sure that no filenames are longer than 48 characters. Why? Because the database function won't work otherwise. (With pop music, this isn't a problem, but it sure is with classical music. For example, from Hilary Hahn's Bach Concerto's CD, CDDB returns the following track name: "10 - Concerto for obe, violin, strings & continuo in c minor, bwv 1060 #1: Allegro")
c) Run a third program to sync up your directory tree w/ the iRiver. If you just drag 'n drop, it takes a lot longer.
d) Run a fourth program to build the iRive
