Rio Karma DAP deceased - whats a worthy replacement

Civilian_Target

OK - so my Rio Karma has finally bit the dust. Not through any particular fault of its own, it made a spectacular leap for freedom from my trouser pocket as I was taking them out of the locker in the pool, and landed in a drain!

Fortunately, its covered by a Comet 3-year accidental damage warranty, so I now have £165 to spend on a new MP3 player, ideally buying from somewhere in the UK or Ireland that does accidental damage insurance

If I could get another Karma with its delicious interface, on the fly playlisting, multi-format support and gapless playback, I would, but them seem to be very hard to find in the UK and Ireland (they went out of production in May), so I was wondering, what is a good Karma replacement. The only real stipulations I have are Vorbis support and a decent battery life, and less than £200 (€270). And I'm not going ebay because I want at least a 1 year warranty.

Heres what I've got to choose between IMO:

Samsung J70 - currently leaning towards this one..
http://www.be-direct.co.uk/productDetails....ate=pricerunner
Upside - great battery life, seems to do everything the Karma did, looks pretty, good price too
Downside - Its just out and theres virtually no reviews etc. out there on it, I really have no idea whether it's actually any good.

iAudio M5 - the X5 looks sweet but is a bit pricey. iAudio m5
upside: it does everything I want, in theory
down side: its ugly as hell and probably hard to use.

MPIO HD300
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B...8132630-3825209
Up side: Looks sweet, seems to cover all bases
Down side: MPwho? And why are they not talking about the battery life?

Any other suggestions then on players then? or any ideas where I'd find a Karma in the UK or Ireland?

muckwarrior

Civilian_Target wrote:

iAudio M5
down side: its ugly as hell and probably hard to use.

Well if it's the same UI as the X5 then it's not hard to use. Perhaps not the easiest, but certainly not bad.

And as for the MPIO this seems pretty typical of the user reviews I've looked at.

Civilian_Target

muckwarrior wrote:

Well if it's the same UI as the X5 then it's not hard to use. Perhaps not the easiest, but certainly not bad.

And as for the MPIO this seems pretty typical of the user reviews I've looked at.

And then there were 2 - thanks for that, shame about the player.

Ease of use is quite important. The Karma was so easy to use, so I'd be hoping the replacement will at least come close to that.

Nala

There IS Rio Carbons in Ireland!!!

6gb for €169 in Dixons. Had loads of them in Liffey Valley an hour ago.

[edit] just saw you meant the Karma. Sorry!

Is the Carbon any good?

cormie

just a word of warning, going from Karma to anything else without gapless is really gonna annoy you:(

Nala

Actually can anyone tell me if the Rio Carbon has line-out?
I've searched the net but no luck.

Civilian_Target

No - it doesn't, but there's a volume-levelling feature that allows you to use the headphone jack as a line out, AFAIK

Nala

So basically, I could hook it up to my hi-fi and play the music through the hi-fi's speakers?

Sorry if this sounds like a dumb question. Just the CD player on my hi-fi is broke and I need some way to play my music out loud. The sound on my DVD player sucks for CDs.

muckwarrior

Nala wrote:

So basically, I could hook it up to my hi-fi and play the music through the hi-fi's speakers?

Yup!

cormie

Nala wrote:

So basically, I could hook it up to my hi-fi and play the music through the hi-fi's speakers?

Sorry if this sounds like a dumb question. Just the CD player on my hi-fi is broke and I need some way to play my music out loud. The sound on my DVD player sucks for CDs.

Depends on your "hi fi" if it's a good one, yes, more than likely, you'll just need the right connections, if it's a cheapo one, maybe not, but there are ways around it, tape adaptors etc, so basically, the answer is a yup;)

Nala

Well it was over €100 a couple of years ago so its probably a good one. Its a Philips one I think.
It has digital radio, you can preset stations, it has a wake up timer as well.

muckwarrior

Nala wrote:

Well it was over €100 a couple of years ago so its probably a good one. Its a Philips one I think.
It has digital radio, you can preset stations, it has a wake up timer as well.

Check to see does it have a line in.

Nala

This is the hi fi I have, it has an Auxiliary-In port thing alright. It mentions in the user manual that you can connect a DVD player or TV to the hi fi through this so I figure an MP3 player should be OK?

http://www.p4c.philips.com/files/m/mc-110_25/mc-110_25_dfu_eng.pdf

cormie

You're sorted then, just go into Maplin (or whatever electronics shop is near you and ask for a 3.5 stereo jack to l+r AUX input cable. They'll know what you mean I'm sure:)

Nala

Cool thanks Cormie! :v:

Nala

Bought a Rio Carbon today. The power adapter was faulty, hooked the player up to my PC and it has now stopped working. It's going back to the shop on Friday.

I won't be buying a Rio player again.

Civilian_Target

Bit the bullet and got an iAudio X5L to replace my Karma. It's meh, quite frankly. The interface sucks, startup is slow, the on the fly playlist is meh, the supplied software's shocking and there's no database, which is a pain in the hole.

On the upside, it's smaller and sturdier, it can show pictures, it has massive battery life, it's a mass disk and transfers are pretty fast. Overall though, I'd have taken a replacement Karma any day...

cormie

Really? Wow... How long have you had it? Give your oppinion in a month or so, wonder will it change? :eek: