[VeeJayRecords]

After purchasing an Irver mp3/CD player awhile ago, I know the quality of IRiver. I also have an Archos 20 gig mp3 player and I'm quite happy with it, but it's time for me to get even more portable with a flash player.
Ipods are out of the question due to cost and the proprietary nature of the company.

After doing some research I narrowed it down to Creative Labs, Iriver and Iaudio. As someone who likes to hear their music loud, the 5mw per channel Creative 1 gig player didn't cut if for me. Iaudio puts out a great series and is about 13 mw per channel. However, at 18 mw per channel, the Iriver T30 with its eq customization sounds great (Iaudio has it, too but I like the idea of 5 more mw per channel).

One problem - I still have a Windows Windows 2000 Pro SP4 operating system.
I just started reading threads here today and now realize that Iriver got smart and offered the UMS firmware updater/converter. However, from what I understand you still need a Win XP system to do the conversion, before Windows 2000 Pro will read it as a mass storage device. I've seen threads here showing how to get Windows 2000 to read the unit so that the upgrade can be done, but it seems some have had problems while others are successful. I can always go to a friend's computer that has XP installed, but if I do try to get Windows 2000 Pro to read the drive, I'd like to know that there are fixes in case some problem occurs.

Does anyone know why Iriver pulled down the 1.70 UMS zip file from their site (release date March 27, 2006)? If there was an upgrade, it's understandable, but most companies leave all the firmware upgrades on their site for a reasonable period of time.

When using the firmware converter, which UMS firmware should I eventually upgrade to for the US market?

Btw, does anyone have experience with the Iaudio U and G series and are they as good as the reviews? Why would Iriver ever think of putting out a unit that was incompatible with previous OS since they're still about 25% of the market?