A message to all iRiver owners.

[my_iriver]

Can someone answer this?

How come people assume so much about mp3 players? Eg. The H340 show pictures, can I set a picture for a background?
What do you think a Mp3 player is a PC? Come on.
I think it bull.... that people buy a player then think... hmmm... it could have gapless, why doesn't it have gapless. It shows pictures... can't it play videos...
Heck why don't you email iRiver and ask them to update the firmware to make coffee and download files off KaZaa while you're at it.

I'm sorry I'm bitching about this but I get this all the time for stupid clients on programming projects. Can't it have this.. can't it have that... after they allready knew and signed for what they were getting.

Hell, I did 1 1/2 months of research on a mp3 player before I got my H340 and guess what... unless it crashed all the time, had gaps in the music halfway through the song or the functionality promised to me didn't work I'd have a valid excuse for bitching about the player. I'm happy I got what I paid for, a player that performs like what was promised. Come one people. I think everyone wants too much for too little. If you wanted to have gapless then you should have did your research and bought a Rio. I think alot of people only realised they needed gapless after getting it, well tough sh..t. The mistake was yours not iRivers. Atleast now you know what to look for in your next player.

Also the firmware upgradable for me usually means that bugs can be fixed. For an example of this look at your motherboards and graphics cards. Few manufacturers add features in firmware upgrades, they usually just fix bugs. Get with the program. Well done on iRiver for giving us free features on some future firmware update, but really they don't owe us anything other than bug fixes. If you look at the firmware releases on their site they were quick to release firmware for player bugs.

If you can't spend your money wisely blame yourself!

That's all I had to say.
Thanks for the soap box.

-my_iriver

PS To all potential H3xx iRiver buyers, you can download the manual from the iRiver downloads and support page. Download it and have all your questions answered. I'm not sure if the other player model manuals are on the net, but you can check.

[crypt@]

Agree.

It is a futile exercise to complain about lacks when one already made the commitment. It is the surest indication that one hasn’t completed a proper research. But if proper research was made then one should take full responsibility to the final decision. But we are a greedy race, and in many ways because of our insatiable need for more we advance to the next level of enlightenment.

So whinge away I say, so long as one realises most will simply sigh at ones impulsiveness. On the upside, there may be a slim chance a sympathetic iRiver developer happens along the forum and bestows upon us an end-all of all firmware release.

[alseides]

i can't tell if you are enraged about stupid people who don't know how to spend money or hating iRiver. maybe its both.

[crypt@]

I think it is a rough day at work. Us computing guys can never satisfy...

[Lewis]

its not the lack of features that annoy me, although gapless would be nice the fraction of a second gap that is there most of the time is forgotten about or isnt noticed. the thing that annoys me is that iriver said the update would be in may, not september, if they said september from the begining then nobody would complain, but then this update didnt add the features it promised, although i dont miss otf playlisting because ive never had it before, i dont know any different.

[Tang]

Your post is a nonsense sorry my_iriver...
I was imagining that iRiver owners bought a firmware upgradable device... iRiver has presented the firmware upgrade as a very advantageous functionality to enhance the players features list and especially codec support... It was never presented as a "bugfixe" way...
Just read any manual since iMP250...

I'haven't discovered iRiver with the iHP1xx you know... Do you know that we were asking for Ogg playback since the iMP350 (that I owned after buying it directly to an Korean online seller since at this time there was NO french resellers for iRiver product).
We asked Ogg Vorbis many, many times and finaly it came first for iHP100 by a firmware upgrade... Then it was implemented by default to newer iHP1xx...

Other iRivers series owner were still complaining and iRiver finaly suceeded to implement Ogg vorbis to most of their devices with some restriction due to hardware limitation...

Do you know that the upgradable firmware functionality is now generalised for all DAP of ervey brand? The firmware argument is a real commercial one and no brand can ignore it...
If a brand leave his firmware branch without developping then customers will turn their search for other brand who still develop his firmware...
That's as simple... If you don't understand that you're simply disconnected from DAP market reality...

Actually some other DAP brand are more active than iRiver: the Karma is gapless and support FLAC and replaygain... The iAudio M3 has seens his last firmware giving it FLAC support too...

And iRiver? Nothing for the moment and they are unable to respect their own very precises promesses... Some of these are very simple and normal feature as "REAL RANDOM" or "playlist OTF" (a function that others iRiver series do have and i don't talk about other HD jukebox sometimes younger than our one year aged iHP1xx...)

About gapless playback you seems to miss something... Gapless playback is a normal decoding way especially for Ogg Vorbis a codec which is natiely gapless...
I remember that initial iMP350 firmware wasn't able to play Live CDaudio gaplessly... Users had complained and finally an upgrade firmware (v1.20 if i remember well) DID correct this...
Why it would be différent for Ogg Vorbis playback? Especially since iRiver has faulted with his unaceptable "Gap removing" mystification after having promised "GAPLESS" for months???

That's fact and all your stupid complainings/argueing are nothing to me... Just make some search about iRiver past and the brand "philosophy" and then come back to "give lesson" to oldest iRiver fans...

Tang

PS: Avoid argue about my English it isn't my native language...

PS2: In addition as i added it in another post do you know that there is some bug that aren't corrected yet as the very famous "HD spin bug"...

[HotStuff2]

I agree with the OP. I'm not joining the "online petition" that's floating around here for new firmware and features. I'm not screaming at iRiver for not having gapless playback, or this feature, or that feature. My H120 does everything I want it to (and then some), does more than just about any other DAP I've seen out there (iP0d l0ser$! LOL), and looks good doing it.

PLUS, I keep reading on here how iRiver has replaced units out of warranty, or replaced then under warranty even though the breakage was *completely* the person's fault (dropped/crushed in pocket/etc.) Sure, they might be a little hard to get a hold of outside the US, but the US tech support is even helping people overseas.

And people have the audacity to complain about iRiver? They're doing the best they can - and it's pretty d@mn good, IMHO.

[Tang]

Hotstuff i have defended IrIver by the past on the iZoo... Especiallya bour Ogg Vorbis implementation...
But now their firmware policy isn't acceptable sorry... And think that iHP and iFP are advantaged but take a lok at recent iMP upgrades and you'll see that iRiver is irresponsible...
Sorry :/

[HalfNice]

I'm with you on this one (but maybe not as passionately!). I did my research before I bought my h120 and I'm pleased with what I've got. I'm more concerned with getting the right number and mix of songs on it, than I am with additional functionality (tho I would love a real random shuffle!).
On the other hand I can see why some people bitch. iRiver promised firmware upgrades so I guess people have the right to expect it.
All things considered, how many of us would give up or iRivers? Not many, I think.

[Exo]

my_iriver, if we all had your opinion and didn't demand something a little better each time, industry would stand still.

If a demand is obvious from customers, most companies would consider it.
You're welcome to go sit in your corner, keep quiet and just nod when asked if you're happy.

Meantime, this forum is the best place to let off steam about our precious purchase and how we would consider improving what is already near perfect and deserves to be an industry leader.

Please don't patronise us by suggesting we've no idea about the product we've bought, I've been a user of MP3 for nearlly a decade (I started with MP2's in 1994) and been using DAP's for a long time.

As for this comment:

alot of people only realised they needed gapless after getting it

What planet are you on?
The Gaps are something the iRiver adds to the music, it isn't something you'll find in specifications or expect it to do - so bang goes your research idea pal.
Besides, gapless really means to play music the way it plays on a Car Stereo, PC or any Normal CD player.

It sounds to me as if you don't understand either the issues or our passionate feelings of our players and the music we play on it.

[rd]

Sigh...
You researched the player for a month and a half but did you research
this topic? Because we've been over it a lot. It's still relevant but
as long as you're bitching about research....


A couple of points to get you started:

1) There's nothing wrong with saying the IRiver firmware is mediocre. It is.
Stable but mediocre. That's why there is the rockbox project. Some of the omissions and design flaws firmware just show lack of effort. Hopefully,
Rockbox will take care of it because most people here seem to
think that Iriver won't.

2) IRiver has made promises that it hasn't kept. People purchased their
players on those promises. It's a matter of opinion whether those people
should be upset about it. Apparently, you either assumed IRiver would lie
or didn't care. Either way, IRiver made those promises so they could make more money and they did. I personally have no interest in apologizing for them. Maybe you do.

3) People will whine about anything. But there are also reasonable complaints
about the firmware. Sometimes if you give feedback to a company that
cares about its customers it improves the product. It's called good business.
Makes people want to buy your product again.

4) Firmware upgradeable is a very bad term if the only thing it means is
that they'll fix the bugs. Maybe it should be "Bug fixable". But the problem is that people don't buy a player that lacks features when it only says
"Bug fixable". They think "Maybe I'll go get the Ipod if this thing is never
going to improve because OTF is a feature I'd like to have." The trick is
to make them think the feature omission that is keeping them from buying
the product may be added at a later date. That's called marketing. And
good companies actually add the feature later. That's called good
business. It's not unreasonable for a buyer to think that a company
would add feature to it's player. Yes, it's a gamble but not an
unreasonable one. IRiver did add ogg support after people asked for it.

5) OTF playlists is not an ureasonable request like your coffee example. There
are plenty of reasonble suggestion to improve the firmware. Perhaps
you should research that topic.

Don't get me wrong. I like my IHP-120. I think it's great hardware with
stable but mediocre firmware. If the Rockbox thing works out it will
be the best DAP IMHO. But right now I don't see any problem with
criticizing the firmware or Iriver for its poor customer service. In
fact, that's probably the only thing that might bring improvements in the
future. If you think IRiver is on the right track then I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. My personal plan is to watch and support Rockbox because I've lost faith that IRiver is listening. We'll have to wait and see.

rd

[Tang]

I forgotten a non negligeable point...

Actually there is still bugs in the alst iHP firmware... So even the stupid "bugfix" argument is reducted to nothing...

[BlueBandicoot]

Hey! A good ol' bitch up!

So who's having an affair with who!?

[Couch]

I agree with you, but not in the way of being mad at people. Im completely happy with my player. I dont think it needs any improvements. New firmware would be nice, but I dont care that much.Some people do and I respect that.

[Kid-A]

I agree with My_iriver to some extent, although people have a right to complain about issues with their player, I do think sometimes people just jump onto something that they wouldn't find all that useful, just because they know there's something wrong with it.

[Prosperus]

The funny thing is that more or less we are all coming at this with the same high opinion of the player but still arguing like hell. iRiver has a responsibility to fix their bugs related to firmware, and they haven't done this schedule or not. If they for whatever reason don't decide to implement expanded functunality (even commonplace features like OTF playlisting), as a responsible company, iRiver should be working on the firmware to correct the flaws they missed in develpment. Most of us have done our share of researching into our DAPs before buying them, and people have different expectations in their products.

I've done my share of ranting here, but that's the beauty of a forum like this. We can gather together as a community and find our own solutions to the situation. With few exceptions of people outstepping the bounds of common decency (we all remember that nutsack incedent...hehe, I said nutsack situation) we all coexist because we respect each other's perspectives. I happen to think that iRiver should be adding reasonable features in addition to fixing the bugs so I see where some feel that a petition should be made. The decision has been made that misticriver will not be making that petition and there's nothing more to worry about.

Rockbox would be a dream come true, because the way I think of the current firmware is kind of like having a cutting edge computer system and running windows 3.1 on it. It'd be very stable, but the hardware wouldn't be able to harness it's ultimate potential. Here's to dreaming...and rambling.

[jumbogorilla]

Thinking about it..thinking about it...but it still doesn't make any sense that you WOULDN'T demand something from iRiver that iRiver promised to deliver.

Checking out the reviews and forums, I did about two month's research before I bought my player. I knew of the voice recording skips, no gapless, and no FLAC support. I use OGG Vorbis along with other files such as WMA, MP3 and FLAC(for those oldies), and I don't think I would've bought the player if it came as is, without the possibility of an upgrade.

I'm not even attacking iRiver or the h1xx series. There's just somethings that should be fixed, and when fixed, should make the player the perfect player for everyone.

If you want to sit still, suck on your thumb and thank the big corps for all that they've done, just get an iPod.

[andrewmel]

I also researched for about 1.5 months before buying h320. i was a late comer to mp3 players having been very happy with my md player for 3 or 4 years.

I bought on the features, not the promises. I didn't know that I wanted gapless (but would like it now) and think it would be a good improvement but i did believe that I would get a good shuffle and its poor implementation does piss me off and I still dont get why they havent fixed it. I guess I am an understanding guy and think that implementing it must be hard, or they would have done it.....

a

[Tang]

Andrewmel the M3 has same hardware as iHP and thought it's only some months old (for more than one year for iHP) the iAudio Juke has yet more functionability than our iHP: OTF playklist, real shuffle and FLAC support...

Things aren't harder for Cowon than for iRiver sorry...

[scubajay]

Originally Posted by BlueBandicoot

Hey! A good ol' bitch up!

So who's having an affair with who!?

well....some guys H120 was seen talking to another guys H340, and all the while the H120's other half is at home watching over the H100's.

Man......the hearing is gonna be bad, especially as they did a DNA test on one of the H100's and found that the Dad was some ifp-990 from across the way.

Go Ricki, Go Ricki, Go Ricki.

[Saidas]

iRiver owners have a right to express whatever they want, after all, that is what this sight is for; it is not an iRiver corporate site. Whether or not iRiver listens and acts is another matter. From a purely business standpoint it would behoove them to do so; the better their product the more will be sold.

Speaking of which, since iRiver spends very little on marketing, word of mouth is essential to them. The money spent on correcting and improving their products would be far less than that which would be spent on marketing. A case in point, Rockbox might very well do this for free!

I am happy with my player, though not completely, and still think that at the time of this writing that is still the best player on the market. However, there are continually more and better DAPs in the marketplace and if iRiver fails to keep pace, they will suffer as a result. It's as simple as that really.

[jdmullet]

Ok Iriver advitisers there FIRMWARE upgrade like its a MASS feature of the play(as in upgradeable (made better)) So if there not gunna make better and juss fix bugs they shouldnt focus so much on making it well known That its FIRMWARE UPGRADABLE


P.S Key Words Are UPGRADEABLE UPGRADEABLE