Rio Karma

It was my first ever DAP and I loved it to bits, even as a teenager with no idea about Head-Fi or SQ in general. At the time 20GB was a big deal and I was the only person in my school who had one. The scroll wheel and gapless were the best bits for me... unfortunately I was walking home one evening, had a knife pulled on me, mugged, and it was never to be seen again. Along with my phone and wallet, still sore about that! By that time Rio had folded and I didn't have the internet knowledge to track used ones down, so that was the end of that! Sad but true!

The Karma is still the best portable player ever made.  I've got two half broken ones that I've never gotten around to reassembling into one working player.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tjohnusa 

Just picked one of these up for $25 from a fellow at Audio Circle. I have read threads about the sound quality but have neve heard one. It was sent with alot of rap on it and I kind of like eminem so my first listen was with a cheap set of Harmon Kardon semi open cans and was wowed with the sound. I spent some time trying to get the drivers loaded into w7 and am not having much luck. I have an old desktop with xp on it that I will put back into operation just for this player...it is that good! I hope to pull out my collection of cans and amps tonight for a fun night of ABing...along with a few rum and cokes. Any one else have love for this old relic of a player?

Congrats with you puchase, nice deal. I still have one fully operational and having owned many other DAPs since I bought the Karma in 2005  I'm still amazed how great it sounds and it's ability to drive higher impedance IEM's or headphones. I'm curious to hear your opinion from your A/B even including the influence of rum and coke :-)

I'd wanted 1 of these for the longest, as it's SQ is said to be among the best of all the portables ever made. Now I gotta do a search - enjoy!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by nywytboy68 

I'd wanted 1 of these for the longest, as it's SQ is said to be among the best of all the portables ever made. Now I gotta do a search - enjoy!!!

Me too! (the search is strictly research related, I promise! I cannot buy any new DAP:s. I CANNOT!!!)

My curiosity has been piqued :C

Here is an old (2006) review of the Rio Karma and a comparison with four other old and good sounding DAP:s (Kenwood HDD players and JVC XA-HD500)

The JVC wins sound wise (for those who might be interested, there is a JVC XA-HD500 for sale right now on Head-fi), and the Rio Karma wins when it comes to features.

My First work out DAP was a RIO and I don't even remember what happened to it.  It must have been too early to sell on the internet.  Did I throw it away?  In any case I haven't seen any real improvements in mp3 players since the Rior/Creative days unless one considers expense, screen, or apps which have little to do with music....well yeah there is that whole capacity issue.  Really, it has been so long that I don't remember what it sounded like, if it sounded better I am going to cry.

my Rio Karma is already damaged a year ago, i love the sound quality, especially when produce the sound of Tom-Tom (drum)

So I found a good condition Rio Karma is it really that nice?  Would the sound quality beat something like a clip + an ibasso amp?

The SQ is great, but the best thing about the Karma is its interface.  It makes an ipod look like the work of preschoolers high on sharpie fumes.  You'd still probably be better off adding an amp if you're not using IEMs though.

So i picked up a Rio Karma that was in great condition with a new battery to see what all the buzz was about. Sq wise its nice, but i havent felt it to be anything extraordinary. After getting used to a UI like the zune hd, the rio just feels ancient, but I like it alot more than the clickwheels on the ipods. Its a chunky player, and sounds good, but I guess all the praise from headfi gave me unrealistic expectations.