One last question before I buy an mp3 player...

i think you should seriously look into the rio karma. great little machine.

Listen to you...ya little traitor ! You shall be strung up immediately....And then we'll have your IHP, Senns, and new Xin amp. Cool.....

But ah..yeah, the Karma does have some nice features. AS does the IHP. But if I were you...I'd first get the Zen from a place that has a good return policy, and find out for yourself whether or not all those rumors are true. And if they are, how exaggerated are they ? Or aren't they ? The good thing about the Zen, is that it can be found everywhere...So what've you got to lose by getting it, and making sure you can return it if it doesn't live up to your standards ?

If you wind up taking it back, THEN you can debate over the other players. At least you'll have eliminated one in the process through pure physical experience.

at 100 dollars less, its such good value.

*cough* ihp-120 *cough*

Depends upon what you're willing to pay for. OR not. I was on the verge of buying a Karma...I love the fact that it does gapless. For that alone, it's beautiful. But there were things when compared to the IHP, that made it a non issue for me....

1) The IHP's ability to mount as a HD..pure drag and drop with ALL files, not just data. This makes it extremely versitile ...even Linux boxes can take advantage here.

2) No software necessary with the IHP

3) When I was really intent on buying the Karma, one thing kept popping up on the RIovolution forums on a consistant basis. People complaining about HD's crashing/hanging. I said to myself, let's see what happens after a FW update or so...And it happened. Lot's of bugs were fixed..looked good. But then I was still noticeing people talking about totally dead HD's. So it seems to be more than just conflicting software at this point. I dont' mean to trash the Karma...I like it. And I've said before, it's not DNAA's fault that Hitachi happens to be having a problem with a certain batch of HD's ...Right now there's a poll over at the rio karma forums which address' this issue, and it's turned into a big thing. So far it looks like out of the people who are actively participating about 20 HD's are done in....out of over a hundred. That's a big no in my book. I'm sure tthere are plenty of people who are using Karmas with no problems..but I've just got that "luck" with electronics. So I wasn't about to take any chances. Besides...I had never seen ANY posts on the iRIver forums or the iPod lounge, with the same issues so............You take it from there.

I could live without the recording and FM radio on the IHP, and at the same time, I could certainly live without the Ethernet functionality on the Karmas dock. Also, Flac is nice, but doesn't really matter much when 20 gigs is what you have to work with. And when on the go, I doubt that my old ears could tell the difference between Flac and a lossy file which has been encoded well. Sitting still..sure, very possible. But at that point, if I'm home, sitting still, I'll use my "STEREO" and play CD's. OR I'll use my PC. W/E.

THat's just me though. People have to decide for themselves what they're willing to sacrifice/trade.

I would however, love to get my hands on a Karma, and check out its sound quality. I keep hearing random things like "The Karmas sound quality is superior to the IHP's". But then I see that these comments always come from people who have heard from a person who'se heard from a person..meaning they really have no idea because they've never even touched one. And the only person that i've heard from on this forum, whose opinion I respect, is Austonias, because I really dont' think he's biased towards any particular player. He's the only one who'se said that the Karma sounded flat and lifeless compared to the iPod. And I have listened to the iPod many a time. I've enjoyed its sound, but I prefer the sound of the IHP..so there's that one. Anyway, must stop this now. Long post.

I would only buy the iHP-120 if the extra features and small form factor is important to you. Otherwise, you can get a Zen Xtra 60GB for the same price as an iHP-120 (20GB).

Plus there is no widespread hiss or backlight problem with the Zen Xtra. That was just a couple of users complaining about a certain batch that was faulty. The Zen Xtra does not have a higher incident of problems as any other player out there.

Zen Xtra - Do any of them NOT hiss?



PS - The Zen NX is slowly being discontinued so it's becoming harder to find.

Actually, (not to nitpick or defend, but) that poll in riovolution is now at 15 users voting "HD is toast", only 4 or 5 of which offered any explanation at all (which it seems to me I'd be champing at the bit to do) and a couple of which look suspiciously like certain users re-registering under another name (as soon as the argument got heated, suddenly there were users who registered that day making their first post saying their HD died a couple days after buying it- you can make up your own mind on that).

I was one of the users there who got into the heated debate, but it wasn't to defend the Karma necessarily- it was to 'encourage' some of the people who were condemning the unit to use their head about exactly what it is they had to go on- polls like that are completely irrelevant scientifically, and can be very misleading. Further, a cursory look through Apple.com/support shows that HD failures aren't unheard of, but I'd still expect a lot less trouble in a 3rd generation device.

I just wanted to remind a few people exactly what it is they were looking at- a few posts on the only internet support forum for that unit (where you'd expect those types of posts to show up), and problems that aren't unique to that unit.

That said, all it takes is one person reporting a certain problem to get me to research that problem's frequency before purchase- but I certainly won't start hollering what a POS it is over it.

(note: this is coming from one of the original Karma customers and an owner of two of them (one was my wife's that I've now sold, and mine has been run through the fcking RINGER) as well as, now, an iHP-120, FWIW)

I got a 40gig Xtra for Christmas, and it has no hiss. From what I've read the hiss seemed to be a problem on an early batch of Xtras and most of the latter ones are hiss free. If you end up getting one, just check to see if it hisses, if so return it. Also, they only have a 90 day warranty, so getting a 3rd party extended warranty may be a good idea.

Anyway, the sound quality is great (for an mp3 player) and it does everything I need it to do: play mp3s... The only reason I'd reccomend another player is if you're looking for extra features the Xtra doesn't have.

I bought a karma about a week or so ago and took it back. Everytime I would go to lift weights at the gym the damn harddrive would freeze. I was not running just having it in my pocket while benching or doing curls...it would freeze on me. My 3rd gen ipod and zen nx would never do this.

Karma

Sounds like some of ya got bad karma. I love my karma. Iv had it for more than a month and not a single freeze up. FLAC is really nice for your favorite albums. The karma has awsome support at riovolution.com If it doesent fit your fancy then go with the ihp. I didnt like the zens sound though it was clear. My only issues with Ihp are the wierd joystick/d-pad and the DB.

I've been reading a lot about the Xtra users' comments and the backlight seems to be a problem with the early batch, as I haven't seen users complain about it in more recent posts at www.nomadness.net.

HD's are gonna fail...regardless of what device you are using, I don't know if Hitachi have a higher faliure rate then Toshiba (they could...I really don't know) you really can't blame DNNA for the Hitachi HD failures, if I'm not mistaken they are the first to try these HD's out in a portable mp3 player. If they're experiencing a high failure rate you can bet they'll switch something up for their next Karma

So puker2, are you any closer to deciding or even more confused now?