[linux-audio-user] Linux-friendly portable music player?

Paul Winkler pw_lists at slinkp.com
Mon Sep 25 16:16:34 EDT 2006


On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 08:22:24PM +0200, mik wrote:
> the iriver h120. it's out of production but you can find it very easily 
> on ebay. new, at half the original price (which, maybe, is still too 
> much...). also good for recording.

I've been happy with mine, except that the user interface is really
really horrible.  Not graphically; I mean that every control is
overloaded with multiple meanings depending on context and after two
years I *still* find some simple operations hard to perform.  My wife
occasionally borrows it, and I'm always afraid she's going to
throw it out the window in a fit of frustration.

I keep meaning to try loading it with Rockbox which AFAICT
now supports recording:
http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/IriverRecording
but AFAICT there is not yet a declared stable release for the iriver?

Other than the crappy UI, it's great. Sound is very good; linux sees it
as standard USB storage device with a VFAT filesystem; it plays Ogg; the
built-in FM radio is occasionally handy; it's built pretty solidly; and
mine has crashed maybe once in the two years I've had it. (Powered it
off, no problem after that.)

The iripdb program ( http://www.fataltourist.com/iripdb/ ) is useful for
creating the tag database so you can browse by artist, title, etc.

If I was shopping again today, I don't know what I'd buy.  AFAICT,
iriver has no replacement model with the same features :-( I *need* the
external mic input, and I now have so many OGGs that it'd be annoying to
switch to anything that doesn't play them.  

-- 

Paul Winkler
http://www.slinkp.com



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