I can't decide betwen this two firm.

the option that I have are the

iriver t10
iriver u10
iaudio 5
iaudio u3
iaudio g3

I'm also looking for an ogg vorbis hardware player.

What's a good 256MB flash player?

My samsung Yepp MT-6 does well as 1gb player.

iRiver is not very famous for their Ogg Vorbis support. At least, my IFP-899 has plays back .ogg audio at a lower volume, soft - but irritating - click sounds occur between tracks and battery life is half that for MP3 playback.

So, if ogg support is a must, I would go for iAudio. But maybe the problems are fixed in the "Uxx" and "Txx" series, don't know.

The T series has the same limitations.

Samsung > iAudio > iRiver

Hi,

DON'T buy an iriver! I bought an IFP-999 and I am not very satisfied with the Ogg Vorbis Support. I encoded some of my files with -q 6 and they won't play properly whe the bitrate goes beyond 212 kb/s or something or under 96 kb/s. That means, you will have *ugly* distortion while listening... Furthermore, the new "T-models" sold in Canada, Europe and USA can be fueled with Windows media player 10 ONLY! They have a nerve to do something like that!
But the Sennheiser earplugs are very good.

My sisters iAudio U2 plays every file so long (beside a few crappy high-bitrate files I encoded with Garf's tuned encoder - GT1beta3(?)) and has a quite "snappy" control feeling The earphones are crap, though

The Samsung YP-1 I tested played also the files I tested, but the controls were quite slow... Not so very good. But the player is the most "affordable".

Go for iAudio!

Some good tips in here!
Please don't let them get lost in this forum structure but contribute your experiences to a clearly laid out place, a wiki site!

Based on...?

And the winer is..... Cowon iAudio U3, a true iPod Nano killer but is a bit expensive.
Thanks for the comments about iRiver and iAudio.

Good choice....If Iaudio released a player with 4GB internal flash memory, card-reading (SD or otherwise) capabilities and better encoding/line in capabilities for recording, I'd buy 100 of them.

I've had the 60 Gb X5 for 12 hours and it really seems Cowon has done fine work on its Ogg Vorbis decoding. While I sleep, MediaCoder turns my FLACs into OGGs with the latest "Whoa, Nellie!"-fast Lancer codec.
I even think there's a chance Cowon/iAudio might make a firmware upgrade to support HE-AAC with SBR. There's a thread on that topic in their forum, so append your enthusiastic support.
What a great player your little iAudio would be if it had hours of content upped 150% with that codec!

ok, at first i would like to recommend not to judge the brand by only a single product out of the usually huge line-up they offer.

i just recently got me the 1gb t10 and before that I used an ifp590... here's what i found out:

# vorbis support from q0 - q10, no volume issues anymore (as there is/was with the ifp series from iriver)

# sound quality in general seems very nice to me, i was satisfied with the ifp already

# you have to recharge your batteries separately, doesn't work via usb cable like it did with the ifp (which featured a li-akku, btw..)

# i really don't like the choice they made about making WMP almost unavoidable - but - almost means that you can get around it and, in fact, you have to do that, if you want to use .ogg or .txt files on your player, since WMP doesn't support these formats at all.
the clear drawbacks of this WMP necessity, you can't use it as an ums device (though there are some versions out there, that are ums - here in germany we get the crappy wmp ones ) and that reduces the usability to the dear old windows os, it doesnt work with linux or mac. for some folks that might disqualify the player completely!
if you use windows, then you can just copy the files to your player, as it shows up as a mtp media device in your explorer, once connected. with the restriction though, that folder creation is impossible. The only way to get folder structures is to copy them from your hd. (you can create folders with wmp, but i hate that crappy piece of ms-softwarejunk, so i don't bother about it.)

final thoughts: it isn't that great a player, i am able to work around the file-transfer issues, others may find this too uncomfortable already. One thing that really impressed me though is the great ogg support this player has, if this is high priority for you, it isn't a bad choice. I like the design and size, too, but that's my very personal point of view, the controls work good for me and there is no stick that can get sluggish after heavy usage, like there was at my older ifp (one of the reasons, i replaced it now).

I hope someone found that usefull, if you have additional questions about the device, just ask and i'll look into it

bye folks!

Rockbox! that's all I have to say. If you want a DAP for hardware features then that's fine, but all of this stupid bickering over Iriver vs. IAudio can be solved with Rockbox firmware. That's why they decided to develope it in the first place. I personally would avoid Apple like the plague, I am about ready to throw someone through a window if they try to shove another Ipod offer down my throat, but that's just me



If only there was a Rockbox port for everything life would be grand

I agree. The Rockbox firmware kicks ass. But it is only available for iRiver's H1x0 series. So, it's kinda off topic.

Sebi

Installing Rockbox could void the warranty:
http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main...arranty_if_I_us

To add further to the comments above, I would argue that this is not stupid bickering but valid if you don't want to create a greater risk of rendering your player useless by installing third-party firmware.


Most, if not all, Iriver products up until the latest generation of flash players behaved similarly, including all the IMP (CD-based units), so I know I'm not referencing a single Iriver product when I refer to their shoddy Ogg support.

I'd like to stress that this is not the case for the H series players. The original firmware handles Ogg Vorbis files properly.

Sebi

It's good to hear they got it right initially for the H series. I've not been interested in any HD players yet.

H3x0 series too now. Lots of H3x0 users can verify that for me.

And yes the Rockbox firmware is awesome. I don't want another DAP without it again if I can help it.

I just bought a Samsung YP-U1 with 512 MB, flawless ogg vorbis support! (even with high bitrates)
Cheaper than a Apple shuffle and it has a display with folder support.

I like it. What about Ogg Vorbis gapless and gain support?

Samsung YP-U1 USB Drive Music Player

Hey,

then you should try H10 Jr. with 512MB, 1GB and soon 2 GB..

Flash Player from iRiver, here: http://www.iriver.com/html/product/prpa_product.asp?pidx=68

best regards,

iNsuRRecTiON

maybe you should note that the rockbox firmware is working on the ipod.

Hey,

yes, but still missing important features, which offers the iRiver original firmware..

In addition, H10 support won't be there in the near future..

best regards,

iNsuRRecTiON

No gapless playback, dunno about gain support.
I like high quality listening at my PC and just copying the tracks to the mobile device. The Creative Zen micro is clearly superior sound-quality wise though ...

I bought an iAudio U3 1GB last night. I am very happy with it.

The only complaint is that it does not come with a necklace and AC charger.

Just for the record. Someone might find it useful. I have iAudio G3. The latest firmware seems to be able to read the tags and it plays vorbis fine at -q 6 level. They claim compatibility up to -q 8, but I have not tried it.

Very nice toy abeit a bit expensive, but they support Vorbis and quite a few others. No need for special SW and so ideal for Linux guy like me. Excellent example how to become an important player out of nothing. Sony take a heed!

Triza

I have the Samsung Yepp MT6Z (1GB) flash-based player. I has perfect Q0 to Q10 support.

I've been using an iRiver iFP-790 for about a year (256MB). For my purposes it's ogg support is fine with the exception of the bitrate limitations. I usually use q2 or q3, so quite often I ended up smacking the lower bitrate limit. Fortunately someone hacked the firmware, and those files played properly. There were reports of playback problems at bitrate extremes.

Ogg RC2 files have nasty playback problems as well (some files from UT2004).

The reduced playback level only seems to be a problem in noisy environments. I also carry a few NiMH AAs with me so battery life isn't a real problem. Contrary to another's statement, plugging into USB DIScharges the battery.

FWIW I find myself using the mic recorder an awful lot...

Hey,

the iRiver H10 Jr. flash player support up to Q10 Ogg Vorbis

CYA

iNsuRRecTiON

Don't go for Iriver I used to have one and it was awfull, I would look into Samsung.

Just bought the wife a IAudio U3, it plays Ogg Q10 no problems. I compare if favorably to my Rio Karma. Of course the Karma has 10x more capacity, but the U3 has a color display, radio and recording capability.