Rio Forge 128 MB Sport MP3 Player

FM TUNER
(UPDATE #2)
I sent my Rio back for a refund. The unit consistently shuts itself down whenever I press a button. This started happening after a couple of weeks and Rio said the contacts weren't making good contact. Rio support fixed the problem when they fixed the FM problems, so I thought it was specific to just my unit. After hearing so many others complain about this problem, plus it has begun occuring again in my unit, I think people ought to know about it. The same issues have been stated concerning the 256MB version.

(UPDATE) -- Rio fixed their FM problems by adding a capacitor to the unit. The FM tuner is now acceptable, pulling in almost as many stations as the IRiver ifp-790 I compared it to. I would say the Rio, with the fix, is about 90% as good as the IRiver FM tuner.

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The FM tuner sucks. Sorry there is no other way of putting it. I went into the top floor of my house and compared it to my clock radio. I...Read more

I bought the old version of this product (the Cali) and was pretty happy with it, so when it was stolen I groaned but purchased the "latest and greatest."

There is a serious design flaw in this player. A very slight tap will cause it to turn itself off. The spring on one side of the battery isn't strong enough to keep a proper connection with the other terminal. Gym use will easily trigger this behavior. Google it or check out rioworld.org (which also has a serious contingent of rio apologists.) It is well known. I wish I'd checked amazon before purchasing this product.

Literally a few days after the one month limit for a cash return my forge completely stopped working. I spent 60 minutes on hold today talking to customer service. It's very disappointing & if it weren't $100+ I'd have to just write it off as a learning experience. I may still need to because in my time with customer service I have 2 "case numbers" & two promises to get back to me.

I had problems with it turning off. These are the things I did that fixed all my issues. The spring that holds the battery is too loose. You must stretch it (half it's length) to add tension on the battery to avoid voltage loss due to any shocks or jolts. Here are other improvements: I updated the driver for the unit at their site. I bought a 1 gig 32X Kodak SD card and installed it. (slot is located behind the battery when you take it out. Using my Windows XP I formated the unit using 32 and NOT FAT 32. I did the same to the SD card. Using Rio Music Manager I save all MP3's to the SD card and NOT the RIO unit. The unit now is flawless. This unit gets lots of bad press but if you do a couple extra steps you'll own an awesome MP3 player. P.S. The radio still stinks!