With complete the popularity after the MP3 format it was not a large surprise to look complete large peripheral producers release movable players founded on SmartMedia or CompactFlash storage.


The initiative behind them, and in fact the first MP3 movable player to look in the market was created through Diamond Multimedia with its Rio PMP300. As we have seen early with other MP3 associated products and material, there were few legal actions assumed against Diamond when this first player was freed, but at last it was Diamond who succeeded in court. The solution that we can see recent day is that only about each large and mid-sized peripheral manufacturer (still non computer related) offers MP3 players in their movable music products line-up.


The player we acquired for trying was the Rio 500, a second-era MP3 player. Still though the Rio 600 is already present it has been clear to see between enthusiasts that the Rio 500 stays as the favorite player because of the 64mb memory incorporate to the player.

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The Rio 500 has been planned to be as user friendly as potential, when I first expected at it, I wished its size, being only slightly larger than a credit card.


Since we are speaking of a second-era product, it has acquired more than the common playback process, a bookmarking choices is available, as good as browsing by documents so you can toggle among directories tracks or the bookmarks you have made. Browsing could not acquire any simpler than the multi wheel/button that you have on the right side of the player so that approach to the several menu choices scrolling, fairly much similar with a mice wheel.


The LCD screen, although a bit little does an great job showing any type of data: song, title, artist, playtime as good as a battery indicator. We have look other MP3 players that just show track numbers creating it so uncomfortable feel. Still excellent the screen characteristic a soft blue backlight that create the screen so readable even if you function out of daylight.