Rio Karma (and the POS Seal of Disapproval)

I liked Rio's MP3 CD players. They were cheap and you could load a dozen albums on one disk. Bulky, though. When I wanted a smaller (than CD) MP3 player, about 3 years ago, I got the Rio Karma. I hated all the DRM in iPods and the control freak mother attitude embedded in Apple's iTunes system, which is still not up to the SoundJam MP standard of 2000 C. E. Rio could share files using a Java application, it acted as a server on the network, and it was endlessly configurable. I chose it over an iRiver I was considering.

Later, I was given an iPod shuffle and I never looked back. The DRM is annoying and stupid, since you can only sync it with one computer, but I try to deal with that. I have been given a Nano, too, that I am saving to use for photos or something else later, since the low-budget shuffle is still working fine for me.

These photos show what happens to a Karma after 3 years. The battery swells up and bursts the case open. I dissected it to find that out. It doesn't hold a charge, either, in case you wondered, and freezes up when run off the wall current. It is truly a POS, unless you like your electronics engineered to last one or two years rather than a more reasonable length of time.

Rio has gone out of the mp3 player business, so you won't be buying one. I wonder how iPods will age. They certainly have been built to last -- all summer long-- as the saying goes.