Life after the Vibez

[eswa]

I used a Vibez for 1,5 year now, and it doesn't get past the startupscreen anymore, and if it does, it shuts itself down after 5 sec.
So I'm looking for a new device and I was wondering if there are any devices with Vibez-like specs? I'm talking about gapless/crossfading, otg playlisting (and actually save playlists on the go aswell) and maybe the parametric eq, and the superb shuffle of the Vibez.
The S9 has none of it, it only stores one "favorites"playlist and it has quite large gaps between songs. I should probably look for Rockbox devices, but I want a 32gb PMP (like the spinn/s9). Am I overlooking a brand/model? Maybe after 8 januari (CES)? Sony/MS?

[CrowdAds]

[The DarkSide]

With the exception of the extinct rio karma, none do what the Vibez can do.

[eswa]

Isn't that strange/stupid? The Rio Karma was released 5 years ago, and still only Rio (-employees) managed to put all of these features in a player. Why do all the other brands stick to the same limited mp3playback options?
Which player comes close? Players that support Rockbox are almost all outdated as wel...

[dfkt]

Well, Rockbox will pretty soon run on some of the new AMS-chip based Sansas, so that should be a good alternative - especially since they have really good sound quality.

I don't think any of the other "brand" firmwares will satisfy your needs.

[nrc]

What's even more sad is that after Rio was bought by Sigmatel they offered that firmware as a reference implementation. There were multiple offbrand players that picked up the Forge firmware but only TrekStor offered the Rio firmware.

I'm happy with a Sansa Fuze for now. I've sworn off hard drive players. FLAC and OGG support and good sound quality are the most important things. I miss RioDJ but now that I'm doing my own playlists anyway my mixes are probably a bit better. I do miss crossfade.

[rubennyc]

eswa, have you considered trying a new battery? You may also want to try charging it up with an AC-USB power adapter instead of a PC's USB port.

On a side note: Some of us are still fleetingly optimistic that the flash vibez really actually will become available ... eventually ... some day.

[dfkt]

Flash Vibez still isn't out? I thought it's available already?

[rubennyc]

Originally Posted by dfkt

Flash Vibez still isn't out? I thought it's available already?

The official press release promised the 8, 16 and 32 would be available by the end of September 2008. That didn't happen. Amazon and J&R both list the 8 and 16 GB as available for pre-order. No sign of the 32, though.

The latest word is that the 8 and 16 should be available I think by the end of January, or all three by end of Q1. But, who knows?

Kinda ridiculous, ain't it?

[dfkt]

Ouch indeed... it has so incredibly much potential, especially without the slow HDD holding it back.