iriver H140 40GB MP3 Jukebox

• Plays over 1200 hours of digital music
• Up to 16 hours of battery life
• Supports MP3, WMA, ASF, WAV and OGG music files
• Ultra-fast USB 2.0 transfers (up to 40 times faster than USB 1.0)
• Integrated FM tuner

You see them everywhere: iPod users. Those tell-tale white headphones give them away as soon as you see them. I used to envy them, with their slick little box of tricks pumping music through their heads for up to ten hours at a time. I wanted one, too, but I thought they were way too expensive for what they were. For one thing, they could only handle a single codec, namely MP3. When, oh when would someone bite the bullet and produce a decent, high capacity OGG-based player for the rest of us?

Alternatives to the iPod have come and gone, but none has really stuck. Apple really cornered the market with what was arguably the first good-looking and well-performing player. Nevertheless, its shortcomings were painfully evident. What the market has been missing ever since is a player that does all that the iPod can, whilst providing features absolutely essential in a truly high-end player, such as an integrated FM radio, voice recorder, support for multiple codecs, and longer battery life.

Such a player seemed like it was still some time away, until iRiver recently came out with the iHP-140. At last, we are offered a 40 Gb player that can handle the MP3, OGG, ASF and WMA codecs, has an FM radio tunable to the band of whichever continent you happen to be on, a voice recorder that works with either the internal or an external microphone, and a respectable 16 hour battery (assuming 128 Kbps MP3 listening at normal volume and no flashy EQ settings). The battery is also Lithium Ion, so there are no battery memory issues to worry about.

After a couple of weeks with my iHP-140, I have to say that it has lived up to the hours of review reading and research I did before purchasing it. As a Linux user, I needed a player that did not depend on my computer operating system. I should not need any proprietary software to index the files, transfer them to the device, flash the firmware or manage the device in any other way.

The iRiver caters to all of those demands and more. The unit supports the USB mass storage standard, so connect it to your computer and a 40 Gb drive immediately appears on the system. Use standard utilities to copy your music files over, dump some playlists via XMMS or a few quickly hacked together Ruby or Perl scripts and away you go. Flashing the firmware is as simple as dumping a file in the root of the unit's file-system and selecting the relevant option from its menu.

The sound quality is excellent, although you'll probably want to replace the supplied ear-buds with something better. The Sony MDREX71SL ear-buds are providing me with adequate service during my bicycle commute to the office. The remote control is very handy for safe control of the device while biking. Just clip it to your T-shirt and lift a hand off the handlebars to change songs or flip to the next directory full of music. You never have to take your eyes off the road.

The FM receiver is of high quality and voice recordings work well, even with the internal microphone.

iPod users at work peruse this device with some suspicion. How could it be better than an iPod, when they haven't even heard of it? Besides, it's a lot cheaper than an iPod, so it must be inferior, right? Think again.

The personal jukebox is finally mature. Whether or not iRiver has the clout to go up against the Apple marketing machine and win the PR battle remains to be seen, but if you're a technically-minded person who wants the most fully featured player on the market today, there's really no contest.

Do I have anything bad to say about it? Yeah, the brown case. What were they thinking? Still, like I said, I'll take features over something that superficial every time.

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I couldn't be more delighted with this player. Upon receiving it, I opened the package, connected the AC Adapter, and connected the included USB 2.0 cable.

WindowsXP immediately recognized the player as an external drive. I flashed the BIOS, and then started copying files. About 20 minutes later, my 15GB MP3 library was on the player. I immediately started listening to music, and I was bowled over by the sound quality.

Since I wanted to be able to choose music by genre or album title, I downloaded the "Moodlogic" software from the iRiver website; and a few minutes later my music library was sorted and categorized in the iRiver's database. The set-up couldn't have been easier, and the manual is excellent.

With just a few taps on either the wired remote (which has a bright LCD with all of the functions of the main unit) or the navigation button, I can be listening to a random selection of all of my "Folk Rock" songs; or listening to my favorite Van Morrison album. Build quality, design, and feature set are all top notch; and I've yet to find something that I want it to do that it can't. Although I rarely use it, the FM tuner also works very well.

In addition, it's a great way to back-up your PC. The iHP-140 works flawlessly as an external drive.

This is one of the few cases where you actually get more than you pay for. Highly recommended.

As an added note, the Moodlogic software and BIOS updates are here: http://www.iriveramerica.com/support/H100.aspx

Read Best Reviews of iriver H140 40GB MP3 Jukebox Here

Just purchased the iHP-140 from Amazon.com recently, after 2+ months of researching for the BEST mp3 player out there for the money.

I won't go into very technical details with this review.

POSITIVE ASPECTS..

FIRST..It has the LONGEST BATTERY LIFE out there. 16 hours based on "normal" playback. Takes 3 hours to charge from a COMPLETELY discharged state. (Much less time if battery still partially charged.) After I researched iPod and ALL others, this was the longest battery life you could get. Has an internal rechargable battery with no memory effect.

SECOND...Some people say that there is a long "learning curve" to this player. Actually, if you can move files in Windows Explorer, you can drag and drop files directly. AND with the USB 2.0, its a flash to drop files... virtually NO waiting. I've become the queen of copy and paste my files to this player.

THIRD...You can use it as an extra, external Hard Drive for storing or exchanging files. (a big plus if you need extra HD space)

FOURTH...Has a GREAT FM Radio! No, you can't record directly from the FM Radio to the player, but...I haven't done that in years, so this is an UNimportant aspect.

FIFTH....Recording operations are numerous..YOU CAN RECORD FROM OTHER EXTERNAL AUDIO SOURCES. Just plug in something (like someone's CD player) into the optical jack. OR.. I can use the EXTERNAL MICROPHONE to the LINE IN jack. It can be a DIGITAL VOICE recorder (just talk into the thing while recording voice, just like a separate DVR unit).

OH... it comes with all the stuff to record from these devices.

SIXTH...Compare the price to the 40GB iPOD???? OUCH!! iHP-140 sure does win over that one!

SEVENTH...Media player compatability is the BEST. It is not just pigeon-held to only MP3 types of media. It is compatable with SEVERAL file types (see product specs). AND the firmware is upgradeable! So future upgrades are a big plus. This unit will still be great in the future too.

EIGHTH...you can plug this puppy into a car radio, via a "purchased separately" cassette thing.

AND there are many more positive aspects to this unit if you like to customize your music, playback options, equalizer, sound, etc.

NEGATIVES........

*Cost can be an issue for some people. I paid a grand total of $400.00 even. CHEAPEST anywhere! All on Amazon.com!!! Trust me, I've looked EVERYWHERE, (ebay, used, new, retail, wholesale etc.) Amazon had it on sale, with FREE shipping, and $30.00 off for opening up a credit line with them. So, got a great deal.

*The earbud earphones are uncomfortable for me. So they supply a special adapter jack for other types of earphones if the ones you like don't fit the units earphone jack.

*The unit is slightly heavy, I just weighed it on a postage scale, with the case its about 8 10 ounces. Not for joggers, but bikers and for regular people, its great.

FINALLY..I just wanted a digital player because my cd's were constantly getting lost, scratched or "borrowed" from my teenager. I just wanted to listen to music without the hassels of changing a cd, or carrying around a cd player. With the 1200 hours of music I can store on this, I'll never have to search for a cd again! AND ... it won't be outdated in 6 months! I wanted to have this be the first, and possibly last digital music player I would ever need.

WELL WORTH THE INVESTMENT. :-)

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This is a beautiful, feature-packed mp3 player. I've owned this player for almost 6 months, and I've never regretted choosing it over other hard-drive based mp3 players available.

The H140 is almost the same size as the 40GB iPod, (about a quarter of an inch thicker and 9 grams heavier than the iPod), but has more features most importantly, much better battery life. The iRiver manual claims up to 16 hours of battery life. Manufacturers' claims are usually exaggerated, being based on "ideal" conditions. But I've gotten 13-14 hours of playing time on a charge, and that's twice what you'd usually get from an iPod. Hard drive based players typically spin the drive either when (1) navigating menus, or (2) when you select a song to play. Once you select a track, the player loads the file to memory, and the hard drive shuts down. Battery life depends a lot on how you use the iRiver. If you load a play list and then just sit back and listen, the charge will last longer. On the other hand, if you fiddle with it a lot and keep switching songs after only listening to each a few seconds, the hard drive will spin constantly and battery life will not be as good. In any case, the iRiver offers the best battery life of any hard drive player in its class.

The iRiver plays mp3, wma, wav, asf and ogg format files. It reads ID3 tags (V1, 2, 3) and displays the ID3 information, if available. If no ID3 information is available, it displays the file name. I've had no problem with mp3/wav/wma/ogg files at various bit rates, both CBR and VBR.

The FM tuner works well. You can save up to 20 stations to memory. The voice recorder is handy for dictating quick memos, like where you parked your car or a phone number, and works well off the internal microphone (or you can attach the included external microphone). Since the H140 has a built-in hardware mp3 encoder, you can also record from the Line Level input or the Optical input at any bit-rate you choose. For playback, you can select from various preset equalization settings, or create your own.

Navigation is not as intuitive as the iPod, but it's not hard to get used to. Once you're accustomed to it, it's easily as fast as navigation on the iPod. One big advantage the iRiver has is the LCD on the remote (which the iPod lacks). This is very handy, because it makes it completely unnecessary to ever remove the player itself from your belt clip or pocket or backpack. The remote can control ALL the functions of the iRiver. You can lock either the player or the remote (or both) so you won't have to worry about accidentally hitting a button.

The iRiver comes with Moodlogic's software for organizing your music, and device drivers for your operating system. If you use Windows XP, you don't need to load anything. The iRiver is automatically recognized and shows up as a drive in Windows Explorer when you connect it with the USB cable. If you use WinAmp on your PC, you don't need the Moodlogic software either. The iRiver can read WinAmp play lists (*.m3u files).

Sound quality is very good, possibly the best of any portable mp3 player I've used. You can dramatically enhance the sound quality of ANY mp3 player by substituting better headphones and buying an external amplifier, but that makes it less portable. When I use the iRiver with a set of Sennheiser HD600 headphones and a tiny cMoy amplifier, it sounds as good as the headphone output from my stereo.

Have owned this unit for approximately a month. Battery life hasn't yet reached the slated 16 hours, but doesn't fall short by much can squeeze 12-13 hours out of it with intermittent backlight and lots of manual changing tracks in between. They DO say its only 16 hours for 128kbps files though, and a lot of my music is coded at higher bitrates.

Setup is a breeze, plug in the USB, power it on and do your thing. Item is very small, compact and lightweight. Feels sufficiently solid. My one quirk with this product is the limited character capability of the screen which supports titles up to only 52 characters long. Hopefully a firmware upgrade will be made to expand it.

Sound quality is excellent and sufficiently loud, have used it in the car, on the bus and on the train to and from work with no problems. Good bass and treble, and options to customise equaliser settings are present. No problems yet with file formats. No sticking, no skipping, no erasing.

Included recording capability rocks the house. The lapel mic is VERY clear and can pick up your voice from adequate distances. Onboard mic isn't much different, but can pick up surrounding noises as well. An excellent feature, though.

If you've never owned an iRiver before the button interface may be confusing, but give it a couple hours and you'll be fine. The navigation is more or less intuitive.

I'd also recommend Red Chair's Irivium software if you want to run the database function. It does a MUCH better job than the stock iHP Manager.

Overall an excellent buy.