Customer Reviews

iriver H10 6 GB Digital MP3 Player Grey

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

For those trying to make a decision whether or not to buy the H10, please note that the new firmware upgrade by iRiver has fixed many of the problems brought up by other reviewers. Synching with WMP10 is seamless and audio quality is very good (unless you're an audiophile). Overall, the quality and value of this player with its features is excellent. Also remember that the product is almost never as good as some who rave about the H10, and almost never as bad as those who warn consumers from buying it.

This was my first big purchase of an MP3 player. I wanted something that was over 1G because they are hard drives and not flash drives. I read through some of the other reviews and decided to take a chance on the iRiver because of all of the functions that were available with this model. The recorder, FM radio, photos, and text that iRiver offers are way better than the iPod. The songs were easy to load and delete. Some say they had problems with the amount of time between song playing but I found it to be like a cd and this did not bother me. I had a friend who bought the iPod and they had so many problems with the first one locking up and the pad indented causing more problems. They had to return it. I also purchased an FM transmitter and took my iRiver on a 2000 mile trip. It was nice to have music going and not to have to search for a cd. I wished that I had waited until the 20G came out!

My friend let me borrow his iPod for about a month. It's a nice player, but I wasn't impressed with its features. It had about the same sound quality as my old CD player

No matter what people are saying on how great the iPod sounds, the H10 sounds even greater, especially with the Custom EQ or SRS WOW turned on. I have yet to find a player that comes close to the sound quality that H10 is capable of, provided that you have good headphones.

The earbuds that come in the box are mediocre at best. I strongly suggest investing in some higher quality headphones/earbuds. I use a set of $20 SONY earbuds.

I always charge it overnight so the battery life is almost never a concern with me, but iRiver claims to have a 12 hour battery life. The battery is removable and extra batteries can be purchased from the iRiver website. It charges through the USB port or through the provided AC adapter.

The touch pad is a true touch pad. Most other touch pads for electronics are heat sensitive, which means it must be directly touched by a person for it to respond. This one for the H10 however is pressure sensitive. I keep finding myself just rubbing my pocket to change the volume.

The user interface is really easy to learn. I found it very similar to the iPod's interface. Some of the more advanced features may require reading the manual.

I strongly suggest upgrading to the latest firmware. It will speed up access/loading and shut down times. At first it took about 10 secs for it to shut off, now it only takes about 3 secs.

One problem I found is the hybrid USB/AC adapter cord. The AC adapter connects directly to the USB cable. The AC apapter alone is useless, unless its connected to the USB cord. I don't want any extra cords near my computer, there is enough as it is. Apparently iRiver uses the same AC adapter for several of their products.

The other problem is Windows Media Player. I found it a bit frustrating becuase WMP tends to not respond a lot. WMP is poorly programmed so getting music onto the player may take a few tries, but it only needs to work once. I blame Microsoft for these problems though. Hopefully WMP will have better MP3 player support in the future.

but that's not possible here. Anywho, my only beef with this contraption is the shuffle option. It sometimes gets "stuck" on a song and repeats it several times. However, this rarely happens and I just skip ahead. The sound is great (although, I use my old sony walkman headphones,) great price, and easy controls. Excellent iPod alternative.

Lots of mixed reviews out there about this player. The biggest problem with this player is that when you receive it you need to upgrade the software by visiting the iriver website and downloading a firmware instalation program. I found this to be a straightforward process. If you can carefully follow instructions you should have no problem. The player also only runs on windows xp with service pack 2 or higher. The player also requires the use of windows media player 10. I had already been using WMP 10 to manage my music so I had no problems there. Point is that there may be some work involved in getting the player to work with your system. You may need to upgrade the service pack or WMP and you certainly need to upgrade the firmware on the player. By the way, the firmware upgrade solves most of the problems that you may read about in earlier reviews. Time spent reading the instructions while your waiting for the unit to complete it's out of the box charge, is time well spent.

So with all that, why 4 stars? The sound is great (although good headphones in my opinion are a necessary add on, I use the Bose Triport headphones which I absolutely love). The player is packed with useful options; FM radio, voice recorder, picture viewer, many EQ presets and custom EQ settings. I find the navigation intuitive and easy to use. Now everybody agrees that the iPod is the easiest player to navigate, and this is not an iPod, but still, I have no problems with the scroll bar and buttons of the iriver. The cost is very good for what you get. I'm very pleased with my purchase. I have not had any issues with the player freezing up or crashing or otherwise not working properly. I can't comment on iriver costomer support. If I have any problems in the future I'll edit my review.

Alright, I bought my iRiver in the first week of September (one month ago), and I thought it was a very nice deal. I'd never owned a large MP3 player before, and I really didn't want to get an iPod, because it seems like everyone has one. Therefore I went to the nearest Best Buy, and although it took ages for me to decide if I wanted the 6GB or the 20GB, I eventually got the 6GB. Personally, I think I'd never fill the 20GB.

The color menus are nice, but I got the player for music, so I really didn't care about the picture/document space. I got...oh let's say 250 songs on there (and there was still plenty of space left), and the sound is great. The battery is okay -- it lasts about 7-8 hours. The only thing that annoys me about the battery is that it seems like it uses battery when it is turned off and on hold, which I found peculiar. It also seemed that once 1/4 of the battery was used, there was only an hour left; seems a little odd to me.

I was really pleased with the player; it worked just as great as my friend's iPod Mini, but it was an iRiver, something that my friends had never heard of.

Although yesterday afternoon I attempted to play a song that I originally got off iTunes and ripped to Windows Media Player (and I'd listened to the song before, several times actually, and it worked fine), and all of a sudden the player froze up, and when I got it to turn back on, it said something along the lines of "System Files Missing." It wouldn't go to the main menu, it wouldn't turn off by pressing the power button. Turns out the song I tried to play was corrupted, and the player would not work. I tried downloading the firmware, but everytime I tried to get past step 1, it didn't recognize that the player was hooked to the computer. I was relatively annoyed, because I was told that ultamitely there was no way to get it to work again. I still have it today, but I'm going to return it soon; I'm concidering an iPod Mini or the 20GB iRiver. I just don't want the problem to arise again.

Other than that freak accident, I'd defintally reccomend this player.

I was looking to pick up a new mp3 player at Circiut City, and saw this for $100 so I figured I should give it a shot, since everything else near 6gb was $70+ more. Heres a breakdown.

PROS
-Removable battery
-Built in Radio
-Decent earbuds, replace them if you're a complete sound freak though.
-Color screen that is very crisp/clear
-Good layout
-Built like a tank
-Relatively cheap

CONS
-Touchpad/interface not nearly as easy to use as, say, the ipods
-Horrible cables which require you to have the computer in order for the wall charger to work.
-"Syncing" your player to your computer is annoying/tedious
-Sometimes mine will mess up, such as none of the songs or only certain songs will play until I shut it off, take out the battery, and hope it works the next time.

So all in all its just an OK unit. I would never suggest it over an ipod, but for those on a budget looking for a music player that will do just what it takes, this is a good choice.

I orderd this off the internet. It came and I opened the box. It come with standard earbuds (which arent bad), Charger,USB connecter,rubber case,and a 1 month free trial to Napster to Go(it helped me fill up my player fast).The player it self looks great and is a eye catcher.It feels sturdy and has really good button placment.The interface is as eassy as it can get. Look up songs by Artist,Album,Title, and Genre.It can also store photos(I havent done this yet and probably never will).Has radio which get ok reception.Also has a voice recorder and FM recorder wich are cool. Sound quality is pretty good. The EQ's are really cool. The SRS WOW is the one I mainly use cause it works well with Hard Rock/Metal.
Despite what other not so smart people say this thing is easy to use. Updating the firmware is simple, just follow the steps.

Like everyone else, I did all the research and knew I wanted to use Napster. So, I ended up with this unit and it has been great.

People may complain about the set up or song transfer, but I have had no issues and it works like a charm.

But most impressive is this...
I have had this MP3 player for almost one year. I have it running in my car and office for an average of 10-12 hours a day, non-stop. I get to work, plug it in and listen until I go home at the end of the day. Whatever durability testing iRiver did, I have surpassed it. And it is still running perfectly.

It's been dropped, kicked, baked in the car, and even doused with water. It is still going.

After all the issues with durability I have heard about other MP3 players, this one rules. I got my money's worth a long time ago and am now looking for a 20GB.

This device had problems almost from the very beginning. It would often freeze after syncing music or pictures to it. After just a few months it completely stopped working. A clock icon with the message "System initializing, Please wait" would remain on the screen and would not turn off unless the battery was removed, which it would continue doing after the battery was reinserted. The only way to undo this was to completely reformat and delete the memory. This issue would repeat every few months. The customer service on the iRiver site did not provide any helpful information. I finally called their number and the representative was very rude and ill-tempered, all with heavy background noise. He apparently knew nothing about the problem, insisting that it could be fixed by once again resetting the device.

I strongly recommend steering clear of all iRiver merchandise.