Diamond Rio, from Diamond Multimedia, invented the portable MP3 player.  After winning a lawsuit brought by the music industry, Diamond released the Rio MP3 player and has maintained its lead as the most popular portable.  The Rio 600, their latest player, has all the features of the Rio 500 with improved looks and a little easier navigation of audio files and features.

Here are a few of the features of the 600 that make it one of our favorites:

• Runs on a single AA Battery
  
• Uses fast USB interface to computer
  
• Has bookmarks and an audiobook mode that makes it easy to keep your place when listening to long voice files.
  
• Is firmware upgradable, meaning they will have software that updates the player for new features and file formats
  
• Supports MP3 and WMA files
  
• Due to its popularity, it is supported by every major software product capable of writing to portables
  

Overall, the Rio is really solid.  It doesn't include FM tuner or audio recording, but is a great MP3 player, and starting at $169, it is a great deal.

$169 from Amazon

Back to the MP3 Player Index

What and How of MP3 Players

Nomad Review

MPTrip Review

MP3 Player Store

Other Neat Products