Customer Reviews:
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 iRiver T60 January 27, 2008
Hopefully this will be as dependable as my last iRiver,which didn't have enough room for me. I love the smaller size and bright backlight. When travelling, the use of the AAA battery is a lot easier to replace than looking for a computer to recharge. Still has the FM radio as in the last one, but also an alarm. Again, should come in handy when travelling.
best of the best January 7, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
in flash mp3 player categories this is the best. iriver plays OGG Vorbis perfectly with no delay while other brands don't.
I owned many brands since 1998. I had ifp-300 a few years ago. it is still being used by my son.
T60 has perfect radio receiving power. You can record from radio without any loss.
if you keep screen on permenantly battery consumption is faster than other flash types.
 Almost perfect with a nice feature set December 31, 2007
25 out of 26 found this review helpful
I recently bought a Creative MuVo 100 MP3 player on deep discount due to it being powered by a single AAA battery. I liked a lot of things about it but then I decided to see if I could find a AAA battery powered player that had more disk space and that's when I found the T60. I won't knock the MuVo 100 since it's a great player in it's own way, but I much prefer the T60 after having owned it for a week now.
Pros:
- Very compact size; I am enamored of the triangular shape, very sleek.
- Powered by a single AAA battery, available everywhere.
- Good battery life (I own several iPods and they always seem to need a
charge and that means having the cable handy and an outlet).
- FM receiver/record features; and you can store channels.
- Built in mike (record lectures, take memos, etc.)
- Color screen (the MuVo's is grayscale by comparison)
- Drag and drop file management - no need for Windows Media Player or any other proprietary software; music files can be in folders or not and the player's software will find them; you can also navigate such folders within the player.
- Support a variety of audio formats: MP3, WMA, ASF and OGG Q10.
- Solid state disc, not a microdrive; granted iPod now has an 8Gb flash player and bigger ones are coming but they have built-in batteries and once they no longer charge all you've got is a pretty paperweight.
- Good feature set including: EQ, delete command, alarm, data storage, bmp viewer, various listening modes E.G. A-B, playlists, date & time, etc.
- Great sound, just like all iRiver owners say.
Cons:
- Toggle control is poorly conceived; as others have said, you often do one thing when you mean another; it's this player's biggest problem, not a deal breaker but they really should have spent more time designing this; you do get used to it but that's no excuse for poor design.
- Flimsy battery door; not a huge con but it's an important part of the unit and I could see it getting cracked and not fitting securely and then you either try to get another one from iRiver or use ugly tape to keep the battery in; could have been designed better; however they did do a good job of hiding it in the sense that it sort of blends in with the player's fluted texture which is cool.
- No microSD slot; you could say I'm nitpicking here but I don't think such a thing would have added much to this player's size and, with the right firmware, could have let owners upgrade to a total of 8Gb of space; too bad - would have been a great selling point.
- USB cable door is a bit flimsy; located on the side of the player, this door is similar to the ones on a lot of digital cameras in that is is just a small piece of plastic held on by a thin handle allowing you to sort of swing it out of the way of the USB cable jack that plugs in; I think it would have been much better to have located this plug on the end of the player opposite the one where the headphone jack goes in; you need to be careful with this door and have at least one longer fingernail to open it.
- Not powered by the USB cable; yup, transferring data to the player uses the battery; can't understand why they didn't just power it off the USB cable since you have to have it hooked up to transfer data; not a huge issue but another poor design decision methinks.
Keep in mind, I've owned a number of portable music players before buying this one including several from Creative, one from RCA, and I do still own two 60Gb iPods. I do love my iPods for the huge disc space they provide but I really felt there was room in my "collection" (and in this market) for a good player that uses regular batteries. Certainly the future for electronics that use non-user-replacable lithium-ion batteries is assured but that doesn't mean I have to like that state of affairs. Sandisk got it almost right with their e280 series players and their replacable batteries (though it seems they changed their minds for the new line which don't let you replace them - wtf?) but they're still proprietary with swapping out requiring removing a tiny philips screw etc. From what I've been able to gather, the iRiver T60 is essentially the best for it's capacity and type of battery; Sandisk does still make a 4Gb AAA powered player but it has a grayscale screen and the reviews for it are not so great.
NOTE: I only decided to write this positive review after getting around a serious problem I had with this player. Now, I'm not sure where the problem actually lies but I am willing to give iRiver the benefit of a doubt here. What happened was I was having trouble transferring songs to the player. It kept shutting off in the middle of the transfer which would cause Windows to "dismount" the player/drive letter. I checked the battery gauge on the player and it still showed two out of three bars. I tried a different Windows XP computer and, if anything, the problem got worse. I tried a different USB port, copying files a different way, no joy. I did finally notice that the error message was "battery low". I thought about this a bit; the indicator said two bars and the player, once disconnected, worked just fine. So I took the Polaroid brand AAA battery out and put a brand new Sony AAA battery in and voila! That was the whole problem, the player was for some reason getting a low battery reading from a still viable battery when connected to the PC. The Sony brand battery had none of these problems and I tranferred 4Gb of music over the course of half an hour with no hiccups. So, the moral is, don't use Polaroid batteries (or probably any other cheap brand) with this player. Instead stick to good known name brands (oh and yes, I do have the latest firmware installed so it wasn't "an old firmware" type issue). Also, I have not tried this player with rechargeables but I assume there won't be similar problems (just somewhat shorter battery life).
UPDATE ON BATTERY PROBLEM ABOVE:
It's been a few more weeks now and I've done several more updates/loads to my iRiver T60 player and I think I've finally nailed down the problem with updating it. Since it doesn't use USB power during transfers AND since the screen stays on the whole time it is connected (and recognized by Windows) if you start with anything but a full or nearly full battery (it seems to need to show three bars on the T60 screen), then the player will flash the "battery low" error upon connection and shut down. I find this, as well as not using USB power, quite odd as I can modify the settings in the player to turn the screen off during playback etc. after 5 seconds, 10 seconds etc. but NOT apparently during transfers. So here's what I plan to do to solve this. I will keep a dedicated set of rechargable AAA batteries around near the PC that I will use to do transfers. Now, that's not as annoying as it might seem. I was planning to use some rechargables with this player anyway and I typically do transfers in my office where there are extra wall plugs. Still, a rather poor design flaw I must say. Perhaps a firmware update will fix it somehow? iRiver, you listening?
-s1m0n
Fantastic Sound December 10, 2007
15 out of 16 found this review helpful
The 4gb T60 is a replacement for my Creative Micro Zen Photo Creative Zen Micro 6 GB MP3 Player Black(which fell well short of the mark). I also owned the iRiver IFP-100, 250MB model, loved its sound quality, fm radio, and microphone (which I used to record class lectures with great clarity), but disliked its small capacity.
To be fair in my review I must note that I do not use the stock earbuds, I own and use both KossKoss "The Plug" Portable Headphones and ShureShure SE110 Sound Isolating Earphone with Balanced Armature Driver, Black, which I also used with the Zen.
Pros
- Phenomenal sound on the T60, especially the SRS profile. There is depth to the music I've never heard before.
- AAA batteries!!! The IFP 100 had AA batts and I loved this feature. I was frustrated to only get 5-6 hours of life on the Zen and have to recharge via USB. iRiver has this nailed.
- Size: the thing is tiny and super light-weight.
- Files: can store files as you would on a USB memory stick, but I have not yet used this feature, though I like the idea.
Cons (NO deal-breakers)
- The interface software is clunky. The T60 worked straight-away with Windows Media 11. I still have yet to get the iRiver brand to work and transfer songs.
- Joystick: I echo the previous comment about the joystick. It could be improved.
- Unbelievably, a lanyard was not included even thought there is a loop for it on the T60. I had an extra laying around and am using it.
- I had some issues with my anti-virus software (Trend Micro) after installation of the T60. TM disliked the iRiver software and continually blocked it. Some minor tweaks fixed the problem.
OVERALL
This is a music player and it does so very well. The screen is functional, but useless for photos. If you appreciate superior sound quality you will not be disappointed. There is a bit of a learning-curve with the buttons and joystick, but it quickly becomes habit.
The T60 would get 5 stars if not for the clunky software.
A good player for certain kinds of use and users November 12, 2007
20 out of 21 found this review helpful
A good player for active minimalists (like me) who tend to subject their gadgets to a certain amount of abuse. The T60 is compact and tough, I've dropped mine a few time without injury. iRiver is known for its sound quality, and the T60 doesn't disappoint. It takes a single AAA battery (I use rechargeables)--an advantage if you are away from a wall socket for long periods. The 4GB storage is generous as flash players go. The screen is small but informative, though hard to read in full sunlight. The recording quality is remarkable, considering the unit's small size. The FM receiver is decent, though reception is marginal in outlying areas. I use my player in MTP mode (there's a choice, depending on the firmware you load) with Microsoft Media Player, and it seems perfectly compatible, including good synchronization with playlists and fast data transfer.
I can generally operate the controls one-handed, without looking, which is useful on a walk. The joystick is imprecise; when I aim right to advance a track, I sometimes change the volume, and working through the menu can be tricky--though you get better with practice. If the backlight is off, the first joystick flick (or button push) turns the light back on, the second does what you intended--which I find mildly annoying. My biggest complaint is the long startup time--nearing 20 seconds on mine--when many files are loaded. I don't know if this is a problem endemic to all flash players once they go beyond 1 GB of storage, but it's a problem on the T60. Perhaps iRiver could fix, but at this writing, the company hasn't updated the T60 firmware since May 2007.
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