Customer Reviews:
 DO NOT BUY! September 10, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I would not recommend this MP3 player. I have had nothing but trouble with it since I bought it 2 months ago. It freezes. It shuts off when I don't want it to and turns on spontaneously, which wears the battery out. Ripping music to it is difficult, the software that comes with it is horrible. Stay away!
 I Wanted to Like the Pearl. Really September 4, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
_ The 2 gig RCA Pearl fit my image of a well thought-out design. I love the integral USB plug that swivels shut. I have rechargable NiMH batteries, ro the notion of replaceable batteries seemed eminently superior to unreachable, short lived Li-Ion devices. The Micro-SD upgrade - just a fine idea.
_ But. The software is counter-intuitive. After a week I can make it work, but it is clumsy and slow. [One exception - The module to extract songs from your CD library is excellent.]
_ After a week the switches in the controls are already skipping. I can effectively play random songs by all titles. Only.
Some songs, about halfway through, start playing at double speed. I don't even know how that is possible, but observed phenomena.... Some songs start cutting out as though there were a bad connection to the earphones. That was not so.
_ Many times when shutting down, the player will lock up and never finish shutting dowm. Eight hours until I took the battery out. Occasionally The start-up will also hang up.
_ The volume is non-standard. Top volume is not terribly loud. Sufficient for my uses.
_ When it works, the 2GB RCA Pearl is a joy. Say half the time.
_ I didn't realize that RCA doesn't really exist any longer, so this is really an Audiovox. I did the updates, both od the Player firmware and the software that goes on my computer. Also, like old digital cameras, one cannot just drag mp3's into the device; one must use the proprietary software.
_ So I have a large, expensive USB drive. One I am not sure I can trust.
__ DAB __RCA Pearl 2 GB MP3 Player with FM Radio and Direct USB (Blue)
Lacks a couple critical features August 19, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This little mp3 player would be perfect for people who don't need to carry their music collection around with them and like the idea if their player runs out of juice they can slap in a cheap AAA battery. However, two major problems. Well, actually four. But the two biggies, one you can't navigate files by directory. You can't put, say, music in one directory and podcasts in another. This player just presents all files in one big list to you. You can sort them by tags but that's a bit of pain. The real deal killer is the second problem. When you turn the mp3 player off and on the player doesn't remember where you were. That's not bad for 3 minute songs but if you're 30 minutes into a podcast, it takes a while to ff back to where you left off, assuming you remember.
Other minor problems, the SD card reader doesn't seem to read all SD cards. And it really doesn't kick out much in the way of volume. If you're trying to listen to a podcast on a subway or on a busy street, max volume is way too low.
 RCA, please keep working on the firmware... August 14, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I don't like proprietary stuff. I don't like proprietary software (iTunes, WMP), cables (the iPod dock connector) or nonreplaceable li-ions that have to be kept topped off on the charger between sporadic uses and stop holding their charge within 12 months (see also: Apple).
In other words, I am really only interested in MP3 players that are plug-and-play for file transfers with no particular software or OS required, that can run off of normal alkalines, and that use a standard USB cable of some kind or, better yet, have the USB connection facility right on the unit.
In the last few years I've bought several MP3 players - an old PNY player, couple of Sandisk m2x0 series players and a Creative MuVo v200 - which fit the aforementioned bill but had varying and sometimes serious shortcomings that have kept me looking for the ultimate in practical MP3 players. The Pearl TH1602 seems to be a new contender meeting my two big requirements, and at an even better price than the aforementioned cheapies. But, naturally, sadly, there are still some problems.
A prior reviewer mentions some frustration with ID3 tags on his Pearl not consistently working. I have found that some uploads to the player get corrupted somehow, with the tags to break partially or completely; they will appear with "Unknown Artist," "Unknown Album," etc., and many tracks in such batches will not be accessible at all. (The tags are still intact on the files themselves, as can be seen viewing the player's contents from a file-browser window - the player just seems unable or unwilling to read them.)
Once the player has broken the tags for itself like this, no amount of straight-up deletion and re-copying of those files will fix the broken tags. What *will* fix them - at least with the latest firmware, 1.2.1.0 - is 1) deleting the files from the player, then 2) renaming both the folder they're in (if applicable) and ALL of the files themselves. It doesn't have to be much - omitting or adding a hyphen somewhere in the filename will do it. You can use a mass tagging program to do this in two seconds.
I assume the player caches the actual filenames in its database on the first start after an upload, and then assumes that any filename it's seen before doesn't need looking at a second time. To be fair, I've had many similar problems with one of my Sansa flash-based players; the Pearl actually seems more willing than my Sansa to see the errors of its ways if you just rename the files and/or folder.
Commas in the artist or title tags seem to particularly befuddle the player and can help break the tags on their way to the player.
It seems RCA could fix this pretty easily in one of three ways. They could figure out what's causing tag corruption or misreads into the database, they could provide a "wipe database" option on the player that would force a new read of all files, or they could simply do what Rockbox firmware does (and what ALL mp3 players should be able to do)-- enable selection and ordered playback by folder and filename as opposed to ID3s.
I have also had some problems with the player just getting confused and weird in album or artist listings, which is usually cured with a restart.
News is good elsewhere. Sound quality is pretty decent. The player seems to be very well built and scratch resistant. The interface makes perfect sense and the radio works pretty well. The player is not gapless playback capable, but it's better / less hesitant between tracks than many. I do wish the voice recorder made its recordings at a higher sample rate, but that's par for the course on these players.
I don't know why some people are complaining that the th1602 won't play an album in order or it won't allow you to sort things in any way - I think this is user error or tag corruption. I've had no problems with organization or sensible playback order, once I've gotten it to recognize all my tags. If you go through Music --> Albums to make a selection, it has no problem playing a chosen album in correct order, and the albums themselves are shown in alpha order.
The thing is, this is considered a bottom-of-the-line device and I doubt it will see anywhere near as much attention from RCA's software team as it deserves. They will work this thing just to the point to reduce return rates and no further. But I'm actually pretty serious about my gear, and I look expressly for features that the MP3 player manufacturers consider "low end." If someone *would* bring out an AAA-powered device with a flip out USB connnection, just like this but with 16 or 32gb on it, along with firmware that really works... well, I'd certainly pay quite dearly for it. Get on it, and get on that firmware, RCA!
 Good MP3 Player for a great Price August 4, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I bought two of these for my boys (14 and 12). Worked fine out of the box, the boys were pleased and had no problems loading music. The built-in USB is a plus (one less cable floating around) and the battery life seems adequate. We have had no problems with the shutdown issue reported elsewhere. I bought better ear-buds for them and the sound quality is great. Our FM reception seems to be fine for listening - given the nature of FM signals, I wouldn't want to record a 'got-to-have' broadcast while moving around, but for general listening, it's great.
All around, a great buy!
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