RCA Lyra 20 GB Jukebox MP3 Player
By: RCA Average Rating: 3.5 Total Reviews: 44
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 On: 2005-01-15
I have had my lyra for about 3 years now, im a coach bus driver.
to say my lyra has been thru HELL would be an understatement, it has been droped bonched around rained on and frozen more then once, but it keeps going and going and going,
the energizer bunnie has nothing on my lyra. i think finding songs and playing music is a snap, and as for the guy that was complaining about the buttons getting hit, try the little switch on the side marked button lock, it works great to. in closing this little work horse can take what ever you can dish out.
 On: 2004-12-04
I like to listen to classical music, and the RCA Jukebox is NOT the right MP3 player for classical. It is very hard to hear soft music, as the volume does not go up very high. Also, it is easy to hear the noises on the hard drive. The mP3 player is very bulky. One of the worst parts is that it doesnt work if it gets cold. Even in the summer, it might not work in intense air conditioning. The soft ware that comes with the jukebox is also hard to learn how to use. You have to pay more to upgrade it if you want any of the advanced features! I would maybe try the iPOD mini instead. The 20 GB hard drive is really appealing, but I doubt that that much storage is necessary for the average user.
On: 2004-12-03
I like to listen to classical music, and the RCA Jukebox is NOT the right MP3 player for classical. It is very hard to hear soft music, as the volume does not go up very high. Also, it is easy to hear the noises on the hard drive. The mP3 player is very bulky. One of the worst parts is that it doesnt work if it gets cold. Even in the summer, it might not work in intense air conditioning. The soft ware that comes with the jukebox is also hard to learn how to use. You have to pay more to upgrade it if you want any of the advanced features! I would maybe try the iPOD mini instead. The 20 GB hard drive is really appealing, but I doubt that that much storage is necessary for the average user.
 On: 2004-11-16
Good things I have to say: It holds a ton of songs and for the low price it will be worth it for some people. The battery lasts about 8 hours and charges relatively fast. If you like to jog, it wont skip or have problems from rigorous movement. It allows you to make playlists while you are listening to music, which is pretty fun. After I downloaded the right drivers and software, it worked pretty well with my computer, though this may be complicated for some people.
Problems I have had with it: It cuts off the first second of every song, this is the most annoying problem it has. If you have the volumn turned down lower then half, you can easily hear the hard drive noise through your headphones/speakers. It sometimes stop playing and locks up entirely. You cant even turn it off when it does that. The only recourse is to hit the "Reset" button which can only be reached with a safety pin or similer thin object. After adding most of my song library, which was only 15 GB, it made the "Play All" setting unusable, because it takes too long to switch between songs. Even though the headphone design is very comfortable and has good quality sound, after 2 months one of the speakers broke which made them unusable.
I managed to buy this for $35 new from sears, so the extremely low price is the only reason I didnt take it back. If you demand excellence in your electronic products, stay clear of this player.
On: 2004-11-15
Good things I have to say: It holds a ton of songs and for the low price it will be worth it for some people. The battery lasts about 8 hours and charges relatively fast. If you like to jog, it wont skip or have problems from rigorous movement. It allows you to make playlists while you are listening to music, which is pretty fun. After I downloaded the right drivers and software, it worked pretty well with my computer, though this may be complicated for some people.
Problems I have had with it: It cuts off the first second of every song, this is the most annoying problem it has. If you have the volumn turned down lower then half, you can easily hear the hard drive noise through your headphones/speakers. It sometimes stop playing and locks up entirely. You cant even turn it off when it does that. The only recourse is to hit the "Reset" button which can only be reached with a safety pin or similer thin object. After adding most of my song library, which was only 15 GB, it made the "Play All" setting unusable, because it takes too long to switch between songs. Even though the headphone design is very comfortable and has good quality sound, after 2 months one of the speakers broke which made them unusable.
I managed to buy this for $35 new from sears, so the extremely low price is the only reason I didnt take it back. If you demand excellence in your electronic products, stay clear of this player.
On: 2004-06-01
Im going to give this product its deserved kudos in the beginning here so I can saturate the rest of the review with the negative this product also deserves. The windows-friendly removable hard-drive design is nice, and this product is fairly cheap.Of course, it acts wonky and unpredictable. I would select a folder to play and it would refuse to just play the damned thing. After each song it would stop playing and change the mode to "repeat all". I have no clue why, either. USB 1.1 transfers are painful, and the transfer interface isnt exactly CONVENIENT for overnight transfers. Profiling the player takes an eternity, and you have to do it twice (unless i misunderstood how this thing works). Its absolutely spellbinding how user un-friendly the case is. what is this case? Its horrible. I cant fathom its purpose. I stare at it night after night, trying to explain to myself what human being could have possibly made such a piss-poor design decision. Ugly. Bulky. Hardly protective. Inhibitive. Obnoxious. Ridiculous. Why? I have some old socks I could have used that might have fit better. But (forgive me for jumping around) the worst aspect is definately the actual interface. There is no logical system. An iPod, or Rio Riot, has a system. Things are organized based on a hierarchy. Menus are layed out in a coherent pattern. This goes BEYOND learning curves, because accessing your music is just not convenient or intuitive. Its like standing on your head to work your coffee maker. I have no idea why youd by this flaky piece of garbage. There are other products in the price range with a better reliability record as well as more features. Dont waste your money.
 On: 2004-04-08
I was able to get this on close-out at Sears for about $200. So far, overall Im happy with it (after 2 weeks) and plan to keep it. Heres my 2 cents about it:Pros:
1. Great sound quality
2. Battery life does last at least 15 hours
3. Organizes well
4. Does resume to last song played--starts at the beginning of the song
5. Metal case, very solid feeling
6. Great accessories included (except the case) Cons
1. I play mostly WMA files, needed to upload quite a bit of firmware updates to make it work.
2. Needs to be reset now and then--but soft reset still keeps most of your settings (except backlight, equalizer settings)
3. Can get slow during shuffle mode
4. Can slow down when turning off I purchased this to use in the car with the Belkin Tunecast II. It serves its purpose well, has been reliable after setting up. A note about the Belkin Tunecasts, "II" seems to be slightly more amplified, but Im not really that impressed with the clarity of either, as they both have quite a bit of distortion, at least driving around southern california.
On: 2004-01-21
This is a cool MP3 player/hard drive for the money. It is simple to use and easily read by my computer. It does have a few minor problems that I dont like. It has a slow download time (USB not firewire), the screen has a minor uncontrolable dimming problem, and the control knob sticks a bit. The worst problem the player has is it doesnt like to play in the cold. If it is cold, it has a loud, continuous beep and give the message, "ambient temperature too low." It will not turn back on until it warms up, so it will not work well on a jog unless you live in Las Vegas. The player works best plugged into the wall. But with all the drawbacks, it still is pretty good for the low price.
On: 2003-12-25
BUYER BEWARE!
I purchased this mp3 player and at first it worked just fine for less than an hour. SYNOPSIS:
This is a neat toy but has become a very expensive paperweight after just a month. The product tries very hard to be a jukebox/second hard drive, but it is not functional for someone who plans to update/change files and songs due to the VERY SLOW USB 1.1 connection. Save your money and get a player with faster connection options, better usability, support, design, etc BUGGY:
The player freezes/hangs when it is powered down and then turned back on for use. Additionally, the display freezes and hangs after playing more than five songs. Total pain since I CONSTANTLY have to reset the unit. And I dont always have something to jam in the super small reset hole-regular pens wont do it. POOR PRODUCT SUPPORT:
I have had no success in downloading updates to fix the problem because there arent any. What happened to customer support and providing updates for users? SLOOOOOW INTERFACE:
The USB 1.1 interface is very slow and takes a long time to initially set up your library on the computer. Took all night for me to upload the 5 Gig of songs/albums I own. Big downer since I was excited to have it charged and ready to go in an hour or so. DESIGN:
It is bulky and awkward to wear if you are working out/jogging. BATTERY LIFE:
Battery life is very disappointing only around 3 hours SYNCRONIZING/ORGANIZING SONGS:
The Music Match software is a very slow and awkward interface to sync files. The ability to create playlist is a good idea since playback of syncronized songs is HORRIBLE (more on this later). Creating play lists is fairly easy and with Music Maker, but loading playlists on the player is VERY TIME-CONSUMING. PRODUCT INTERFACE/USE:
Poor interface/use. Unless you use the playlist maker (which is time-consuming to load), you will be very frustrated at the playback functionality. There is no inherent song continuity unless you are willing to listen to your entire collection-unsorted. That is to say there are several options for playback: artist, album, genre...and each with its own quirks and pains Artist playback: If you try to play songs by the same artist you can only listen to songs from the same album. If there is a guest artist in a song then you will have to select that one separately. When the current album is over you will have to go out and select the artists other album. All possible to do but it shouldnt be so difficult. Album Playback: Songs only play from the same artist and same album...if there is any differences-ie movie soundtracks with multiple artists-the songs will play from each artist/group individually and require you to navigate back to the album and select another song. Song genre playback? It is a combination of artist and album difficulties-oh its even more painful! IE: You cant listen to all the Rock songs at once because youll be selecting the songs by artist/group and album. DIFFULTY AS A 2nd HARD DRIVE:
It is difficult to use as a second hard drive/transfer files between computers since you have to install the driver and restart on each computer. NOTE: My friend who owns an Mac was able to plug the USB into her computer and immediately recognized it as a hard drive. THIS IS PLUG-n-PLAY at its best! This begs the question...WHY do the Windows users (the intended audience) have to install a driver to use it? GOOD FOR CD CHANGER REPLACEMENT:
I also want to say it is very nice to use the unit as a CD changer in my car. Finally my tape player has a use again! RECOMMENDATION:
I do like the idea of a second hard drive but I would recommend an mp3 player with a USB 2.0/Firewire interface if you have a lot of files/songs you plan on backing up/syncing. If you want a high capacity "jukebox" or 2nd hard drive DONT BUY THIS! There are A LOT BETTER ALTERNATIVES to spend your hard earned money on! CURRENT STATUS:
I am currently in the process of sending my player for service and if it has any more problems I plan on getting an iPod or something similar with Firewire since my computer doesnt have USB 2.0
 On: 2003-09-07
The cigarette lighter adapter that was shipped didnt work and it would power off after being fully charged.The player locks up frequently and is cumbersome to work with and the headphones didnt work either.The only thing worse than the player is the customer service.Avoid at all costs.
On: 2003-08-17
The downlowding is very slow because it is USB.
It gets frozen a lot (I press restart an average of 2 times a day).
There are only folders for in the Hard Drive Part Not The MP3.
The Case it comes with is bad.
The only good thing is the price.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-08-13
My Lyra worked out of the box, no problems with windows Xp as long as you follow the instructions. USB 1.1 is a litle slow but just leave it to transfer files over night and in the morning it will be done. Mp3pro playback is great because it gives more room to store other files. Summed up, the best you can get for the price you pay
On: 2003-08-12
...[This] is the best ..., 20Gb Hd Mp3 player!!! I have nad Zero problems, just go to [website] and get the lastest updates. If you get updates you do not HAVE to use MusicMatch for file tranfers. I have moved ove 10 gbs of music and 7 gb non-music files from work to home and vice versa. No problems. Using Xp pro home/work.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-07-28
I bought the Lyra player impulsively before a trip and afterwards read customers who had similar computer systems and had problems. Working with Windows XP Professional, I had no problems installing and using the Lyra. The 20 GB hard-drive has enough space for a huge amount of songs and if you use the MP3 Pro capabilities it can hold more than you can imagine listening too. The few gripes I have with the Lyra are its very slow transfer speed (it took about 5 hours to transfer 9 Gigs) and updates you must download to enable the player to use wma files. Overall the system is a good package, great capacity, easy to use, and inclusive (comes with a cigarette charger, tape adaptor, wall charger, case, Audio cables, and headphones).
by: Anonymous On: 2003-07-13
Youve got to be kidding! USB on a player with a hard drive this large? Better get used to L-O-N-G waits for downloads. Anything without Firewire (or even USB 2) shouldnt even be considered, unless youre buying solely on price.
On: 2003-06-20
Everytime I tried to send to device it kept saying I needed to download the upgrade 1057 version. after the upgrade it continued to say the same thing over again. i only had it for 6 days and could not get it to work. Can someone help understand what i may have been doing wrong. thanks
On: 2003-06-12
First off I gave the Lyra 4 stars and not 5 just because it should come with a better case. This unit is one of the nicest I have used. The controls are very easy to use and there is no learning curve.
Once charged up the transfer of songs with the 1.1 usb for example a 80-90MB file takes about 3mins.
The box come with everything you need from the car charger to the audio out cables. All items are excellent quality!!!!! EXCEPT the case. Now I understand that there is alot of value in the in the LYRA box and the case is a "bonous" but with the limit of after-market Carrying Cases I would expect something more protective from RCA.
One suggestion, if you get this find yourself some non-adheasive vinyl (like the stuff the oilchange stikers are made of or pda screen protectors) and cut out a piece to cover the display on the LYRA to prevent scratches.
The LYRA is a solid unit good size not to bulky fairly good looks. This is a must have for any music lover or tech geek. This would make a great gift for a student, fathers day gift, any one!
I am sure that if you purchase this you will be more than pleased. There are many MP3 Players out there this is one of the best!!!!! Dont spend the extra [money] for a MP3 player with the same amount of storage and sleeker looks, there is no need.
Thanks for reading I hope you get one!!!!!!!!!!!!!
On: 2003-06-08
This is a GREAT unit. Everyone here depends on Music Match for some reason. I find that Music Match bites, so I just drag and drop. HOW do I do this? Easy.. just open 2 Windows Explorer windows.. select the MP3s, then copy, then paste it to the Lyra... its that simple.. no music-match needed.Good job RCA! Just get rid of that Music Match thing, will ya?
by: Anonymous On: 2003-05-25
I owned the Creative Nomad IIC and really enjoyed it. The only problem was once I loaded all of my DMB, there was no room for anything else. I enjoy music and wanted something that I would have for a while. I like the Creative USB 2.0 but thought it was a little expensive. The IPOD seems like a good product but 5 bills is to much. The RCA seemed like a lot of product for the money and MP3 Pro format. After using it for a week and a half, the hard drive locked up. I tried using the profiler on the player and the software and had no luck. I tried to load new drivers and firmware from the RCA site and had no luck. All of the files look like they had become corrupted. So now I have a heavy paper weight. Back to Amazon and the ZEN USB 2.0 is on the way. Also, I have heard alot of complaining about the software that comes with the Creative and I think it is very easy to use. The Music Match has a lot more to offer, but I guess it depends on how detailed you want to be with your music. Lots of extras to come with the LYRA but how good are they if the files become corrupted, the hard drive locks up and profiler software does not help either. Spend the extra on a solid product like Creative or Apple. I gave it 1 star because I liked the Music Match software, the extras that came in addition to the player and the MP3 Pro format.
On: 2003-03-31
I have been reading, looking and researching hard disk MP3 devices for some time. I finally purchased the Lyra and it surpassed my expectations by a mile. Easy install under Windows 2000 Professional. Great MP3 player and hard disk. No problems with drag and drop. My only complaint is the dependence on Music Match. While Music Match is a fine program. However, I (and many others) organise MP3 using sub-directories. I would like RCA to add the ability to negotiate and play using sub-directories in addition to albums, etc. I have a MP3 CD player which offers this and it is a superior way to select and play MP3s. But, this is a minor complaint. The Lyra is worth every nickle of its reasonable price.
On: 2003-03-20
After down loading the user manual and experimenting with the lyra jukebox, I find this gadget a blessing. I will never own another CD. The sound quality is excellent. Hooking up to other sources is a snap. Downloading music has never been easier. Catorgorizing my music is simple. What amazes me most is when I show people what Im listning to, they still dont understand whats involved in the lyra jukebox. Its so nice to hear no. 1 hit after hit without having to edit CDs or listening to all of a CD. Well worth the price.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-03-12
Id give this a five star review if it only had USB 2 or Firewire. The review of March 3 is dead wrong - you CAN drag and drop and you dont have to put the music into some wierd format either. It plays MP3s just fine. And it sounds full and rich, too.
On: 2003-03-04
I bought this after reading a ton of reviews on portable jukeboxes and thought I was buying a reliable player. I was wrong. Whenever you try to change a song (whether in shuffle mode or manually change it even within the same artist) it has a 15-20 second delay while it "thinks" until you start hearing the next song. Totallly unacceptable. Even though the manual says that you can Drag & Drop your songs, thats not true either. You have to use the Music Match software, which actually converts your mp3s to some other weird format. So its not even really a true mp3 player. Also, when trying to use the software, it constantly locked up my computer (am running XP). Tried calling tech support twice, which was a joke. The people working the help desk have NO idea whats going on. Never received a call back like promised. Etc etc etc. I only had the hard drive about 60% full, too. Cant imagine what it would be like if it were completely full. This is immediately going back to Amazon.com Extremely disappointed.
On: 2003-02-22
Its not perfect. Having to use Music Match to do tagging is an exercise in frustration. And the buttons are very sensitive, which is a good thing when youre working with them, but a bad one when you toss this into your pocket or bag, and suddenly its playing a completely different song than the one you picked, or its repeating them, or stopping completely. If they werent going to be recessed, then some sort of protective cover mightve been a good idea.But thats pretty much the end of my serious gripes. Anything else is just a matter of my not having taken the time to sit down and read all the info. And even so, Ive done pretty well with it, so I can report that its fairly user-friendly. The hook-up to my computer went very well, and XP recognized the device immediately. Whoever wrote that you have to be organized when you start working with Music Match is quite correct, but thats not a bad thing. If you want your music properly cataloged, do sit down and spend the time to check all the tags MM applies. Theyre frequently wrong, or misleading, and theres no consistency to the naming. For example, The Beatles appear variously as "The Beatles," "Beatles," "Beatles, The" and so forth. Thus, they show up on different places in your Artist search. That may be okay for an mp3 player that holds maybe 20 cuts, but for the Lyra, it can make a huge difference in how you listen. Take the time to regularize your file information when you start out, and stick to your organizing principles throughout the process of filling the HD, and youll be a happier listener. The sound itself is very good. The device doesnt seem to be affected by jarring. Its quite heavy by comparison to other mp3 players, but of course a HD that size is going to weigh more than than 128k of memory. The controls are easy to learn, the display is fairly clear, and you can control how long the backlight stays on. Battery charge seems to last pretty well, though I come nowhere near the 10 hours mentioned by some users. Id say 5 or 6 is closer to accurate for my unit. Its not a problem for me, though. You can play it while youre plugged in, and it recharges pretty quickly. I dont know if the more expensive devices are better than the Lyra. I do know that Im happy with what I spent and what I got for my money, and thats about the best recommendation I can give.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-02-15
The first Jukebox had a blank screen, making it impossible to navigate or select music. Amazon.com replaced it promptly. But the replacement Jukebox was also defective. It did not respond to the volume settings and the headphone plug seemed to work sporadically.Unlike others I dont mind the MusicMatch software. But I found the Jukebox controls to be clunky and counterintuitive. There is no autodj function as found on MusicMatch. There is a surprising delay between playing one song and the next. The LCD screen does not allow horizontal scrolling and so it was impossible to see the names of the songs or artists when I was trying to select them. I asked for a refund and Ill wait for the next generation.
On: 2003-02-13
OK, I have been fumbling around in th mp3 world for quite sometime looking for a good player. I purchased the rd2820 and am amazed at what this thing could do. With the 20gb hard drive it is the smallest, and toughest in its class. The player also comes with rca line-out cables to plug into your stereo or car, along with a cassete adapter for those who dont have rca cables on their car stereo. Currently the largest memory for a car stereo receiver is 5gb mp3 player which runs for about [$$$]. The rd2820 allows you to put all of your music in one place and plug it into your car or home stereo, or you can just take it with you as a walkman--WOOOW! It has rechargable lithium batteries which really do last for 15 hours, and it comes with a wall, and car charger. As for its performance, there is nothing that comes close for the money. Heres the real catch RCA has finally made public its mp3pro software and the rd2820 is the first player to utilize it. What the mp3pro does is allow the rd2820 to store twice the amount of files or songs as any other 20gb player without losing any sound quality, in fact I beleive it even sounds better than 128kbs. So to sum it up RCA has released without a doubt the best player out there!
by: Anonymous On: 2003-02-09
I bought this 4 days ago and have been using this since then. First unit I got was not working properly (meaning, files transfered ended up with corrupted files) and I returned it to the store. The replacement one is good so far.
Pros :
Battery Life, All my music can be carried in my pocket, awesome sound output, Line out in addition to head phone jack, backlight, well the USB doesnt bother me since I leave the unit to charge as well as transfer files before I go to bed and it is ready in the morning ! I wouldnt put extra $ for fire wire.
Cons :
Joystick like controls. I would rather have a separate control for volume.
Power button is used as a stop function as well and you got to hold for few seconds.
Controls are not like regular type. I suspect these controls could break easily.
Firmware is a joke. Horrible navigation. If you play using "All Files" option and shuffle/all option corrupts the sorting history and you need to profile again. Basically, sort by "All File" option is useless because of this bug. Hope they would fix in the future upgrade.
NO Resume mode option. I listen to lot of lectures recorded in mp3 mode. Each track goes for hour long and if I had to stop and play again it starts from the beginning. Even a 40 dollar cd walkman has this option and I would expect it from this mini PC.
Price of this will come down soon and it could be a bargain.
On: 2003-02-02
Of course all that could change in 48 hours if this thing decides to up and quit on me. But so far that doesnt seem likely. Ive been putting it through its paces pretty comprehensively, and I like what Im seeing (and hearing.)If theres any problem at all with the RCA, its MusicMatch Jukebox. Right out of the box it was clear that I had a later version on my system than what was on the disc. That wouldve been fine if the version I had behaved remotely the way the instructions said it would. In desperation I ended up upgrading to the newest version, and being told over and over again that I needed to download this or that...very frustrating. However, once I got the gestalt of MMJ, the only problem I had was organizing the way I wanted to approach the somewhat daunting task of putting my entire collection of music on the Lyra. I ran some tests between CD quality at 128kbps (CD quality audio) and 64kbps (FM radio quality) and decided that for a portable experience, the smaller files were just fine. Immediately that upped the number of albums Im able to store on the Lyra to something like 800 (based on the number Ive already done.) This will allow me to store my entire collection, even tape and vinyl, and its given me the excuse Ive been looking for to sit down and convert these last two formats to digital. Yes, it does take some time to convert files from CD to mp3, and transferring the mp3 files to the Lyra isnt instantaneous by any stretch, but I dont find myself rolling my eyes over the lag. The process isnt so resource-intensive that I cant do other things like check email and surf. Windows XP treats the Lyra like an external hard drive (which of course it is) and you can do drag-and-drop transfers without having to use MMJ, so you can be ripping an album to mp3 while transferring another to the Lyra. The controls arent hard to learn which is good because printed instructions are sketchy at best. The PDF files are better, but still not comprehensive, and I dislike navigating PDFs, so they made no points with me by using that format. The best recommendation I can make is this: Organize yourself before you attempt any transfers. Know what you want to store on the Lyra, and how you want to store it. While you are, to a great degree, at the mercy of the information on the CD itself (MMJ will get artist, title and track listings from the online music database.) you can rearrange the files on the Lyra, just the way youd rearrange data files on a hard drive. I had no problems at all with XP. Its true that the system doesnt recognize the Lyra when you plug it into the USB port if the unit is turned off, but once its on, theres no problem at all. It shows up as another drive in your Win explorer. This is common with a lot of USB peripherals, Ive found, and it doesnt bother me. For the price, I think the Lyra is the best buy I couldve made.
On: 2003-01-30
Sounds good, transfer speed is okay - its not instantaneous, but it doesnt take too terribly long.
Couple of gripes - the sorting is terrible: cant play songs by genre, cant even play all of the songs by one artist. If you select artist, then press play, it will only play tracks from one of their albums. Guess you could get around this by not putting album names in your tags, but then you couldnt play by album when you wanted to. You ultimately end up having to make tons of playlists, which is fairly easy but still a hassle.
Also, you cant adjust the tags on the player, even when its hooked up to your computer - if you want to change a tag, you have to remove the file from the lyra, change the tag on your computer, then re-download it.
These are kind of nit-picky problems, but they irritate me. Im pleased with the player on the whole, and it fulfills its basic functions well - it holds a ton of songs, and playback is fine. I would recommend it, but just with the caveats listed above.
On: 2003-01-29
This is becoming a saga, Ill write a trilogy and sell it via this site. I just found out that the reason the Lyra keeps crashing is because I dont use the terrible (in my opinion) MusicMatch software to transfer music files. The tech support person made it clear that MusicMatch is REQUIRED for music transfers, not optional. If you drag and drop you will experience intermittent crashes.
Oh, and I discovered an even better hardware defect. The plug where you connect headphones into got stripped. Basically the metal prongs inside that make contact with the headphone plug have recessed so that I cant get a solid connection unless I hold it in with my hand or use some sort of paperclip while tightening the cord so that the edge of the plug presses against the prongs. How many years have we had this whole "connector plug" technology? 40?
Im glad some of you havent experienced any issues, this little thing has put me through hell for the past month. They even refused a return/replacement. Thankfully I bought it on a platinum card, a dispute has been filed with money credited back to me. ... Id advise waiting for the new generation of mp3 players about to come out from superior companies with up to 100GB and USB 2.
On: 2003-01-27
This is a great mp3 player. A little bigger than the Ipod, but I would not shell out ... more for an Ipod. Easy to use too. I had very little problems with the software. Just plugged it in and started downloading my music on it. Great for anyone!
by: Anonymous On: 2003-01-22
I love this player. After 3 tries with other jukeboxes Ive finally found one that works. First, I bought the Archos. It sucked, my XP wouldnt even recognize it. Second, I shelled out the serious cash for the iPod and the $80 firewire card that you have to buy to transfer your music. My computer had a serious difficulties recognizing the iPod too. The iPod is a slick piece of machinery, no doubt...But is it worth the price? Finally, Im in mp3 heaven with my 20GB Lyra. It uses a fast USB (it took me about 3 hours to transfer 12GB of music), so I didnt have to buy a firewire card. Its still small enough to take running and it sounds great. Im happy.
On: 2003-01-21
I heard mostly negatives about the time it takes to load all the music. Ok it takes some time but if your organized that is only the first time! You can just load from where you left off from then on. Come on now the IPod is great but is it really worth it when you can get this for half the price? I would like to hear from someone who had enough time to try both. I accidently dropped mine a couple of times. Now I usually take better care of my stuff but this did not even scratch with the cover on it. Once it got stuck but I just hit the reset. Also it comes with the car kit, AC and stereo adaptors which are purchased in addition with other units.
On: 2003-01-16
Excellant machine. Grandson has had no problems with it. We use it do download and upload from Windows XP. It is worth the money!
On: 2003-01-06
If you try to sort by genre, it drills down to artist. I havent been able to get it to shuffle through the entire genre, only a particular artist.
by: Anonymous On: 2003-01-03
Ive had NONE of the problems with XP that others have mentioned... as for the one reviewers difficulty with it being locked up, theres a reset button near the plug for the power cord - just shove a paperclip into the hole, should fix it.I did have trouble under my bro-in-laws win98 machine - once you unplug the unit from the USB port, you have to reboot the computer to get it to recognize the Lyra again. Ive not had a chance to test this with XP, but Im not expecting it to be a problem - I had the same prob under win98 for other hardware, such as zip drives. The unit does not sort by folder (I have an idea that other brands dont either), but its very easy to set up playlists using the PC, and not too bad to create them on the fly using the Lyra. MusicMatch was the software I was already using, so there was hardly any learning curve for me. The only caution I would make is to make sure that your MP3s are saved with file names and info that will allow you to adequately ID the individual files, since the unit doesnt sort by folder. So far, I think this is by far the best value for the money - its at least [$$] cheaper than the Nomad, and scads cheaper than the IPOD. Since they all use the same HD, Im thinking there will be no problems with reliability that the others dont have, as well.
On: 2002-12-31
I just bought the 20GB lyra at christmas and downloaded my entire music collection (4000 Songs) in like about 4 1/2 hours, battery last long and the price is cheap, sound is pretty good too. If you dont have any concern waiting for a lot of time to download your music, buy it.
On: 2002-12-31
This item is fantastic. The controls are easy as pie, the unit fits in your coat pocket or briefcase, it holds gobs of files, what else do you want. I feel bad for all those suckers who shelled out all that extra cash for an I-Pod. The only complaints are that I hate Music Match and I really prefer Real Player. I tried to transfer my mp3 that were created with Real and the tags did not transfer. But that criticism is of MusicMatch, not the Lyra. File transfers are slow, I loaded the Lyra to a quarter of capacity and it took 90 minutes to transfer the files from the PC. Again, not a major problem. Still, it was a great purchase and I highly recommend it. I use XP and had no problem. Well, thats a lie, the first time I hooked it to my PC the Lyra froze. I think it was my fault as I did not follow the instruction card. Anyway, when it froze it was a snap to reset, so no problem. I guess you need to be a little (very little) computer literate to use the machine, but if you use mp3 files for music, you need to have some computer knowledge. So, in conclusion, if you want an mp3 juke box, this is a good choice.
So, the glowing review above is true, except that the headphone jack no longer works. A marvel of modern technology, 5,000 songs in the palm of your hand, and the 50 year old headphone jack technology doesnt work.
Shame on RCA - I wish I were one of those "suckers" who bought an iPod.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-12-31
So i wanted an iPOD. My poor Dad who only uses PCs didnt understand the difference, and bought me this for christmas.
I was afraid to even open it, but i did. Yuck. I figured it was generated for the masses so hooked it up to my work laptop. (windows.) The software was so freakin wierd and backwards. I got it to work, transfered my iTunes files to it from my Mac. And it was ok. Not bad really, just not good. I swapped it. Traded it in and paid the little bit extra to get the iPOD. I plugged the iPOD into my mac. I took a quick shower, before my clothes were on 1327 of my favorites were loaded on, ready to go.
If you dont have a Mac, and youre used to having to do 20 extra steps to get stuff to work, then this one is great. If you have ever used a Mac, give this one up. Its a nice macine. Looks good. Runs pretty good, but its not worth booting up a PC for.
On: 2002-12-26
This mp3 player just rox, If You dont have an mp3 player just go out and get one of these You will never be sorry.
Its one of the best products i have bought in the last couple years.
On: 2002-12-22
As I sit here on hold for the past 15min for Lyra tech support, I have time to reminisce over the first call about 45min ago when the tech didnt even believe this model existed. A small smile touches my lips when I think of my coy little Lya RD2820, too shy to FREAKIN WORK. This thing blew up like Hiroshima. I installed the software on my WinXP box, plugged it in, the Lyra screen showed a connection in progress and WinXP failed the plug & play. Since then, connected or not, my Lyra still thinks its connected and there is --no way to shut the damn thing off--. The power button doesnt work, the battery cant be removed. Needless to say it refuses to be recognized by any machine in my home now, XP or 2K. All the technicians right now are huddling in a little group figuring out if they have any tech skills between them.Isnt technology wonderful?
On: 2002-12-10
I was looking for a MP3 player that had loads of space and was compact. I spend a lot of time in a car traveling, and wanted something to store my music without having to bring my discman, and all my cds. I wanted this one, because of the room, and features. I was a little concerned about one of the reviews stating that they had trouble using it with windows XP, which I have on my laptop. But, I decided to give it a try anyway. So, far I love it. Easy set up, and the battery lasts a long time. I had no trouble at all getting the software set up on windows XP. The music software that you use with it, is a little complicated at first. I just fiddled around with it for a little while, but now I have it down on how to do it. After the songs are uploaded from the cd on the computer, it is a breeze to load it on to the MP3 player. I first uploaded my favorite band cds, and are able to find all the songs under there category. I also love how compact it is. Now, I dont have to lug around all my cds and discman. I highly recommend this too. I bought the 20GB one, but I am sure the 10GB one will work just as well, I just wanted the extra room.
On: 2002-12-02
This is my first portable mp3 player and I think I made a good choice-got it and had no problems getting things started,it was pretty straight forward.
I could not give it the fifth star cause I dont know if its me or a drawback in the player-but somehow I am not satisfied with the tracks sorting.
I use kazaa for my downloading and I can sort by title of track,artistes (genre etc etc)..Ofcourse this can be done with the Lyra but somehow when im not getting it like that (how its done in Kazaa)I have to see if i can sort that out.
And also after transferring all my mp3 files to a new folder I created in the Lyra hard drive-I renamed alot of the tracks-however,when im scrolling through the lyra-its the same as before (no name change)
Hopefully its a defect on my part-but if I somehow fiddle till I get what I want out of this player-it would definitely deserve 5 stars.
On: 2002-11-25
You will have trouble with windows xp. Call 580-634-0115 they will guide you thru.
On: 2002-11-19
I previously had bad experiences with other hard drive jukeboxes, but this one worked right out of the box with no problems whatsoever. I already use Musicmatch for my MP3s so that was a plus, but you dont even need the program to copy your music to the Lyra. It appears on your computer as an external hard drive so you can simply drag and drop folders of music onto it, then it organizes them for you into album, artist, genre, etc. The four "soft buttons" as RCA calls them allows you to organize the music in many different ways; its a little complicated, but if you like listening to entire albums the way they were meant to be listened to, then you dont need to do much. Just push a couple of buttons and youre ready to go. All in all, a great product.
by: Anonymous On: 2002-11-07
What can I say, the thing just works. I pulled it out of the box and I was syncing my entire music collection -- which is substantial -- in minutes. The product supports FireWire, but I still use USB and am glad that RCA chose to let you do it that way too. You get a nice set of accessories with this so you can play it in your car -- a big bonus. And it supports WMA. I also appreciate the fact that it is compatible with Musicmatch. The price is all right too. This thing rocks!
On: 2002-11-06
The product sounds better than either i-pod or creative nomad mp3 players. It really worths the price you pay.
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