Live from CeBIT: Hands-on with the iRiver v10

Well looky what we stumbled upon at the iRiver booth today: their new v10 media player, which features a T-DMB receiver, a 3-inch 480 x 272 display, USB 2.0, either 4 or 6GB NAND flash, integrated stereo speakers and support for MP3, WMA, OGG, H.264, WMV9, and DivX. Unfortunately it's only a non-working prototype at the moment, but you can expect to see these hit the streets this summer in Asia and then launched at IFA in Berlin this September for the rest of world, likely sans DMB and that big telescoping antenna. Hands ons with the, uh, mockup after the break.

[mcd @ Mar 10th 2006 9:26AM]

That is a very, very nice piece of kit. But only 6 gig max? Come on iRiver, this thing should at LEAST be 20gig!!

it beats the hell out of an ipod video and origami imo.

[William @ Mar 10th 2006 9:29AM]

First comment!

[gnome @ Mar 10th 2006 9:30AM]

The 1980's called... They want their antenna back.

[duhwhat @ Mar 10th 2006 9:39AM]

gnome, i agree.

oh man that antenna is hot.

[Bovine @ Mar 10th 2006 9:52AM]

Guys, that antenna leads me to believe that they are holding off announcing one of the biggest features of this device: You can recieve Asian TV from anywhere in the world!

[dreampc @ Mar 10th 2006 10:08AM]

For anyone who receives digital or hd signals from local tv stations, knows.... you will need something much bigger than that antenna to get a decent signal...

Expect blue or gray (searching for signal) screens quite often with that.

[Ross @ Mar 10th 2006 10:16AM]

uh...did any of you actually read the post - it said likely without the antenna. Reading Comprehension 101 - lost on the general engadget crowd...

This looks pretty nice...now get to work on a new 60gb jukebox player that will kick the ipod's ass on design and features again...

[Rob @ Mar 10th 2006 11:22AM]

DMB stands for Digital Multimedia Broadcasting and is, as always, being widely tested in Europe before we on the bottom of the tech totem pole get to see it.

[cuby @ Mar 10th 2006 12:20PM]

i like the graffito-tagged mailbox in the demo image. that's pretty edgy, i really feel like iRiver is speaking my language...

[willy @ Mar 10th 2006 12:23PM]

What about the battery? Hopefully it's replaceable.

[Dignan17 @ Mar 10th 2006 12:49PM]

Too big for a flash-based player. I don't care if it's that thin if the screen isn't bigger and if the device is that freakin wide.

Sorry, iRiver continues to not impress me.

[Slartibartfast @ Mar 10th 2006 1:51PM]

Man, ditch that butt ugly telescoping antenna and I'd buy one. Wait... non-working prototype? September release? Forget that! I'll be the proud new owner of the elusive iPod house on April 1st!

Does anyone over there in Germanyland have any actual product in the stores for sale right this moment?

[The icollector @ Mar 10th 2006 2:10PM]

Man, these look really good. I wish they came with like a high capacity hard drive though.

[EdZ @ Mar 10th 2006 3:11PM]

I hope they kep the DMB functions for any potential European release (they've layed off a lot of staff at their European offices, so they may be pulling out. I hope not).

[RB @ Mar 10th 2006 3:31PM]

It looks pretty nice. It's actually that I would prefer to have instead of the iPod...

[Miles @ Mar 10th 2006 4:50PM]

Looks nice, but once again, a competitor to Apple is trying to do everything whereas Apple makes things simple. Do I need 1/2 of those features....no. Do I want to pay for them....no. Is it simple to use....I'm betting not.

[another commenter @ Mar 10th 2006 4:56PM]

My 2 year old PSP looks more modern than that.

[yorkie @ Mar 10th 2006 4:56PM]

Why can't I buy a device like this, that'll plug straight into my iPod? If my PC can read the iPod's HD, then surely an device like this could? I have a spare 20GB sitting here right now ..

[joeydank @ Mar 10th 2006 5:08PM]

cuby, you speak my language.

[Spiffy Skipjack @ Mar 10th 2006 5:19PM]

I'm having LCD panels installed on top of my retinas so I can watch TV WHILE watching anything else. It's superimposed over my existing vision... or underimposed, maybe, whatever - HDTV IN MY HEAD.

[J @ Mar 10th 2006 5:31PM]

I hope I can get AM reception on this thing. If it can pick up a police band scanner I will put down $1000 right now for one! Top that Iplod.

[prasoon @ Mar 10th 2006 5:34PM]

like many others i'd say - i dont need no competition to my fav apple - n wait - this doesnt stand competition - apple ipod is simple n awesome - nothing can ever get close to that experience n sound quality.. n u steal an "i" n place it close to the word "river" - aren't u trying to steal ipods glamour beginning by the stealth of naming conventon apple follows.. hell iriver is...

[Phineous @ Mar 10th 2006 5:58PM]

That antenna might work. I was using a paperclip inserted in the coax connector of the HDTVs at Best Buy to test their reception. It worked great unless someone walked through the signal.

[Xodex @ Mar 10th 2006 6:13PM]

Fuck that's sexy :)!

[tone @ Mar 10th 2006 6:15PM]

EWWWWWWWWW they should make that antena internal or something.

[G @ Mar 10th 2006 7:06PM]

#19- a little known fact is that Apple ipod does NOT have great sound quality. I won't argue the other features - for now. Dang, I agree with #6: iRiver, get back to making a great mp3 player again! Did they just decide to stop at H10?

[Dan Nicholls @ Mar 10th 2006 7:27PM]

this device looks like itstrying to copy apple in all hoensty. A single look at the shot of the back of the device will tell you taht. Look at the back of an ipod, and then at that shot of the back....the whoel structure of logo and info is taken straight from the ipod.
To me, this is an attempt to market an apple design before apple do.
EIther way..it's gunna fall flat.
Dan x

[mobeom @ Mar 10th 2006 7:38PM]

"n u steal an "i" n place it close to the word "river" - aren't u trying
to steal ipods glamour beginning by the stealth of naming
conventon apple follows.. hell iriver is... "

prasoon, you're an idiot!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRiver

"iriver (full name iriver Limited), daughter company to ReignCom, is a consumer electronics developer founded in 1999 and is

headquartered in Seoul, Korea."

And when did the ipod come out? Late 2001.

[someone @ Mar 10th 2006 8:06PM]

You dont have to worry about the antenna, from the looks of pics 5 and 2, it is stored like a stylus thing for a pda

[AutoDas @ Mar 10th 2006 8:07PM]

why arre people so dead focused on the antenna? It is hidden and I don't think this product will even ship with an antenna for the countries that do not support DMB.

[AutoDas @ Mar 10th 2006 8:11PM]

oh yay got to love those apple fanboys rofl dont know a thing

[jtnt @ Mar 10th 2006 10:11PM]

Too big.

[ArtR @ Mar 11th 2006 12:49AM]

Did you all notice that the ANTENNA SLIDES INTO THE DEVICE?

that way it's almost like it's not there!

i say it looks awesome and just as a portable TV it's great! but the size of the memory restricts it alot... lus iRiver really needs to make a new hadr drive based player....

[ArtR @ Mar 11th 2006 12:57AM]

26. "n u steal an "i" n place it close to the word "river" - aren't u trying
to steal ipods glamour beginning by the stealth of naming
conventon apple follows.. hell iriver is... "

prasoon, you're an idiot!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRiver

"iriver (full name iriver Limited), daughter company to ReignCom, is a consumer electronics developer founded in 1999 and is

headquartered in Seoul, Korea."

And when did the ipod come out? Late 2001.

UM it looks like ur the idiot here... lets see apple was founded in 1976,

the iMac has been around since 1998... so who was the first then.....

[Others @ Mar 11th 2006 2:04AM]

I doubt iRiver was trying to copy the iMac brand that no one knew about it...unless they are idiots like you. Seriously, who the hell even heard of iMac? Koreans? The idea that anyone would think that makes me laugh. I guess they call them fanboys for a reason...Back then, Apple couldn't make any money from anything except their huge amounts of savings from the bank. The money they got in the 80s. Get real, the Apple brand only got popular because of the iPod, and the iPod got popular because Apple was the only company smart enough to advertise on TV. No one gives a shit about the iMac, especially overseas.

[Mars @ Mar 11th 2006 4:15AM]

HAHAHA!!!

"Others" oh man you look like an idiot right now! You think that "we" overseas, don't give a shit about iMacs and Apple products?! ROFL! Who did Apple replace in western europe in the educational market last year, as the biggest supplier of computers? Dell? HP? Toshiba? Them ALL! And believe me, they are gaining more and more market-share over here.

[Vets @ Mar 11th 2006 4:19AM]

Others: you don't find it strange that a year after the iMac came out, iRiver got founded??! It's idiots like YOU that've used Windows your whole life and never heard about the iMac and Apple because you were too busy with viruses and installing security patches! Even you think nobody heard of the iMac when it first came out you are sorely misguided. It was the iMac not the iPod that started Apple's resurgence. The Apple brand was always popular to the people that followed it, and they are the ones that know it was the iMac that sparked this whole "i" naming scheme. The iMac did so well in the few years before the iPod came out that Apple decided to keep on using the naming scheme with their other products.

Please keep your blasphemous comments to yourself if you have no clue what you are talking about. Should we go about calling you a Windoze fanboy?! It seems to me like you are the one that has 'fanboy' characteristics. How old are you really?! Why don't you grow up a little, take a computer history course or something. Windows wouldn't be here today if it weren't for Apple! Why don't you spend some time on OSX before Vista comes out (who knows when that'll be) so you can see how much of Vista is ripped off from the Mac. Don't even get me started on this whole Origami B.S. Why did they even come up with a code name and everything for it?! It is just a stripped down version of XP on a mini-tablet PC, why not put something closer to Vista?(because Vista needs an insane amount of resources to run) When Apple came out with the Newton-what 10 years ago?-they developed a whole new OS to run seamlessly on it, and it was Windows and Mac friendly!

[Vets @ Mar 11th 2006 4:31AM]

Oh.....one more thing! Do you think Apple is the only computer company to advertise on TV?! Wow you really are a moron. Apple is known to rarely advertise their computers, sure they advertise the iPod though-but why not?! It's absolutely fantastic. I'm sure if another company came out with a product that was as good as the iPod they would be advertising just as much!

"No one gives a shit about the iMac, especially overseas."

Just because you said that, I know you've never even come close to being 'overseas". If you've never been there and you don't know a single person from there.....why make yourself look like an ignoramus! Anyways I hope you feel good about your asinine ways! (if you even know what that is child)

[LSF @ Mar 11th 2006 6:20AM]

Vets: Calm down! Seriously, the whole OMGZ APPLE INVENTED THE DESKTOP BEFORE MICROSHAFT is childish and getting old really quickly.

I'm sure that because you use a Mac and don't have to install security updates you are super-inteligent. Use that new founded inteligence to invent a machine that can surgically remove your head from your ass.

[Faye @ Mar 11th 2006 7:08AM]

Vets: Chill.

I use an imac (G5) now and used PC before, both are good in their own way. I love this iriver, I wanted to get the U10 but it doesn't support mac. anyway, hope this one does! If that antenna will help with some sort of wireless TV, then i don't mind it there; also will give me THE 80's look. Yeah!

[Gabe @ Mar 11th 2006 8:56AM]

Vets, You need to take some paxil, so you can calm down a little.
I know several people that live in Korea, in Seoul actually, and none of them use any apple products, and didn't hear about your precious iMac. Infact they have never seen an apple store, or any mac computer being sold anywhere in korea. One other thing both Windows XP and OS X suck, and no one was every trying to make Windows seem better. Just because someone doesn't like Macs doesn't mean that they are a "windoze" fanboy. infact you are the only fanboy here. Did anyone say anything about winodws being better than macs no. But what is a whole lot better that OS X is Linux, its free, all the programs are free, but to use Linux you have to have some amount of computer knowlege, and it looks like you don't, so if I were you then I would go near it.

[microdot @ Mar 11th 2006 10:26AM]

ipod: 102985479923
iriver: 0

[jerome @ Mar 11th 2006 1:46PM]

erm....iRiver was in fact just "River" for the first couple of years of it's life. The i came directly from the Apple "iEverything" boom. And that was told to me by iRiver's UK PR manager.

[Bob Rutherford @ Mar 11th 2006 2:46PM]

God. Who cares? Next article, please...!!

[Metric @ Mar 11th 2006 2:50PM]

Yeah, another set of comments that have degenerated into an "Apple is great and Windows is crap No, Apple is crap - Windows is great" argument. Move on, for f***s sake!!

[c.Lake @ Mar 11th 2006 3:07PM]

@jtnt

Too Big????? Are you kidding? It's thin as fuck. How small do you want it to be... small enough that you can't hold it.

[James @ Mar 11th 2006 3:33PM]

stfu Vets you stupid pussyhurt apple bitch. it's idiots like you who give mac users a bad name. you know why people always make fun of you? because you're so easy to piss off. any comment against your precious apple gets you all pussyhurt. who gives a fuck. it's just some company. brand loyalty is the gayest fuckin thing. especially when it comes to apple. and just because you don't like apple shitty OSs means you use windows. i love when you idiots automatically call people stupid windows users when you get pussyhurt.

[o rly @ Mar 11th 2006 4:09PM]

These comments are what happens when the main site (engadget) is Apple/iPod biased and let users continually post their biased opinions which favour their bias, and that's because they're (engadget) are biased themselves so it's been excused.

[Others @ Mar 11th 2006 5:08PM]

Vets, I don't think you should be questioning my age when you have problems reading and understanding. I was clearly talking about Apple being the company smart enough to advertise the iPod on TV, the iPod being a DAP, and not a PC. So please, keep your stupidity to a minimum. I also didn't say anything about Microsoft, but I guess since I dont like Apple, I must love Microsoft. I'm actually a fan of the Commodore 64. To be fair, I didn't say I don't like Apple, I'm making the point that the iMac was never popular. It wasn't popular despite how loud you yell, because you can tell by how much money Apple made back then, and where the revenue came from. So quit hiding yourself in the closet and admit that you're an Apple fanboy and understand that everything you say is biased, and the average consumer don't really care about it.

[Bob Rutherford @ Mar 11th 2006 5:38PM]

To the engadget owners...

It's threads like this one that have made me look elsewhere for my daily gadget news diet. No matter what the original topic, it always ends up "Apple sucks, Windows sucks more, blah blah blah" - and then people start writing vicious comments down and it just escalates more.

I suggest you sort this site out, otherwise lots of people are going to start leaving it alone. It's rapidly becoming a geek bitchfest. And that's the worst type of bitchfest!!