RIP Rio

[nrc]

Rio Audio, the company that created the first mass market portable MP3 player, has been shut down by it's latest parent company DNNA Holdings.

http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000483056128/

It's a sad day for folks who look for features over fashion. :(

[dando]

Rio Audio, the company that created the first mass market portable MP3 player, has been shut down by it's latest parent company DNNA Holdings.

http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000483056128/

It's a sad day for folks who look for features over fashion. :(
Bugger. ReplayTV can't be far behind then. Sonic Blue was a company ahead of it's time, and saddled with poor management. :(

-Kevin

[oddlycalm]

While the management at SONICblue may not have been stellar, it was the lawsuits by the recording, motion picture and broadcast industry groups that drove Rio and Replay out of the US. Their actions were particularly short sighted as MP3 players and PVR's have become ubiquitous rather than going away. Rio's primary sin seems to be that it was a US company and it was eary to market.

Rio was part of our local community. Our son did models for each of their designs and one-off cases for pre-production prototypes and I know folks that worked in the various facilities here responsible for the Rio and Replay products. I was hopeful that D&M Holdings (Denon, Marantz) would make a go of Rio, but the iPod has sucked all the air out of the high end market.

oc

[RaceGrrl]

The Ipod is just fugly. I really like my Rio Forge, just wish it had more memory.

[dando]

While the management at SONICblue may not have been stellar, it was the lawsuits by the recording, motion picture and broadcast industry groups that drove Rio and Replay out of the US. Their actions were particularly short sighted as MP3 players and PVR's have become ubiquitous rather than going away. Rio's primary sin seems to be that it was a US company and it was eary to market.

Rio was part of our local community. Our son did models for each of their designs and one-off cases for pre-production prototypes and I know folks that worked in the various facilities here responsible for the Rio and Replay products. I was hopeful that D&M Holdings (Denon, Marantz) would make a go of Rio, but the iPod has sucked all the air out of the high end market.

oc
IIRC, in addition to the lawsuits, there were some accounting probs that caused the founder and CEO to step down long before SB went on the auction block. ReplayTV's features were vastly superior to TiVo other than the UI. The also made the shift from mfging hardware to licensing technology much earlier than TiVo. TiVo stayed afloat through partnership deals with companies like AOL and Hughes that Replay couldn't match. I still have two Replay boxes I purchased circa '99/'00.

-Kevin

[racer2c]

Wasn't one of the law suits about the name itself? It was originaly called the Diamond Rio which was a country band who sued and won. Thus just the Rio name. I couldn't find anything on google aboutit, but I swear I remember this. I used to buy Diamond Voodoo 3D cards back before nVidia.

[oddlycalm]

IIRC, in addition to the lawsuits, there were some accounting probs that caused the founder and CEO to step down long before SB went on the auction block.There was a securities class action filed after SonicBlue's stock tanked and that did cause the CEO got tossed over the side as I recall. The case was actually a landmark securties case due to the Supreme Court ruling. Diamond Multimedia and the Uniform Standards Act (http://library.findlaw.com/1998/Aug/1/127987.html)


Wasn't one of the law suits about the name itself? It was originaly called the Diamond Rio which was a country band who sued and won. Thus just the Rio name. I couldn't find anything on google aboutit, but I swear I remember this. I used to buy Diamond Voodoo 3D cards back before nVidia. Not sure about the law suit, but one compelling reason for no more Diamond Rio was that Diamond Mulitmedia was no more after being sold to S3 in 1999. S3 then changed their name to SonicBlue and sold off the graphic chip business to chipset giant VIA in Taiwan.

Now if you talkin' about the Diamond Reo trucks made until 1994 in Lansing, MI... :gomer:
http://www.hankstruckpictures.com/pix/trucks/dasch/jd_1988_diamond_reo.jpg

[oddlycalm]

Bugger. ReplayTV can't be far behind then. Hard to say what will become of the standalone ReplayTV boxes in the future, but the technology will no doubt live on. From what I can see regarding trends, both Tivo and Replay are probably nearing their end as standalone products. Integration into satellite and cable boxes as well as integration into other home theater components seems like what the future holds.

The real question for me isn't whether D&M will offer a Replay 5500 succesor, but whether anyone will offer a HiDef DVR that has enough storage to be interesting. If a company released a HD DVR today with 100+ hours of storage and a built in DVD recorder I'd have to take a very serious look, but I'd really rather that it be able to handle MP3's as well as other media. I'm tired of having to own a front end for every media format, and it's totally uncesseray with today's hardware if someone would just do it.

So far all I can find is the Hitachi DV-DH1000W terabyte hi-def DVR with DVD burner, but it only stores 68hrs of hi def video and is only being sold in Japan... :( Since one terabyte only yields 68hrs of high def video, it's gonna take a 1.6 terabyte array to make me smile. Won't be cheap but then neither is anything else.

oc

[dando]

Hard to say what will become of the standalone ReplayTV boxes in the future, but the technology will no doubt live on. From what I can see regarding trends, both Tivo and Replay are probably nearing their end as standalone products. Integration into satellite and cable boxes as well as integration into other home theater components seems like what the future holds.

The real question for me isn't whether D&M will offer a Replay 5500 succesor, but whether anyone will offer a HiDef DVR that has enough storage to be interesting. If a company released a HD DVR today with 100+ hours of storage and a built in DVD recorder I'd have to take a very serious look, but I'd really rather that it be able to handle MP3's as well as other media. I'm tired of having to own a front end for every media format, and it's totally uncesseray with today's hardware if someone would just do it.

So far all I can find is the Hitachi DV-DH1000W terabyte hi-def DVR with DVD burner, but it only stores 68hrs of hi def video and is only being sold in Japan... :( Since one terabyte only yields 68hrs of high def video, it's gonna take a 1.6 terabyte array to make me smile. Won't be cheap but then neither is anything else.

oc

Precisely why I haven't replaced my Replay boxes, only the drives have been replaced. :) HP's Media Hub (linux based, not XP MC) is due out this fall, which looked promising when it was announced @ CES back in Jan. We'll see what it turns out to be.

-Kevin

[Dr. Corkski]

Serves them right for dropping CART. :gomer:

[oddlycalm]

Precisely why I haven't replaced my Replay boxes, only the drives have been replaced. :) HP's Media Hub (linux based, not XP MC) is due out this fall, which looked promising when it was announced @ CES back in Jan. We'll see what it turns out to be. Should be interesting to see what products actually make it to the market in the next year. If nothing pans out by the time I get around to migrating to HDTV next year it looks like I'll be building a media server witha 4x400GB drive array and using Zap2it to handle programming. I'd prefer someone sell me a dedicated box but I'm not holding my breath. I realize the market for what would almost certainly be a $2000+ dedicated box is going to be quite small.

oc