irock! 730i Digital Audio Player

Reviews: Multimedia

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Kurtis Kronk
Brian
FID
Jan. 1, 2004

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Using the 730i

Note: Install included software before you continue! The first thing to do is install the AAA battery. Unfortunately, since it is a AAA battery, it only lasts 8 hours. The plus side is that the device is small and light, but I would rather have 30 hours like the CW300 (which was also very light and compact with one AA battery).

I would like to quickly point out that FID didn't do a very good job writing their User's Manual for the 730i. Instead of writing an extensive booklet full of information, they decided to print all the information on a small card. While it is helpful if you read the whole card, I would rather see it in booklet form with more in depth information.

To turn on the 730i, hold in the play button for a second, you will see the ir0ck logo, and then player information, and then you will be taken to the playlist. Next, plug the player into your computer via the included USB cable. Once the player is plugged in, open up your ir0ck! Transfer Manager.

The transfer manager software is extremely intuitive. If you are familiar with Windows, you should have no problem figuring out how to use it. Basically to transfer files, you browse through your local files on the left, selecting the ones you want and dragging them to the right side to transfer them to the player. Unfortunately, the 730i uses a USB 1.1 interface, so you may have to sit and wait for a bit while your songs transfer. It will take around 10 seconds per song.

I've downloaded a couple of MP3i files from myirock.com and have chosen some normal MP3s for testing the player. For now I will just talk about how to use the player, I'll talk about the sound quality later on in the Quality Check section!

While viewing the playlist, and not playing any songs, you may hold down the Interactive button to access all of the configurable player settings:

This player has a large LCD, and to some extent, it may be configured to your liking. You have two display options, backlight and contrast. The backlight option lets you choose to make the blue backlight either always off, always on, or on for up to 4 minutes.

The 730i also has limited playback options. They are as follows: EQ- Choose between several equalizer presets (Pop, Rock, Flat, Classic, & Hip Hop). Unfortunately these settings can not be accessed while playing a song, which is quite inconvenient.
MP3i- Choose what mode to make the default when playing MP3is (Text, Image, or Lyrics)
Repeat- Switch between different repeat modes (Normal, One, All, Random)
Mic Mixing- Mic mixing plays both the selected song, and microphone input at the same time. I'm not sure what application this would be useful for, but it is there nonetheless. Mic mixing will not record over your song, it is only real-time playback. You can turn Mic mixing on or off.

The problem with the playback options is mainly that the equalizer isn't customizable. Having presets is not necessarily bad, but for ~$140.00 I expect to be able to customize the equalizer exactly to my liking. Another thing about the equalizer that greatly disappointed me was that it could only be accessed while viewing the playlist. This means that you can not change EQ settings in the middle of a song that doesn't sound right, you must stop the song, go to the playlist, and then go to the menu to access the equalizer. This can be tedious if you like to listen to a lot of different music genres.

There are also a few miscellaneous options to be had: Help- Selecting this option displays "Visit FID @ www.myirock.com"
Advanced Option- Lets you do several things with memory (Check Memory, Format Memory, Wipe Memory). As a sub-option of each of those, you may choose between either Internal Memory or External Memory (if you have additional memory).
Exit- Selecting this option will return you to the playlist, just like pushing the Interactive button from inside the menu.

From the playlist, you may hit the Mode or Interactive buttons with a song/Memo selected. The Mode button will toggle between Memos and songs. Memos are sound files which you record. Luckily, there is an onboard microphone on the player (near Stop button), so you won't need a microphone to hook up to record memos. However, the microphone isn't very sensitive, so you will really only be able to record memos for yourself (it is called Memo mode!).The Interactive button will bring up an option to delete selected songs or memos.

To record a memo, simply go into Memo mode (use the Mode button as stated above). Then push the record button, and record a memo. To stop a recording, simply push the stop button. The player will show you how long you have left to record memos with the available memory. You can record as many memos as you would like with the only limiting factor being memory.

When playing MP3is, the Mode button will switch between different modes of the MP3i (band name & type of music, pictures in rotation, and lyrics). Pushing the interactive button will switch between different pictures when in picture rotation mode. I personally thought the only cool thing about the MP3is were the lyrics. I think it is cool to be able to see what the lyrics are for a hard to understand song. However, being that you would have to make the MP3i yourself (or choose from limited ones on FID's site), I don't really think that highly of the MP3i feature. With that said, I believe that FID has unintentionally created a sort of gimmick product which heavily relies on the popularity of MP3is. Unfortunately, MP3is aren't as popular as they had probably hoped they would be.

When playing normal MP3s, the Mode and Interactive buttons have no use.

On the left side of the player, you will find the A->B button which lets you choose an area of a song to loop repeatedly. A is the starting point, and B is the ending point. Simply play a song and then push the button once when you want to start the loop, and then again where you want it to end the loop. The loop will then continuously play back until you interrupt it. This could be useful for figuring out lyrics to a song, or perhaps to listen to a particular section of a voice recording over and over to clarify certain segments.

To adjust the volume there are two buttons on the right side (+ and -). Upon clicking, a small box will appear on the screen showing the current volume level. Under the volume buttons there is the Hold switch. With the Hold switch in the ON position, nothing will happen when any of the buttons are pressed. This is especially useful when the player is in your pocket or backpack and you don't want to push buttons and waste batteries on accident. When the switch is in the OFF position, you can use all of the features of the player as normal.

The main buttons on the player (Stop, Play/Pause, Up, Down) are pretty self-explanatory. The Up and Down buttons are used to scroll through menus and playlists, or to seek through a song (hold down the button). The stop button will make the player explode in five seconds, so be careful with that button (only kidding of course! it explodes in three seconds). The Play/Pause button is a mystery, and we haven't yet been able to figure out its true purpose.

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Page 1: Introduction
Page 2: First Impressions, Closer Look & LCD Display
Page 3: Using the 730i
Page 4: Quality Check & Conclusion

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