Buy RCA RD2211 Lyra 2 64 MB Digital Audio Player (MP3/WMA)RCA RD2211 Lyra 2 64 MB Digital Audio Player (MP3/WMA) Product Description:
- Plays MP3, Windows Media Audio, and RealAudio G2 audio formats
- Skip-free playback
- USB connection for fast transfer to and from PC and Mac
- Supports Type I and Type II CompactFlash
- Includes 64 MB CompactFlash card
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
31 of 32 people found the following review helpful.
Good player for the price, but has its problems
By Eric C
I'm a bit of an MP3 old timer, having been around the block with a Rio 500 and a Nomad Jukebox, two of the most popular MP3 players out there. I decided to sell my Rio because it used SmartMedia while my digital camera uses CompactFlash and I wanted to consolodate to one memory card format. I perfer CF for a number of reasons, but I'll save that for another review. I'll use the Rio 500 as the basis for comparison, because it is very similar to the Lyra in many ways.
The Lyra comes with a great accessories kit, including a car adapter and an external USB CompactFlash reader. These components alone are worth around $50. The headphones aren't great, but they do include a removable inline remote control and are much better than the earbud type headphones that come with the Rio. The FM tuner is a great feature if you like to listen to the news occasionally (as I do). The Lyra is playback only, which is to be expected, but it would have been nice if you could record a voice memo or from FM broadcasts.
What is a little unusual about the Lyra is that it has no internal memory -- everything is stored on the CompactFlash card. In theory, this should make downloading music to the Lyra easier, because you don't have connect the player itself to your PC, you just place the CF card in it's USB reader. If you have multiple CF cards, you can store different playlists on each and easily switch between them, unlike players with internal memory. Unfortunately, because of SDMI (digital rights management) restrictions built-in to the Lyra, you can't just drag and drop music from your hard drive to the CF card for playback.
This is where it gets a little weird. The Lyra doesn't actually play MP3s at all -- you have to run your MP3s through a converter (a driver for MusicMatch, RealPlayer or Windows Media Player), which outputs them to 128 bit "mpx" files, which only your Lyra can read. This cumbersome routine is to prevent you from sharing your MP3s with others. Now you know why people hate SDMI. I believe you can dump WMA files directly to the Lyra, but who besides Bill Gates uses the WMA format? The Rio 500 had none of this SMDI nonesense.
But then it gets a little weirder still. The software to actually play the "mpx" files on the Lyra is also stored on the CF card, instead of in ROM! This is kind of cool in that it makes updates to the software very easy and allows the possibility that someone will be able to hack it to play regular MP3 files. The downside is that it takes a few seconds for the player to "boot up" every time.
The Lyra weighs substatially more than the Rio 500 because it requires two AA batteries instead of one. Oddly, the additional battery doesn't seem to increase play time much over the Rio, however. A few ounces may not seem like much, but it makes a big difference when you're jogging with it clipped to your shorts.
The Lyra is a good player for the money, particularly if you need a CompactFlash compatible unit, but the SMDI "feature" really degrades convenience and usability. Be forewarned that most players are SMDI compliant these days and will have similar problems (the Rio 500 being the notable exception). In other words, if CompactFlash vs SmartMedia memory isn't a concern and you don't need an FM radio, get a Rio 500 before they discontinue them!
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful.
RCA Knows Audio...
By A Customer
I Got this one at Radio Shack, for $..., it was listed at $.... ... deal, and yes I am talking about the 64 meg. The one bad review I have seen of this device on this website seems to be coming from some nitpicker, who can not discern between, the red and green light at the intersection, I find people often have strong opinions on topics they "know" little about. The deal with his gripe, let me say that 128k BRS is not just fine it is excellent for good quality audio, if one needs it any better they would stick with WAV's now wouldn't they? Part of the reason for having a Mp3 player is the understanding that you will be giving up the precious bit of sound quality "barely discernable quality" in return for no skipping, no more wasted CDR's, and all the other advantages that solid state music provides. The Software they provide does seem to be the only encoder that will allow a Mp3 to be put on the card, if you try and place it directly on the card it will play the digital sub harmonics as best it can, but it's like calling a fax, and expecting that to be a voice. It has a bright backlight screen, simple interface, Duracell, batt., street style Ephones, cord mounted volume and track selector with a shirt clip, oh yesss even a car adapter. I wanted a Lyra when they first came out, but at the time I was too poor, so I settled for a RCA cd player. It served me well but 20 burned cd's and two pairs of Hphones later, it was time for a change, this is it. If you jog, workout whatever, don't screw with cd players and all their false promise's of anti skip B.S. fact is mechanical action (that is to say motor spinning a optical disk) will fail under the most mediocre conditions. This will not.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful.
One of the best
By L. Goreham
.... It is relatively small and it has a wonderful backlit display. It also has great hacking abilities because all of its information is on the compact flash card (no memory is built in) you can customize the startup screen (to whatever you can imagine or draw)
The fm radio is great it has good reception and 15 station presets. Now ask for the software it came with, it was good too, but the headphones werent all that. It can compress songs on your computer from whatever the bitrate to 128,96,64,and 32. Unfortunately it cannot go over 128, which doesnt matter because a 320k song would take up alot of space plus the audio quality isnt much different.
When it came to trasfering songs to the card it was fast, assuming all of the songs were at 128, if they werent then it would have to compress them (which longer) but who cares, you dont have to trasfer songs that often. I fit about 30 songs on the card at 96k and the quality is great! dont think so ? then the lyra has a built in graphic equalizer so you can adjust each music channel so it sounds like it playing at 320k. So it poses no problem.
Although it takes 2 batteries it is relatively light and it can fit in you jean 5th pocket (the small one on the right). The remote is good and you can adjust the songs by touch alone, it also has a plethora of play options, repeat, repeat 1, shuffle, shuffle repeat, and like 3 others it has a program option too.
This is a great mp3 player it it better than the rios because to expand them you must buy thier "backpacks" and a 32mb backpack goes for like 50something whereas a 64mb compact flash goes for the same price.
The headphones are a tad thin but who gives great headphones away anyways, I would like it better if they were a little thicker on the padding for my ears but I'll buy a new pair anyways.
This is a great player, it converts the mp3 files to mpx but it has extrodinary abilities to expand considering all of the system data is stored on the card so it is also easy to upgrade. ...
p.s.- many of you are worried on how loud it plays, turn the graphic equalizer to "custom" and it will pound your ears away!
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