Battery just quite on my carbon

Have your battery load tested with a carbon pile tester to see if it holds it's load replace if necessary

1. look on ebay for battery if anybody would sell one.
2. go to walmart look in the flash drive isle for a sandisk ultra 2 cf card 8gb about 40$ .
3. open the rio and take out the old hard drive and then find a pc to format the cf card with a cf card reader make sure to format with windows 7 in my computer and choose quick format select default allocation size and then hit start.
4. when succesfully formatted put cf drive in rio carbon.
5. then put back plate back on carbon.
6. then look here for rio carbon developers firmware
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rio_Carbon
7. go to bottom of wikipedia page and click 3.04 Download link 1 and download the exe program and then run as administrater load up the firmware and then walla you have a working mp3 player again.

You cannot restore the player without a computer but by formatting your drive and re-loading the Rio Carbon Firmware, you can reset it to factory settings.
The Developers cut firmware (latest (unofficial) firmware) is still available here:
http://biomoose.com/files/rio/carbon%203.04.EXE

hi try here

http://www.digitalnetworksna.com/support/rio/product.asp?prodID=215

- Rio Software 2.96 - Rio Music Manager, and Rio Internet Updater (7/26/2005)
- Rio Carbon Firmware Update v1.43 (PC) (1/12/2005)
- Rio Carbon Firmware Update v1.43 (Mac OS X) (1/12/2005)
- Rio Carbon Firmware Update v1.32 (PC) (11/5/2004)

If you look in the hints and tips section for the Rio carbon then it is there... That link works so I am not sure which link you are referring to.

Hope this helps,

Mowcius

The battery is not normally something that wears out on a Rio Carbon but if it used and charged wrong then it can either be conditioned to a shorter time or wrecked. Because it goes flat when turned off but keeps charge when on makes me slightly confused but anyway... I would advise charging it up fully and then flatten it fully - just leave it playing while you're out or something. Do this a few times and this may solve your problem. This will put maximum charge into your battery and it might solve your problem. If not then try taking the back off and look for a short circuit or obvious hardware fault.

Hope this helps,

Mowcius

You must use the native software - still available on rio's website. No other transfer method will work with this player.

fz,

Battery
I have had my Rio since they first came out and have had no problems. It gets daily use and has seen many drops and lots of travel. I got 23 hours when new, now more like 15+.

I have not found a replacement battery yet but will post when I do.I found the company but not a distribution source.

Hard Drive Upgrade

If you are going to replace your hard drive because of the issues you mentioned, you might be interested in what I just did:

I just (today) upgraded my drive because the 5GB was not enough. I love the Rio simple interface and wanted more space so I took a chance and bought an 8GB Seagate drive. I just finished installing it and it works great.

Upgrade procedure:

0. Buy the drive

I Used Seagate ST1.2 Model: ST68022CF

I got the certified repaired drive for about $35 at digitalet.com. I figure if it dies, I have music backed up anyway and it was cheap.I didn't want to spend much on a test. I will now look for larger capacity drives to see if they work as well since I like the Rio form factor so much.

I purchased the drive here:
http://www.digitalet.com
Digitalet Item #42399184
8GB Seagate ST1 Compact Flash CompactFlash CF II Card
Price: $33.95
Inventory SKU: DMC-ST68022CF-R

1. Offload music

... from existing 5GB Drive. I simply used Windows Explorer and dragged the entire Music directory on the Rio to my laptop HDD. This preserved the music in folders which I like.

2. Open the case

I found instructions somewhere on web but cannot remember where. At the end of the day, it is an exercise in patience and feel. There are 4 clips that hold the back cover to the unit. Use 2 small flat ***** drivers or a thin metal blade.


3. Remove existing drive

Remove the drive from leaving the cable that goes from the board to the drive attached tothe board (you can remove it but I wouldn't). The end of the cable has traditional pins that mate to a CF card so be careful not to damage them as you remove the cable.

4. Install new drive

Being careful not to damage the pins.




5. Turn on the power and Flash the firmware

You will see the message UPGRADER on the display .Go to the Rio support site and download the firmware. Follow the instruction on the site to upgrade the firmware. http://www.digitalnetworksna.com/support/rio/

6. Reload Music
Once upgraded, the drive is formatted by the Rio and you are ready to reload your music files. There is about 7.6GB free space after the upgrade. I used the Rio Music Manager to reload the music onto my player.

-end-

http://forums-riovolution.com/index.php?showtopic=12674

I killed my Rio by transferring files on low batt. Once it dies, it cannot be recovered - trust me, I tried every method possible. I even physically took it apart. Once these ones die, there is no coming back - Rio no longer makes.supports mp3 players.