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Свершилось, формат OGG теперь доступен для iriver IFP-300T/500T

The Ogg Vorbis firmware for iFP-300T/500T series now available!
iRiver has been trying to satisfy the customers by improving their products without changing the hardware component. Therefore even the customers who bought the iRiver products few months or even years ago can benefit the newest technologies without paying a single penny.
Although the new firmware is far from being perfect, iRiver appreciates the interests and supports that each customer provides.
The OGG Vorbis firmware is available for iFP-300/500 series as of today, December 24, 2003. The introduced firmware is the Manager version and the UMS and iMP series firmware will be available in January 2004.
The iFP-300T/500T series does not support 500Kbps bit rate Ogg files. The supported bit rate range is 96Kbps ~ 360Kbps. To reduce inconveniences, iRiver would like to supply the bit rate converting program.
The CDgOGG converting program will be included in the next update of Manager program that will be available approximately in January 2004.
If any bugs or errors are found, please feel free to contact to webmaster@iriver.com. The bugs and errors will be fixed when the formal version is introduced. iRiver appreciates the interests and supports that each individual customers are providing to improve our product.
Happy Christmas!
What is open beta version?
When a new software or hardware is developed, the product goes through several steps to fix errors and bugs. The first step is Close beta testing. The people are usually selected among the workers of the producing company and few other individual. After trying the product for a specified time period, the reported bugs and errors are fixed. Then the company goes through an open beta testing. There are usually no critical errors or bugs that will ruin the products. However there are still few errors that have not been found by the close beta testers that the company wishes to fix before launching the formal version. After the open beta testing, the product is formally launches or goes through serious modifications if necessary.
iRiver apologies to the iFP-100 series users. Supporting the Ogg file format is extremely difficult due to its hardware. The difficulties have occurred because the Ogg codec is designed in a different way from MP3 & WMA codec. The current Ogg codec requires a SDRAM to decompress the Ogg audio format files and unfortunately the iFP-100 series do not have SDRAM. Therefore, supporting Ogg audio format codec for iFP-100 will be very hard.
The iFP-300T series users are required to make a selection between Ogg/MP3 firmware and MP3/WMA/ASF firmware. The 8MB Nor flash memory is not enough to stably support all the audio formats.
The iFP-500T series is capable of supporting all types of audio formats simultaneously because of 16MB Nor flash memory.

Ogg Vorbis firmware for iFP-300T/500T series now available!