Creative RHOMBA User Manual

User’s Guide

Creative Rhomba

Information in this document is subject to change without notice and does not represent a commitment on the part of Creative Technology Ltd. No part of this manual may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, for any purpose without the written permission of Creative Technology Ltd. The software described in this document is furnished under a license agreement and may be used or copied only in accordance with the terms of the license agreement. It is against the law to copy the software on any other medium except as specifically allowed in the license agreement. The licensee may make one copy of the software for backup purposes.

The Software License Agreement is found in a separate folder on the installation CD.

Versi on 1.0

August 2003

MediaSource, EAX and the Creative logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Technology Ltd. in the United States and/or other countries.

NOMAD is a registered trademark of Aonix and is used by Creative Technology Ltd. and/or its affiliates under license.

Intel and Pentium are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

MP3.com and the MP3.com logo are trademarks of MP3.com, Inc.

All other products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Contents

Safety and Other Instructions

Caring For Your Player.............................................................................................................................. i

Technical support .............................................................................................................................. i

Introduction

Before You Begin......................................................................................................................................... i

Package Contents .............................................................................................................................. i

Software Included .............................................................................................................................. i

Creative Media Detector ............................................................................................................... ii

Creative MediaSource..................................................................................................................... ii

Creative MediaSource Player .............................................................................................. ii

Creative MediaSource Organiser ...................................................................................... ii

Minimum System Requirements .......................................................................................................... iii

Document Conventions.......................................................................................................................... iv

Web Information ....................................................................................................................................... v

Online Registration .................................................................................................................................... v

1 A Tour of Your Player

Your Player at a Glance ........................................................................................................................ 1-1

Using the Menu Scroller ....................................................................................................................... 1-4

Scroll Select..................................................................................................................................... 1-4

2 Getting Started

Installing Software................................................................................................................................... 2-1

Charging the Player ................................................................................................................................ 2-2

Power Level Indicators ......................................................................................................................... 2-3

3 Transferring Tracks or Files

Downloading from the Internet......................................................................................................... 3-2

Creative MediaSource........................................................................................................................... 3-3

Transferring Tracks or Files ...................................................................................................... 3-3

Editing audio track information ................................................................................................ 3-4

Ripping Audio CD Tracks.......................................................................................................... 3-5

4 Using Your Player

Turning On/Off your Player................................................................................................................ 4-1

Adjusting the Volume ............................................................................................................................ 4-2

Playing Audio............................................................................................................................................ 4-2

Playing music or recordings....................................................................................................... 4-3

Repeating a section....................................................................................................................... 4-4

Playing FM Radio ..................................................................................................................................... 4-4

Changing FM frequency............................................................................................................... 4-4

Storing your FM channel............................................................................................................. 4-5

FM Radio recording...................................................................................................................... 4-5

Voice Recording...................................................................................................................................... 4-5

Making a voice recording............................................................................................................ 4-6

Changing Player Settings....................................................................................................................... 4-6

Selecting equaliser setting......................................................................................................... 4-10

Repeating music........................................................................................................................... 4-10

Editing play list.............................................................................................................................. 4-10

Deleting tracks............................................................................................................................. 4-11

Changing the LCD setting........................................................................................................ 4-12

Turning on backlight................................................................................................................... 4-12

Changing the Visualiser setting ............................................................................................... 4-13

Changing FM region ................................................................................................................... 4-13

Enabling the audio track marker ............................................................................................ 4-13

Changing microphone sensitivity ........................................................................................... 4-14

Locking and unlocking your player.................................................................................................. 4-14

Formatting the Player .......................................................................................................................... 4-15

A Technical Specifications

Size.......................................................................................................................................... A-1

Weight................................................................................................................................... A-1

Capacity................................................................................................................................. A-1

Recording time.................................................................................................................... A-1

Battery type ......................................................................................................................... A-1

Battery playback time ....................................................................................................... A-1

Interface ................................................................................................................................ A-1

Playback Formats ............................................................................................................... A-1

Voice Recording Format.................................................................................................. A-1

Signal to Noise Ratio......................................................................................................... A-2

FM Frequency Range......................................................................................................... A-2

THD....................................................................................................................................... A-2

Earphone Output............................................................................................................... A-2

LCD backlight...................................................................................................................... A-2

B Frequently Asked Questions and Troubleshooting

AutoPlay..................................................................................................................................................... B-1

General ...................................................................................................................................................... B-2

Usage .......................................................................................................................................................... B-3

Safety and Other Instructions

Caring For Your Player

Creative will not be responsible for any loss of data due to an reasons whatsoever, including loss of data due to product breakage or malfunction.

Technical support

While your player is quite robust, observing these handling procedures will prolong its life:

❍ Follow the information in this User's Guide only. ❍ Do not take the product apart or make alterations to the player, including

the built-in battery. This could make irrelevant any or all services the product entails, including any free after-sales services.

❍ Do not use your earphones at high volume continuously as this may

damage your ears.

❍ Do not shake or vibrate your player excessively as this may damage your

player or cause it to malfunction.

❍ Do not expose the player to high temperature or extreme temperature

change.

❍ Keep the player away from strong magnetic fields. ❍ Keep the player away from excessive moisture. ❍ Keep the player away from chemicals like alcohol, polish, or benzene.

Visit www.creative.com and go to your region’s web site for general help.

Safety and Other Instructions i

Introduction

Creative Rhomba allows you to play both MP3 and WMA (Windows Media Audio) formats. Its built-in internal memory provides ample capacity to store your favorite music files, and doubles as a storage device for documents, presentations and other data files. The player also has a built-in microphone and an FM radio.

Before You Begin

Package Contents ❍ Creative Rhomba

❍ Earphones ❍ Installation CD including User’s Guide (on CD) ❍ Quick Start leaflet

The package contents listed here may differ from country to country.

❍ Neck strap ❍ USB cable

Software Included ❍ Creative Media Detector

❍ Creative MediaSource

Introduction i

Creative Media Detector

Media Detector makes it easy for you to access multimedia content from various internal or external media. There is no need to hunt through a maze of different software to play different types of files.

Media Detector automatically recognises the insertion of CDs, and connection of external devices like Creative Rhomba. Upon recognition, the content in the media will automatically start playing.

Creative MediaSource

Creative MediaSource Player

Creative MediaSource Organiser

Creative MediaSource is your ultimate all-in-one digital entertainment software, designed for playing, creating, organizing and transferring digital music. It includes several applications like the Player and Organiser.

For more information and usage details on Creative MediaSource, refer to its online Help.

Unlike other media players, Creative MediaSource Player provides exclusive features (such as SmartFit), specially designed to manage and configure your Creative Rhomba more efficiently. With Creative MediaSource Player, you can play back a wide variety of digital audio and video formats such as MP3, WMA, WAV, Audio CD, Midi, VCD, AVI and MPEG-1 on the computer. You can also use the integrated recorder in Creative MediaSource to record audio.

The Organiser can be considered an extended view of the Player, as it provides additional features to help you manage a huge music library more easily. With it, you can:

❍ rip Audio CDs and create high quality digital audio files (up to 320 kbps

for MP3 and 160 kbps for WMA)

❍ configure the settings for Creative Rhomba while it is plugged-in to

Creative MediaSource

Introduction ii

❍ “squeeze” more audio tracks into your player with SmartFit, which

employs intelligent track management and WMA compression

❍ view the contents of your computer and your Creative Rhomba using the

dual-window transfer panel, convenient for file transfer

❍ locate songs in a few seconds, just by typing some keywords into the

sophisticated music search engine

Minimum System Requirements

The software applications on the installation CD may have higher requirements for basic functionality. Refer to each application’s documentation for details.

❍ Microsoft

Windows® XP, Windows Millennium Edition (Me), Windows

2000, or Windows 98 Second Edition (SE)

❍ Intel ❍ CD-ROM drive ❍ USB 1.1 port ❍ 128 MB RAM ❍ 100 MB free hard disk space (more needed for storing audio) ❍ SVGA graphics adapter (256 colours, 800 x 600 resolution or better)

Pentium® II 233 MHz

Introduction iii

Document

We use icons to highlight useful or urgent information for you:

Conventions

Tip. This tells you about shortcuts or hints relating to a feature.

Note. This highlights additional or important information about

a feature.

Caution! This highlights proper usage of your player. Use this information to avoid situations involving risk.

Warning! This warns you of possible hazards to yourself or your player, which may result in injury or damage.

Introduction iv

Web Information

When checking on product information, go to your respective region.

Visit www.creative.com regularly for information on:

❍ firmware updates ❍ tips and tricks ❍ FAQs ❍ troubleshooting ❍ documentation updates ❍ software updates or purchases ❍ technologies used in your player ❍ an online glossary

Online Registration

Enjoy a host of benefits by registering your product during installation, or at

www.creative.com/register. Benefits include:

❍ Service and Product support from Creative. ❍ Exclusive updates on promotions and events!

Introduction v

A Tour of Your Player

Your Player at a Glance

Microphone

LCD screens

display song titles, player settings and status

Volume button

Earphone jack

connects the earphones to your player

Hold button

USB port

connects the player to the computer for audio or data transfers, and battery charging

R (Section repeat) button

Play/Pause button

Front View

Record button

Menu scroller

Mode button

Side Views

A Tour of Your Player 1-1

+ 38 hidden pages