I have a 60 GB Rio Car that has been acting up lately. A few months ago, I received the "no disk drive, contact support message." The support team kindly sent me a new IDE cable, which I installed per instructions and it seemed to fix the problem.

Then, about 2 weeeks ago, I went out to start my car in the morning and the car player didn't turn on. The LED light in the front control did not turn on at all. I wiggled the player in its docking sled and that didn't appear to have any effect. I drove for several hours like this. Then I removed the player and gave it a good "thump" on the top. Then I slid the player back into the docking sled. The "physical agitation" mysteriously fixed whatever hardware gremlin was preventing it from responding when electrical power was applied. It was only about 40 degree out, nothing unusual and that temperature never caused problems last winter.

Fast-forward to last night. I left the player on all night, synchronzing a fresh copy of my 25 GB of MP3s (I recently re-ripped everything). Mid-way through the night, the player apparently turned itself off again. As before, the LED power light in front was off. Also, the blue LED communication link in back (by the USB port) was off. Pressing the buttons had no effect. The power cord was securely inserted. I had to unplug the player and then plug it back in before it showed any signs of life. I was synchronizing using the latest v43 JEmplode and Ethernet (I have an iMac) -- I don't think this has anything to do with it.

Any ideas? Right now I am suspicious of some kind of intermittent hardware failure, possibly with one or both of the disk drives, or another fundamental component. Last night th player was *very* warm before I went to bed, but not hot to the touch. I don't think this malfunction was caused by overheating. Right now the playlists are empty even though it appears that ~15 GB of MP3s were copied -- I'll probably need to manually delete the music off the player and try syncing again. Thank you,

Greetings!

Sorry in advance for the somewhat rambling response...

Could the hard drive cable have worked loose over time? Was the connection tight? Since you were sent the replacement, I assume you put in the new cable and are comfortable with checking the connection.

But... Given that you are losing the display and the wonderful azure link light on the back of the player, it seems that you are loosing power or control to the entire unit, not just any specific component...

What revision of the software are you using (player and hijack)? Do you have any screen blanking options set through hijack, or drive spin down settings?

I don't think the physical agitation did anything. By unplugging it and reseating, you hard booted the unit, removing power. That alone may have been enough to solve the problem.

Can you do a self test and a memory test on the unit? I would think that a memory error might give this kind of reaction.

I'm not sure a "good hard thump" is really such a good idea, even if you may think there is something loose. Don't forget that filler neck on the display [sad]

If you get "power cuts" both on DC and AC supplies, then it does tend to imply the player may be at fault. But to eliminate the obvious, I would be inclined to:

- check your in-car harness wiring is still in good order, with no loose joints anywhere. Look at voltages too, and with the ignition on and off.
- check the power adaptor at home, again for voltage, but also for temperature when loaded. Verify with a loaner power brick if you can to eliminate the brick.

I have once seen a hard disk failure where it would short out the power lines and cause fuses to flip. I hope this is not the case with yours. How old is the disk itself?

Contact support. Check for bad solder joints on IDE header.

The player is about a year old -- it is a factory 60 GB with no modifications. Again, today, I left it syncing while at work. It shutdown again with all LEDs dead. No response. Unplugged and plugged back in. Dead still. Have contacted support as all symptoms seem to point to a faulty player.

I am almost positive it is not the cable. I am not even confident there was a problem with the original cable. Again, today, I left the player syncing and it shut itself off completely--no LEDs in back or front. Unplugged from AC power for an hour, plugged back in. The "azure" light in back "sparks" for a split second and that's it. Looks like a completely dead player right now. Have contacted support. I was using HiJack v300 and 2.0b13 developer edition. No special HiJack customizations.

You still haven't convinced me that you have eliminated the power brick as the culprit. If you are synching, then I am assuming you are on mains (AC) power. The wall-wart types, rather than the power brick types, occasionally go on the fritz. A brief power up then instant death could be a broken thermal fuse in the power pack, not the player. I know it died in the car also, but you may just be doubly-unlucky with coincidental bad wiring. You should try a loaner PSU and see the effect before despatching the player to Cambridge.

It's definitely the player. I have a spare player with power supply, etc. Same failure symptoms with either power supply. Spare player works fine.

Any unuusal rattles from the player? My guess is a screw from the HDD mounts may be kicking about inside the player. If it's out of warranty, open it up and check all the HDD screws are present and correct - if there's a short, you'll get a brief snap of power then it'll shut itself down.

Hugo