Too many choices
The modern-day music fan is afflicted with a peculiar dilemma: too many choices. More music is now available in more forms, in more places, than ever before. The digital revolution has truly expanded our musical options beyond our personal CD collections and AM/FM radio, to include satellite radio, personal MP3 playlists, and even podcasts. Sometimes the sheer variety of ways to listen to music can leave you unsure of where to begin.
 The Pioneer Inno does everything it promises, and does it all well. |
If you've ever found yourself staring hollow-eyed at a selection of digital music players, the new Pioneer Inno might just be the answer you've been waiting for. That's because the Inno takes away the satellite radio vs. MP3 player decision and gives you the best parts of both devices. With the Inno, you can listen to XM Satellite Radio, create personal playlists that contain both XM and MP3 tracks, and even purchase songs you've heard on XM from Napster.com.
With so much capability, the Inno promises to mark a major advance in both functionality and ease-of-use for the digital music fan. My question, however, was can a single device do so many things at the same time, and do each well?
The "Chase"
Let's cut straight to it: the Inno gets it right.
As a portable XM radio, the Inno outperforms all of its predecessors, offering a sweet color screen, dramatically improved reception, thoughtful design, and all the extras we've come to expect from a satellite radio, like a built-in FM transmitter, sports and stock tickers, favorites, etc.
Recording, and managing recorded content, though, is where the Inno truly shines. Recording XM is easy — just press and hold the "XM" button to record a song or channel you're listening to. Or, press the XM button and select "Schedule Rec" to record a program at a pre-determined time (just make sure the Inno is in the home dock and can receive a strong signal). Either way, songs recorded from XM are automatically stored as individual tracks, and tagged with artist, track, channel, and program info.
By default, the Inno's approximately 1 gigabyte of memory is divided 50/50 between recorded XM content and MP3 or WMA files. Due to the difference in how XM and MP3/WMA files are compressed, this means that you can store about 25 hours' worth of XM content, and approximately 8 hours of MP3/WMA files. You have the option of devoting all the memory to storing recorded XM programming, but I can't see why anyone would do that. It's the capability of mixing the satellite radio with your MP3 tracks that makes the Inno so compelling. Keep in mind that any time you change the memory setting, you will lose all of your saved content, both XM and MP3/WMA tracks.
 The Inno, shown here in the Belkin Citron Arm Band, makes a great jogging companion. |
Adding MP3 or WMA files to the Inno is just as easy as recording XM — just plug in the USB cable and drag and drop your music files into the Inno folder. Once you've installed the XM+Napster software on your computer, you can manage all of your music in more detail. But it's the ability to organize your music on the Inno itself that impressed me most. You can create, name, and populate playlists in minutes on the Inno. Not having to connect to the computer to organize your music is a huge win, and the single best feature of the Inno.
For example, I've been recording Bob Dylan's new show on XM (tip: if you're a Dylan fan, you need XM for this show alone). On my way home the other night, I was listening to my recording of his very first show, and was struck by a beautiful old blues ballad, "Just Walkin' in the Rain," by a band called The Prisonaires. With a couple of clicks on the Inno's control pad, I moved "Just Walkin' in the Rain" into my jogging playlist. Not having to boot up my computer, connect the Inno, and transfer the file saved me time and let me get out on the road to get my run in before it turned dark.
Room for improvement
Of course, there are some things I wish the Inno did better. The biggest drawbacks of the Inno are the meager amount of memory and the inability to better customize how you want to divide the available memory between recorded XM content and your own music files. While the Inno's software and general usability are excellent, the Inno just doesn't come close to offering the amount of storage for your MP3/WMA files that the average user expects; especially when you can get a 2-gig MP3 portable for significantly less money. I have no doubt, however, that future versions of the Inno will offer more storage and more customization of the memory — it's just a matter of time.
As with all portable devices these days, battery life is also an issue. Pioneer lists the battery capacity as 5.5 hours for live XM use, and 15 hours to listen to recorded content. This certainly seems in-line with my experience. I never had the Inno quit on me during use. Still, over the month or so that I tested it, there were several times when the battery got totally drained just sitting in my bag and the Inno would not power on. I had to dock the Inno and charge it for a couple of hours to get the battery level back up. Granted, this usually happened after I'd used the Inno for a couple of hours and then left it in my bag for a day or more.
Thumbs up
Well, that's the short and sweet version of my experience with the Inno. In the next few pages, I'll get into greater detail about the design and software of the Inno, but if you're tired of reading, my overall take on the Inno is a big thumbs up. It does everything it promises and does it all well, so I can easily recommend this to anyone who wants to be able to enjoy both XM satellite radio and their own music files on a single device.
