Gigabeat - Toshiba Drops Support

No, that's not an official statement, or even news. If you own a Gigabeat S series, you already know that Toshiba stopped supporting this platform the day they released it. I got mine pretty early on, and I don't think they've released a single firmware update for it.

I was reading ScionGuy's review of the new Zune firmware and software update, and while it looks great, it evoked the bitterness that's been growing towards my Gigabeat since I shelled out a few hundred bucks for it.

I own a Toshiba Gigabeat S30 (read: precursor to the Zune). I think the first model of the Zune looked exactly like the Gigabeat, actually.

It's not that the interface sucks. It doesn't, I like it a lot. The sound and video quality is fine. The feature set is OK. The killer is the dreaded power drain.

The device has two ways to turn it "off". The first is the easily accessible On/Off button on the side. The trick here though is that this doesn't really turn it off, so much as go into power-sucking standby mode.

If you use this button, and then don't use the Gigabeat for a day or two, it will most likely be dead the next time you turn it on...even if you had it fully charged when you turned it "off".

I've seen some folks say this is a "feature" of the OS on the device, the MS Portable Media Center, or PMC. If that's the case, I'd expect this to be a problem for the Zune and any other PMC device.
Apparently if you really want to turn the device OFF, there is a tiny little pin-hole size switch on the bottom left. So if you keep a very sharp object in your pockets at all times, you'll be able to play your device for a stretch 3 days in a row. Or, you might injure yourself bending over.

The power drain kills me and makes this thing almost unusable. I can fully charge it, play it for 5 mins on Friday, and by Monday (it’s been off all weekend), it’s dead again.

Here's the thing: When I turn my MP3 player off, I want it OFF. What's with this standby crap? Save my spot to flash and turn the damn thing off already!

I’ve been patiently awaiting a Rockbox port for this device, but I’m not sure it’ll ever happen. Progress is glacially slow, and at this rate I doubt it'll ever happen. I may have to give up and get something else…I've never been an iPod guy, but if they play MP3s I might go in that direction.

I like the Zune's, but I'm leary of the PMC. If I found that Zune's definitely do not have this battery drain problem, I might consider it.

This is so frustrating for two reasons: 1) It bugs the hell out of me for a company to release a piece of hardware and promptly forget about it, and 2) I really like everything about the device, except the drain. Unfortunately, that's enough to ruin the whole experience.

There's no way in hell that I'm going to buy another Toshiba device, that's for sure. At least Apple and Microsoft are bound to support their hardware after release.