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Roughly the shape of a deck of cards (3.5 inches by 2.5 inches and 0.625 inches thick) it was black and had an LCD screen and a circular pad with control buttons. It had controls for skipping tracks forwards or backwards, repeat, random play and for four preset equalizer settings. The LCD displayed the track number being played, but did not display artist or title information. It could only play MP2 and MP3 files.
It shipped with 32 Mbytes of internal memory and had a SmartMedia slot for more memory space. It was powered by a single AA battery which lasted between 8 to 12 hours. Connection to a personal computer was made through the parallel port, and a proprietary connector on the Rio side.
It retailed for US $200, which made it quite expensive for the ability to play a dozen or so songs. An even more expensive version was later released, and was colored translucent green and equipped with a larger 64 Mbyte internal memory, though all of this came at a higher cost of $250.
In October 1998, the American recording industry group, the Recording Industry Association of America, filed a lawsuit in the Ninth U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco claiming the player violated the 1992 Audio Home Recording Act . The three judge panel ruled in favor of Diamond, paving the way for the development of the MP3 portable player market. [1].