It wasn't a myth! Here be the Rio Chroma. These are the only known pictures to have escaped from the (former) beta crew at Rio. It's been hard to keep such a thing under wraps for so long but we didn't want to jeopordize our source. Now that Rio Audio is shutting down, it's time to share. As you can see, the Chroma looks just like the illustration (right) that was found an obscure webshop and ended up on the pages of so many blogs over the last year. Many people thought it was a hoax, some figured it was the real deal, and others were content to wait and see.

Of course, it never happened. The Chroma project was killed near the end of 2004. There were some personell issues within Rio that kept it from getting completed and eventually they decided that it wasn't economically feasible. This year, they went to work on a couple of new players, building from the Carbon and Chroma. These were called the Avalon and K2 (aka, Cubic). The Avalon was going to have the same design as the Carbon, but with an OLED color screen and 8gb MicroDrive. There was OGG and FLAC support in addition to the current list of features. They were within a few weeks of shipping them out to a group of beta testers when the annoucement came that Rio had sold off its IP to Sigmatel, and the beta program was put on hold. Permanently.

We know very little about the K2, except that it was going to have most of the same features that were planned for Chroma, but with a bigger hard drive (30gb) and an improved design. It was still in the alpha stage, so the general pool of beta-testers were not given much information.

And there it ends. Rio Audio is dead. We're never going to get a chance at the Chroma, Avalon, or K2. The engineers at Rio were a talented bunch, as they proved with the Karma, but Rio has been losing money for a long time now and today they decided to pull the plug on the entire operation.

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A History of the Rio Chroma...Chroma was originally due in Q3 or Q4 of 2004 as a successor to the Rio Karma (which debuted in late September of 2003). The Chroma was going to have a slimmer design, a color screen, voice recording, an SD card slot, and would feature a driverless interface (Mass Storage Complient and able to scan and database it's own tracks) - just like the Rio Carbon. As you can tell from the pics, Chroma had the same basic design as the Carbon, but it was a little bigger to accommodate a 20gb drive.

The Chroma was first mentioned in January of 2004, on Gear.IGN.com, after the editor (M.Wiley) had a chance to check it out during the CES convention. READ.

"Now for the stuff I can't write about. Firstly, Rio will be announcing a new Karma this spring. It will get a redesign and is very small. I can't tell you how much smaller it is than the original, but it is a good deal more compact. It also looks really awesome. The new Karma also has some solid new features. It will get a color LCD and an SD expansion slot. I can't say anything else, but it was one of the most exciting devices at the show. Rio is on the right track."DAPreview posted its first news article about the Chroma a few months later, in July (2004). The name "Chroma" had been spotted on Rio Audio's webpage during a redesign of thier site. READ.

A the start of August (2004), M.Wiley at Gear.IGN commented again on the Chroma after a private meeting with Rio. READ.

"Even though the Karma 2 was absent, I managed to absorb a few interesting details. For starters, it is reportedly much different from the prototype I saw at CES. I was very impressed with the model at the show, so much so that I had a hard time imagining what changes were being made that would make it so different. Nonetheless, it is undergoing more drastic changes than any of the other new models. Rio plans on unveiling the Karma 2 in spring 2005.

As far as specs, I would gamble that Rio is going with a more compact, clicker looking enclosure, a USB 2.0 interface, driverless operation, a color LCD, and an SD expansion slot. These were details from CES and I see no reason why any of them would change."That was bad news, because we had been hoping that the Chroma would be ready for September, the one time of year when they regularly release new models.

Later that same August (2004), details appeared on the product page of a generic-type webshop. READ.

Specs• 1.8-inch, 20gb HD
• Plays MP3, WMA, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, Audible & WAV formats
• 16 bit color screen
• View album cover art & photos
• Voice recording
• SD/MMC card expansion slot (SDIO)
• No software required for loading music & data (drag & drop from Windows Explorer)
• 12 hours playtime per charge
• 5-band custom EQ
• Includes dock, remote control, carrying case, earbuds, cables

By September (2004), the first picture appeared. A simple illustration, that is. There were mixed reactions. READ.

In November, it was spotted at another webshop. Same specs, but this time with a better illustration and an expected MSRP of $ 330. People continued to be skeptical that this was the real deal. LINK.

We already had a contact in the beta group by then, and we had the pictures, but we couldn't say much about it to protect the identity of our source. We did however drop a number of hints here and there, including some pretty obvious ones...

"We cannot confirm nor deny that THIS IS the actual design, but if we pretend that THIS IS IT, what do you think..? Post your reaction in the comments."Anyway, the year ended uneventfully and by the time CES 2005 rolled around (January), we were ready to see something, anything new from Rio. Me and Rob went to Las Vegas to squeeze some information out of these guys but they wouldn't give an inch. There was indeed a new player there, but it was only being shown behind closed doors to executives and distributors. They shut us out completely... a big dissapointment. READ.

By February (2005), it became clear that the Chroma was probably a dead duck, and it was time to say so. READ.

In July, Rio sold off its IP to Sigmatel, which signaled the end. READ.

Finally, today, it's official. Rio Audio is getting out of the MP3 player business, and taking the Chroma with them.