Creative Zen 4 GB Portable Media Player (Black)
by Creative
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List Price: Buy Used: from $45.00 (click here) Category: Network Media Player See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Creative Zen 4 GB Portable Media Player (Black)
Customer Review: Instructions did suck but after 3 years it's great
Summary: 5 Stars
Creative Zen 4 GB (Black)
This is what I said 3 years ago:
"I spent a lot of time looking for an MP3 player and finally chose this one. However, I 've got at least three gripes:Poor instructions, the mediocre headphones and the lack of a case.
I've had this 5 days but I am still trying to figure out how to use it properly! Granted there is an online (rudimentary)help manual and the player did come with a quick start guide, but I don't think that's enough if you really want to get the best out of this player.
Why do manufacturers continue to provide scanty instructions? They spend millions on persuading us to buy stuff but not how to use them. All that will happen is that since I don't know how to use this properly , I'll end up using only the very basic functions, feel aggrieved about the money I spent and then vow to never buy a Zen product again!
As for the sound, I know other reviewers have been raving about the quality but I feel I haven't had the chance to see what this baby can really do with the supplied head phones. They don't fit my ears properly and what I can hear doesn't seem to me that much better than the throwaway headphones snagged from a recent long haul flight. So now I will have to buy a separate headset.
My advice to anyone buying this or any other product is try and read the instructions before you buy if you can and make sure you are aware of the quality of any included accessories."
UPDATE OCT 2010: It's now three years down the line and I must say I have been very happy with this player.
I bought Creative headphones separately and they are fine. The player has never gone wrong except for the odd reboot and the battery is still holding its charge fairly well after this time.
Granted, this is only 4GB and you can't browse the optional SD card (unless someone can say if an update works)but since I use a 8GB SD card, I really don't need extra capacity.
The recording facility has been very useful for meetings and picks up sound well while being unobtrusive.
I got my wife a Sony Walkman NWZS545RED 16 GB Video MP3 Player recently but I prefer the Zen. The controls are much easier to use and you can see what you are doing in the dark. The Sony is more fiddly to use, can't delete without using a PC and we have never got the professed 30 hour battery life - perhaps because we never figured out how to completely switch it off e.g. in sleep mode, if you jog it, it starts up even when you put on the hold button.
In summary, I will use this till it falls apart!
Customer Review: Best little mp3 player I have ever used!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this player after I had been using a Zen V for several years. It was a great little player, but unfortunatly, my library got too big for it.
I upgraded to the 8gb version of this about 6 months ago. I was highly impressed with it, and still am. The basic things I really noted in it are these:
Pros:
-Colorful, vibrant screen perfect for watching videos on or looking at pictures (has millions of colors vs. the iPod video which has thousands)
-Can play many formats of music; doesn't have the limitations an iPod does
-Sleek, flashy, design; player is about the size of four stacked up credit cards
-Easier to use than an iPod; more options and menu functions
-Has a built in radio; headphones are the antennea
-Sound quality is amazing if used with a decent set of speakers/headphones
-Durable; I have dropped mine many times and gotten it wet, but still it functions perfectly
-Syncs directly with Realplayer/Windows Media Player or you can drag-and-drop files onto it
-Outstanding battery life; I left it on playing music on 'lock' for 9 hours straight and it used only half of the battery.
-Background can be changed and customized to any picture of your choosing
-USB cord is not player-specific and fits many of my other USB electronics, so it's very easy to replace.
-Reset button on bottom of player. Will reset and turn off the player, but will not erase your files.
-Registering your player gives you access to great customer service, who will respond quickly to any problem you encounter
-SD card slot for extra storage. Does not merge with library though, has its own seperate folder, which is not a problem for me.
Cons:
-Scratches easily. I recommend a screen protector.
-Will not play iTunes media; only iPods can sync to iTunes. I would suggest getting a converter/virtual burner such as NoteBurner (http://www.noteburner.com/) to get your iTunes music into a playable format
-This has not happened to me, but I've heard that in the older versions of the firmware, you can get the "white screen of death". However, I do not believe this will be a problem since the newer players have new and improved firmware.
This is well worth your money, it's an amazing price!! I like it a lot better than other mp3 players I have used/owned, including the iPod! I highly recommend it, and I will remain loyal to Creative. Their players are of very high quality, and of very reasonable price!
Customer Review: Greatest Value MP3 Player Ever
Summary: 5 Stars
At US$89.99 (current promotion), the Creative Zen 4GB is the greatest value mp3 player ever. You have 2.5" 320x240 16.7 million color, smooth and bright video playback, great for video, photos (able to zoom in on actual higher resolution) 97dB SNR, great for music (the greatest so far except X-fi enabled products), SDHC, great for expansion/add-on. It has a very small footprint, it can hide behind a credit card! It supports AAC/WMA/WMA lossess/MP3, comes with voice recorder and FM tuner. It's very user-friendly too. Get a 16GB SDHC at US$57.99 (from Newegg.com) and you have a total of 20GB, cheaper than Creative Zen 16GB(US$179.99). If you want better earbuds, consider Creative EP-630 (great bass and noise isolation) or the latest EP-830 (only available in Singapore). If you want better sound enhancement, consider getting Creative Aurvana X-fi Noise-cancelling headphones. If you want a killer MP3 player, wait for the upcoming Zen "Share?" in May 2008. Any cons? Yes, the firmware still has some bugs that may need resetting, so be prepared. The SD card has yet to be fully integrated with the main memory and unable to copy files to SD card. The shiny plastic surface is prone to scratches, so get a skin. One-handed use is possible but a bit awkward for left-handers. Left side of casing has a tiny imperfection due to plastic moulding. Once a while, a JPEG photo cannot be viewed though thumbnail shows it. Only able to drag and drop JPEG photo (not other format like GIF, BMP, PNG), video and MP3/WMA files provided it is the right format and resolution. If you charge using USB and on/off the player halfway and unplug, the player may hang. You can reset using the pin hole, press and hole, then switch the player on again. If it cannot work, continue charging till full and use the recovery tool from Creative's website. Future firmware upgrades should resolve those bugs and SD integration issues. Other features that are missing include built-in speaker, wi-fi/ bluetooth/web-access. You cannot find any equivalent high quality player today.
GAPLESS PLAYBCK:
There is gapless playback (I tried with Slow Dance CD, the songs are all "joined" that you need gapless playback to enjoy) provided the songs are encoded in 192kbps or lower. I tried WMA 192kbps and it works. But 320kbps and WAV (lossles) there is no gapless playback. Windows Media player provides gapless playback till 320kbps from my investigation. If you use WAV (lossless)there is no gapless playback too for Windows Media player.
Customer Review: Great player, iPod killer
Summary: 4 Stars
I had been looking for a mp3 player for a while. I never bought into the hype of the iPod. This guy came out, so I figured for $119 it was a good deal. It has a radio which is nice when wathcing the TVs at the gym. You can't record radio content, but who really does that anyway? It has all kinds of preferences and ways to make it your own. You can set your own wallpaper (from any of your uploaded pictures) that shows in the background, a nice touch. You can change the order of your menus, or get rid of some alltogether if they cramp your style. It can store pictures, video (converted with proprietary program), music, data, a mircophone, contacts and a planner. It shows time and battery life at all times, except for pictures and video. The screen is very nice, big and clear. It takes a little getting used to but the navigation is pretty good. Navigation is cool because you can search by now playing, playlist, album, artist, genre, all tracks, recording (microphone), bookmarks, or DJ (album of the day, random play all, popularity, rarely heard, highly rated, yet to be rated). Once you are in one of those screens everything is listed alphabetically and it had a index you can jump to so you had have to scroll from the beginning, just jump to the letter on the right and you are where you want to be pretty quickly. It can show album art, which I haven't messed with too much. Currently it doesn't always match the righrt art to the right track, but that might be the way I uploaded my stuff. It has a SD slot, which I haven't used, but I know that anything I would have on a SD card, I would have to manage separately through the Memory Card menu. This is a feature that some have problem with since it essentially, separates the content on the SD card from the content on the player and they are not seemlessly merged for a single experience. Not a big deal to me, I haven't reached the limit of memory where I would need to add a card, maybe later. Sound quality is very good.
The only gripes I have about it are that it takes about 13 seconds to "boot up" and the screen is easily scratched. Don't get the Zen armband, it is useless. Get a ebay skin with armband instead for workouts. It is much more usable and comfortable to wear, not to mention only about $8 as opposed to ~$20. It is a little more biased to righthanded people with the navigation on the right and you can't "flip" it. Not a big deal though. All in all I think it beats the competition by a landslide.
Customer Review: The Creative Zen has HORRIFIC AAC support, and I can only hope it is better for other file types
Summary: 1 Stars
After my numerous attempts to transfer 4GB of my library to this player, I have concluded that this is quite possibly the worst MP3 player I have ever used. It is no wonder that Creative is not only stagnant in popularity but also ceding market share to Sandisk and Microsoft. I understand the fanboy will inevitably tell me that X file type works fine on the Zen and that I brought this horrible experience on myself by using AAC. But if Creative is going to implement AAC support and advertise it, then they sure as hell should make every effort to insure that AAC support is as good as its support for other files.
First, the only way I've found to make album art show on every track is if I only transfer a small group of tracks at a time. If I transfer anymore then, say, 100 tracks, all of the files will be album artless.
Countless times now, I have left Zen Media Explorer alone to transfer files to the player, only to come back a few minutes later finding that either:
1. Zen Media Explorer crashed
2. the Zen decided to go to sleep, where only a reset can get it going again
3. or some random error (0x80048007) halts the entire transfer and I have to start again.
And if I am lucky enough to get a transfer through "without issue," then there's a damn good chance that I'll encounter issues when I start using the player, including:
1. the Zen does not get out of docked mode and I have to reset it
2. some of the tracks were corrupted during transfer and I get garbled music
3. and even once, the interface was corrupted with the letter "a" getting replaced by "¶" (weird, I know) and all "w's" were half a line below all the other letters. Only a reset and cleanup fixed this.
I should probably note that this smorgasbord of problems is not just an isolated instance. In fact, I am already on my second player that was sent as a replacement, and there has been no difference.
I don't even see why the reset button is a tiny, hard-to-access pinhole seeing how it is pathetically the most used button on my player. It's too bad, I was dying to give this product a second chance because I love the interface, features, and potential for memory expansion. Instead, the great hardware of this product is marred by its horrible software and firmware, and for that, I will never, ever recommend Creative MP3 players to anyone I know. Maybe only people I hate...