Creative Zen 4 GB Portable Media Player (Black)
by Creative
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List Price: Our Price: $45.00 You Save: $54.99 (55%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Category: Network Media Player See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Creative Zen 4 GB Portable Media Player (Black)
Customer Review: Great flash player but beware of unstable interface
Summary: 3 Stars
I received this Creative Zen 4Gb Black 2 days back and my initial impression is favorable but interface is far from glitch-free.
Pros:
- Wonderful sounding audio, in fact 128 bit encoded mp3 songs sound amazing. Have heard that Creative DSP's are the best in the industry and music quality seems superior to my erstwhile Nano. And I'm using the packaged Creative headphones, they sound even better with my Sennheiser's.
- Videos are a delight to watch and screen is crystal clear. I'm enjoying viewing photos and videos on this Zen screen.
- The FM radio is a nice touch and works in both Mono/Stereo modes.
- Sleek and well sized, easy to carry in one's pocket.
Cons:
- Beware of the software running this, I received my Zen with Firmware version 1.21.01 and over the past 2 days have found multiple glitches. Annoyingly, on unlocking my Zen, screen becomes White and I'm forced to restart my Zen. This seems to be a recurring issue and it's downright annoying to restart every time I unlock.
- Another thing that happened this morning at the Gym, was my Zen just shutdown all by itself( with a fully charged battery ). On restarting, I saw a 'Rebuilding' screen pop up, which was concerning. Thankfully I didn't lose my songs/ playlist, just had to restart my playlist from the beginning.
- On setting Date and Time, this remains set for a while. But after a period, I see Time/Date has reset itself, not sure how this is happening.
- While powering down, LCD screen blinks with varying shades of grey, not sure what's causing this.
Conclusion:
Overall, this is a good sounding player with an unstable interface. Comparing this to my erstwhile Nano, must say, Apple interface and software is a far cry compared to Creative. This is surprising, apparently Creative has been in the Sound/Audio industry for a lot longer time. Though I like my Zen, I'm in two minds, whether I need to return this? Will test this for the week and make up my mind.
Customer Review: False advertising, non-replaceable batteries = returned item
Summary: 2 Stars
Before you buy this you must understand a few things that are not covered in the manufacturer's specs:
Contrary to the slick description, you will be forced to convert EVERY video using the creative software. Realize this takes about an hour for an hour long video, even on fast computers. Shame on creative for making it seem otherwise. I had expected to drag-and-drop my library of XVID videos for easy instant access on the road, now I have to wait and wait and wait AND store two versions on my computer. BTW: re compressing already compressed videos = more digital compression artifacts.
The battery is non-replaceable and batteries have a finite life. Obsolescence is built into this product: after x number of battery charges you will be forced to replace the entire unit. This is NOT GREEN! Plus, you can't drop in an extra battery when your video runs out on the plane (3hrs playback realistically). Plan on being chained to a USB port.
Sometimes it locks up (in the off or on state) and you have to press a >tiny< reset button. Tiny as in smaller than a paperclip. Hope you have a needle handy, mine froze up within 30 minutes of using it.
The Zencast podcast organizer is kind of a joke. Not only clunky, it throws the podcasts in with all your other music rather than keeping it separate.
Files on the SD card are not integrated into the library and must be transferred for access.
No video out, no external speakers = hard to share video with friends.
As far as the optional cover goes, it looks great but the metal clip flips back onto the screen - scratching itself! HAHAHA
For the price, it is OK but the description glosses over the bad stuff. I am not into conspicuous consumption patterns like buying a new MP3 player every year so...thumbs down. Too bad, I really wanted this one to work.
Customer Review: Deeply Flawed Software
Summary: 2 Stars
If you're like me and have thousands of mp3's that are not classified by album, then don't go near this player with a ten foot pole. The reason I say this is that when you attempt to browse songs by a particular artist or band, you can only view the songs by album - any song that does not have it's album tag filled in won't show up under that artist. Basically, if any track has no album info, it becomes invisible. Older Zen mp3 players had a "List all Tracks by Artist" option when you browsed a particular artist or band - selecting this option would show all the tracks by that artist in alphabetical order regardless of whether the album info was filled in for a track or not. The new Zen players do not have this option. I went to one artist on my player that I had 60 songs for, except none of the tracks had album info, and when I selected that artist the player told me their were no tracks by that artist on the player - totally and completely ridiculous.
Worse yet, all those tracks that have no album associated with them will not play in shuffle mode. I loaded the player with 1000 songs that had no album info and 10 songs that did have their album info, and put the player into shuffle mode. Shuffle mode then told me their were only 10 songs on the player, and proceeded to play those 10 songs (the ones with album info) over and over, while completely ignoring the other 1000 songs (the ones without album info). This has to be about the dumbest thing I've seen in any consumer product in years. I've seen complaints about how lame the shuffle play feature is on these players and how they seem to play the same songs over and over in shuffle mode - well this is the reason why. A large percentage of these users tracks are not even being recognized in shuffle mode.
If you keep all your mp3's tagged by album then you will be fine. If not, then don't go near this player.
Customer Review: Great...while it lasted
Summary: 3 Stars
Great little gadget...for the most part. I purchased this player at the beginning of 2007 to use at the gym. It's sleek, nicely designed and functional on many levels. It survived well through daily use (no drops, spills, or other abuse). I was very careful with, even though it seems durable. It fit nicely into an ipod armband case, which I bought at a local retailer. The graphics are sharp and the sound is crystal clear (with different headphones).
The firmware is my biggest complaint. It's bulky and buggy-- a quick google search will tell you this. The organization of the files on this player could be easier. Forget about dragging and dropping files under a name that you specify because the player will assign different names randomly (trust me, I'm not new to computers or other technology and yes, I've tried many different methods to try and fix this). The memory card slot is useless as it only allows you drop transfer certain types of files.
Now exactly 2 years later the player will not turn on and go past the recovery screen. I believe it either got cold (50F temp.) or the "update" for the firmware broke it. I suspect the latter. The battery is fine. I've googled and tried countless times to reset it, drain it, etc, still no luck. Even before this problem (in a controlled climate) the player would skip or the screen would flash randomly or the menus would flip quickly as if I were holding the down-button down. It had "phantom-like" behaviors. These behaviors started only a year into ownership. The buttons are also LOUD (sound like cheap plastic) and the buttons should glow in the dark for easier night time use. Also, I recommend that you replace the headphones that it comes with because they are cheap and don't carry much bass.
It is a great gadget overall for the price I paid, however my next player will be the Ipod touch. Goodbye Creative!
Customer Review: Reasons to avoid this Creative Labs Zen player.
Summary: 2 Stars
This review is based on my experience with two Creative Zen 4GB players.
I returned the first one because it was dead right out of the box. The second one worked wonderfully at first and then died after 32 days. No video, no audio, no charging light. No response from any buttons. Please understand that the player wasn't abused in any way, it just stopped working one morning.
I have previously worked as Tech Support for 5 years handling software problems and I'm pretty comfortable with troubleshooting or at least following directions. The Creative Labs website has some simple troubleshooting suggestions which I followed and which didn't work in my case.
After going through the troubleshooting steps I emailed Creative (I didn't find a phone number listed on the website although there are two posted by a couple of other reviewers here) and I received an email from Tech Support the next day. Unfortunately the email was only a rehash of the same troubleshooting steps available on the website. Ineffective.
I returned the 2nd player and bought a Sony Walkman 4GB. My advice would be to skip this model since there seem to be so many people experiencing similar 'dead' issues. It's too much of a crap shoot. If you do buy it then also be sure to get an extended replacement warranty from your place of purchase so you can just replace it without having to deal with Creative Labs. Creative Labs Tech Support seems pretty useless.
Had the player continued working I would have rated it at 5 stars but as I had 2 out of 2 players die on me AND since Creative support is so weak I optimistically rate it at 2 stars. I feel you would be taking a pretty big chance on this mp3 player.
I hope this review helps you to avoid the problems I and others have had with this Creative Labs model.