Creative Zen Micro Photo 4 GB MP3 Player Black
by Creative
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List Price: 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 Micro Photo 4 GB MP3 Player Black
Customer Review: be sure to use the right charger!
Summary: 4 Stars
this mp3 player is great, but i had to return my first one because i screwed up the battery. one thing to remember, when you first get it, CHARGE IT FIRST THING! if you don't, this will cause your battery's life to be short and messed up. and also, if you are like me and aren't able to stick to the computer for 5 hours for the thing to charge, buy a wall charger. but you MUST use the CREATIVE ZEN official charger!!! believe me, i used an A/C to USB adapter like the ones on sale here, but after more than 24 hours, the battery still wasn't full! and also, the machine sucked up the little juice it had within 2 hours. so i thought something was wrong with the machine, but actually it was the charger. when i plugged in the official charger, the battery charged faster (only 2 hours or so, way faster than computer charging!) and there was the characteristic blue "glowing" that i got when it was hooked up to the cpu. with the old charger, there was no glowing. i think that this glowing only works with the official charger or the computer, maybe there's some special creative technology or recognition in their chargers. so make sure you don't make the same mistakes i made, though AMAZON's customer service was great and sent me a new player via UPS AIR! wow! so make sure you use the creative charger since even though it is expensive, sadly, it is the only one that'll work.
other than that, the player itself is pretty great. some things i think brought it down was:
A) the voice recorder.
it takes so much navigating and buttons and menus to start and stop it. and when you play your recording back, you have to crank up the volume to almost maximum to hear.
B) the software
i have to admit, it is kind of frustrating at first. especially mediasource (one of the two programs on the installation cd) , which i don't think is useful for anything besides playing music, which i could use windows media player for. but the other program, media explorer is good. i generally use mediasource for fixing and renaming the ID3 tags.
C) the fact that you can't listen to songs while viewing photos. and when you do use them for screensaver, it's not so nice because you can't see the words real well anymore.
D) the earbuds do kind of hurt and the foamy things do come off.
but other than that, it is great! but you should buy a case, even though it is pricy. you don't want to scratch the screen or anything. the player is very solidly built. it's mostly metal, and the front looks sturdy and you won't have to worry about fingerprints, unlike the ipod. and the connections are fine, don't worry about what those other people said! my computer had no trouble recognizing it! no cheap stuff. i like the texture and the feel of it, and the lighting is really cool. the screen is great, good color, not like LCD (you can see from all angles!), BUT i noticed once i was in the sun, you can't see the screen as well.
overall, great player for the price! and 4GB is plenty of memory, i filled in about 100 songs and about 150 photos and i STILL haven't filled up 1 GB!!! i don't know how you can fill this, let alone a 8 GB! so take my advice and buy this!
Customer Review: Creative Zen Micro Photo 4 GB vs. Philips HDD1630 6 GB
Summary: 4 Stars
Creative Zen Micro Photo 4GB:
Pros:
*OLED Screen (fades out, to conserve battery life.)
*Very clear pictures, which can be used as your background in many different colors.
*Can delete songs right off of your device; don't have to hook up to computer to do so
*Nice design, to fit in your hand comfortably
*Blue Glow
*Good voice recorder
*Good FM Radio
*Good Volume
*Themes
*Alarm (Have to have head phones in your ears)
*Can change how sensitive the player keys are
*Comes with it's own software
Cons:
*Have to charge to computer (sometimes you can easily forget to charge)
*No Album Art (not really a big deal for some people)
*Pretty sensitive key pad
*Sometimes has it's moment when has to re-build it's library or freeze and you have to hook up to your computer to fix (and if your not at home to hook up to your computer, or you don't have an extra battery with you, this could be a problem if you really wanted to listen to your music, or your in a real noisy place)
Philips HDD1630 6 GB
Pros:
*Album Art
*Holds a good amount of music
*Good price
*Pretty nice design
*Has dedicated keys, for volume, menu, view, playlist, and power
*Can use plug to charge, instead of always having to hook up to the computer
Cons:
*Slow processor
*Can't delete songs right from your device, you have to be on your computer
*The volume can't go that high compared to the Zen
*Only has two different themes
*Small Album Art
*Stays lit up as long as you have it on, which isn't good for the battery power
*Doesn't come with its own specialized software, so you have to use other programs to try to make your playlists, which can be pretty difficult at times, unlike with the Zen.
*Scratches and smudges pretty easy
*Radio volume is horrible for me (overall volume basically)
*Photos look pretty crumby compared to "Creative's"
*May be pretty difficult at first to understand how to add album art, because for some reason it only comes up for some artist and other you have to add yourself
*Display isn't really that impressing
*Small Screen
Overall I hope this helps you decide which player you'd think is better, if you have any other questions let me know!
Customer Review: Good player....but.....
Summary: 4 Stars
This MP3 player has everything that people state, EXCELLENT sound quality, awesome song grouping (on the computer, kind of tedious if u try to do it on the player), photo storage capabilities (even though you can't listen to music while veiwing photos, which is really kinda dumb) and the best shuffle feature i've ever witnessed. Its just like what the other guy said, it picks the most listened genre and then shuffles into a song that is close by to that and mixes it in. I have almost my whole compt. library of songs on here and i can shuffle the entire list and i won't be disappointed. The earbuds are kinda odd, so i got some other ones from phillips, however the ones that come with the player aren't bad, they just tend to tangle real easily. The screen is great, shows the song, artist, and album (if you have all that info). You can even sync the player to Microsoft Media Player 11 and it'll make sure all your songs are updated with the proper media info and whatnot. Very good. The radio also is pretty decent as well, no problems there.
Now the cons, DO NOT, i repeat, DO NOT UPDATE THIS PLAYER!!! Until creative comes out with a new patch, the updates WILL MESS UP YOUR PLAYER!!! Before I updated I went to the indoor track and ran like crazy with no problems. After I updated I WALKED to classes and the player would then stop and come up with the problem "rebuilding library". I'd wait for it to do this, and then play again, and it would then come up AGAIN and AGAIN. DO NOT UPDATE THIS PLAYER!!!
The keypad is kinda sensitive but you can control that a bit, or just use the hold button which is what I do.
Sometimes when i turned the player off it would turn on randomly, but that again was after I updated the thing. Like i said DO NOT UPDATE. They might state on their website that it will "make things run faster and better" or whatever. Yea thats true for when it works.
All in all its a good player and i fully recommend.
*Edit* 6/28/07
I actually take back most of what I said...the player is good, if you want a CAR MP3 player. I actually regret not getting an Ipod over this, and if I could return this item for one I would do so in an instant. Like i said, it works great as a car MP3 player but I can't go running with this because it'll freeze up, and with all the Errors and other problems that have been popping up on this thing, It really isn't worth it....
Customer Review: Move over Ipod!
Summary: 5 Stars
I love this Mp3 player! Don't think you have to buy the new Creative Zen V or even the 8gb MicroPhoto. If you don't need 8 gb, settle for 4. It hold 2,000 songs anyway. You can't go wrong with this price either. You can only get a screenless-1 gb for this price on an Ipod. Don't worry about it coming out a year ago either. It is just as high tech as any other mp3.
This one works so well. It is really easy to access all of my songs and they can be organized in so many ways to my liking. The screen is beautiful and the pictures come up extra clear. You can put plenty of songs on it, and it's small and easy to use. The glowing blue light is desirable.
The battery and charging cord all work fine to me. I would advise getting a different charging cord, so you don't have to connect it to your computer all the time. The headphones work great, and it was really easy to get this to work on my computer. It works with almost all song programs and even has one of it's own. Files transfer onto it in a breeze.
Some other features that may not have been mentioned on this page are it's FM radio, sound recording, organizer, contacts, schedule, date/time, and etc. It is a little bit of everything rolled into one.
I have very few complaints. The only thing that bugs me is the touchpad. It is a little sensitive and sometimes gets bumped a little, but you get used to using it after awhile. It is also pretty sturdy, so you don't have to worry about it falling apart.
Just to help any new customers, when you first get this player, charge the battery fully first. Also, the USB cable takes a little force to get it into the player for the first time.
Buy this Mp3, I guarentee you will be satisfied.
Customer Review: frustrating product
Summary: 1 Stars
when i first got this player, i thought it was great, and had more features than an ipod. then i realized the player is extremely incosistent and frustrating. All the connections are cheap... more than half the time i would leave the player overnight plugged into an outlet to charge, and in the morning it would not be charged at all; after a couple of months the headphone jack had a poor connection so my sound went in and out, and the usb connection was also poor, so i constantly have to plug the player in and out for my computer to recognize the player as connected so i can upload songs. after the headphone connection went from bad to worse i mailed it to get fixed since it was under the one year warranty. I had to pay over $20 for shipping and insurance on it, and didnt have my player for about a month, when i got it back they had replaced my player with a refurbished one. well that one didnt work at all. when i called them to talk about it, they said I am not under phone service warranty , and i would have to give them my credit card # and pay $10 in order to discuss the problem. they blame the problem on my computer, saying all my 6 usb ports must not be working and that is why i can't upload songs to it. yet they dont seem to understand that i dock my digital comaera to the usb ports, as well as my boyfriends ipod, and there is no problems with the usb connection. they just cant think that their product doesnt work. so now after spend $200 on this product i have no mp3 player, and it has been so frustrating that i prefer throwing it in the garbage I guess i should go get an ipod, because there is a reason why they are so popular.