Creative Zen Nano Plus 1 GB MP3 Player (Blue) by Creative
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Our Price: $199.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Network Media Player See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Creative Zen Nano Plus 1 GB MP3 Player (Blue)
Digital camera Review: .
Summary: 4 Stars
works well - nice compact size, use it for the gym mostly.
does eat batteries quickly - would recommend having rechargeables if using this.
Digital camera Review: A great MP3 player!
Summary: 5 Stars
I just love my Zen Nano! It's very easy to use and comes with easy-to-use software. I've never had any MP3 player before, and I had my heart set on an i-Pod, but I'm so happy with this! It holds TONS of songs and is very light and durable! Get one!Digital camera Review: A great little MP3 player
Summary: 4 Stars
Although the instructions from Creative are not very illuminating most of the functions are pretty intuitive and it is a breeze to add music from my PC. The size is great (small enough to fit into a pocket) and the protective cover comes with a clip if you don't have a pocket. Although 1GB doesn't hold a lot of songs it works for my purposes and 1 AAA battery lasts me about three weeks of daily play.
One of the Zen Nano's selling points was the FM radio and it clearly receives the signal from my local NPR station, which is no small feat (my alarm clock radio has difficulty receiving the signal). I have not tried to record with the microphone so I don't know how well it works or the quality of the recording. The only thing that hasn't worked well for me is the earphones--they were uncomfortable and too big to fit into my ears so I had to buy another pair.
I highly recommend the Creative Zen Nano and am planning on buying one for each of my daughters.
Digital camera Review: A lot of nice features
Summary: 4 Stars
I like the fact that you can also use it for data storage as well as the ability to download cds directly to the device. The one downside is that the radio has limited reception so if that feature is important to you, you may want to reconsider.Digital camera Review: A nifty little device, but...
Summary: 3 Stars
First impressions were good. Drag-and-drop upload is a breeze. Plug in the earphones, turn on the player, and the music begins. The sound is fine.
After a while, you'll probably want to change a menu setting or two, maybe go from alphabetical play to shuffle play. The menu interface is not great, but for most users this probably is no big deal.
I went for shuffle play, and for a while all seemed well. But as I kept adding songs, it became clear that something was wrong. The new songs never got played. In the end, I had about 300 songs, and never heard more than about 50 of them.
Before asking for help, I decided to load the latest firmware into the Zen. The result was sudden death. Do NOT try to download firmware into your Zen. The Zen has no separate loader; the firmware just tries to load itself, and if this for any reason fails, you're almost literally up the creek without a paddle. In the computer software business, this is called "unprofessional code". You can take it from me, I've done embedded programming (including a lot of loaders) for longer than I care to remember.
It took a few e-mail exchanges, but eventually I got a return authorization from Creative and mailed in the player. (I think the post office charged me $2.08.) Considering the technical quality of the firmware, I had pretty much written off the thing. However, in ten days or so, a new Zen arrived. I uploaded the gigabyte, and the shuffle seems OK. Obviously Creative has a serious firmware problem, and the technical support may come across as a little grumpy, but they try. Not very smartly: fixing the loader should take no more than a few days, and would probably put an end to most of the returns.
To sum it up: if you stay away from firmware operations, and don't need the menu very often, the Zen is a nifty little device for you. My guess (a little uncertain) is that you will not have my shuffle problem. If you do, you could try reloading all your music from your hard disk, in one operation.