SanDisk Sansa e280 8 GB MP3 Player (Black) by SanDisk
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Digital camera reviews of SanDisk Sansa e280 8 GB MP3 Player (Black)
Digital camera Review: Adequate player, but badly constructed with poor Rockbox support
Summary: 2 Stars
An adequate digital music player, plagued by bad controls, poor firmware, and a lack of standards.
Pros:
- Inexpensive
- Nicely sized
- Bright, clear screen
- Played everything I gave it with no difficulties.
- FM Tuner and vocorder
Cons:
- Poorly engineered buttons and cheap, plasticky scroll wheel
- Sluggish performance
- Proprietary dock connector
- Rockbox support is incomplete
I'm an iPod refugee, who finally got sick of Apple's expensive peripherals, tight-fisted control over my music, and slow and bloated music library software. When I recently lost my iPod, I took the opportunity to try a new music player. Based on the reviews I read (OK, and the things I could get for free with my credit card points), I picked the 8GB Sansa.
As soon as I opened the box I was disappointed. The scroll wheel on the Sansa is cheap plastic, and rattles around in its track when you turn it. When I first touched it I thought it was some kind of packaging that was protecting the "real" scroll wheel, and that I needed to tear it off! The buttons on the Sansa are extremely hard to press -- they're very firm, small, and have no tactile feedback at all (i.e. no "click" when you press them). To make matters worse, it's nearly impossible to press the buttons around the scrollwheel with your thumb when your thumb is on the wheel -- I find myself shifting the Sansa in my hand every time I want to switch from scrolling to pushing. Overall, the Sansa's controls are extremely poor, shoddily designed and made with cheap materials.
Furthermore, the Sansa uses a proprietary dock connector, a la the iPod. This is ridiculous -- there's no reason for the Sansa not to use the industry-standard mini-USB connector, unless they think they can somehow wield patents on the dock connector design to drive up the price of peripherals. I was very disappointed with this.
Docking and syncing was thankfully easy. The Sansa supports the standard Media Transfer Protocol, so no driver or software install was necessary. I just plugged it into my Windows XP PC, chose some playlists to sync in Windows Media Player, and everything worked fine. I then installed MediaMonkey (which I highly recommend over WMP) and synced the Sansa with a set of playlists there, and again the sync worked well.
I had specifically planned to run Rockbox (www.rockbox.org), a free and open-source mp3 player firmware project, on my Sansa. The Rockbox install went without a hitch, however it was only then that I discovered that the Sansa cannot sync under Rockbox. Unfortunately Rockbox doesn't support USB communication on the Sansa -- it can only charge when you connect it to your PC. To sync, you have to turn off the Sansa, then plug it into your PC. The Sansa will boot up into the original firmware, which you can then use to sync. Furthermore, Rockbox doesn't support Sansa playlists -- I had to install a custom build of Rockbox with a plugin that could convert Sansa playlists to .m3u playlists on my player, an extra step that I have to perform for each playlist after syncing.
Another annoyance was moving Rockbox content (such as themes, album art, music files such as .ogg that aren't supported by the default Sansa firmware, and .m3u playlists) to and from my Sansa so that Rockbox could access it. To do so, one must switch the Sansa in its default firmware from "MTP" mode to "MSC" mode (where the Sansa acts like a normal USB drive). When the Sansa is in MSC mode, it takes literally 5-10 minutes to boot while it catalogs its content. Every time I would sync the Sansa to add more Rockbox content, I would have to sit there and wait while the player restarted. This is, to put it mildly, frustrating.
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Overall, the Sansa is an adequate player. I've had no technical problems with it. However, its shoddy design, lack of standards, and poor compatibility with Rockbox make it impossible for me to recommend it to others.
Digital camera Review: After fighting the idea of an MP3 player for years...
Summary: 5 Stars
SanDisk SDMX4-8192 Sansa e280 8 GB MP3 Player (Black)
I bought one for my wife to use on her 2 week stint in the hospital. I researched it and came up with the Sansa Rhapsody 8GB. I have 1200 CD cuts and pics of the family and room to spare. Battery is a strong point - both run time and life. And I can replace it. Let me be clear - I CAN REPLACE THE BATTERY. I love it so much I bought one for myself AND have since bought a 3rd one. I love this darn thing. Where have I been?
Only downside I have noticed - it seems to have a bit of a steep learning curve. But don't be afraid to experiment. Play with it a bit before you go off on your trip expecting it to block out the noise on your flight. Trust me... it will be worth it. BOOT TIME is no where near 5 minutes. Sound is great. Updates are easy. Did I say I love this darn thing?
Digital camera Review: All my friends want one!
Summary: 5 Stars
I enjoy the Sansa e280 very much. Great video quality and the sound is terrific. Everyone who sees it wants one. Even people who own iPods have said they prefer my e280. The thumbwheel makes it very fast and easy to access menus and adjust volume. The FM radio feature makes it easy to use this MP3 player at events that broadcast for the hearing impaired. I can listen without distractions as well as record for future listening. A good deal!Digital camera Review: Almost 4 stars
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a great mp3 player, especially for those who don't want to jump on the iPod bandwagon. Only have two complaints so far, which is why I didn't rate this a 5 star item.
First, you cannot raise the volume output on the player when hooked into your car audio via FM tuner.
But my major complaint is the design of the scroll wheel. It is just high enough and the surrounding buttons are just small enough, that pressing the buttons are not as easy as they should be for people with larger fingers.
All in all, a very good mp3 player. Very glad that someone other than Apple has released a high capacity media player. Finally!!
Digital camera Review: Almost as Good As a Nano
Summary: 3 Stars
The Sansa e280 was my 2nd to last MP3 player. I bought it in the hopes that it would be as good as a Nano as it was 1) A lot less expensive, 2) Had a user replaceable battery, 3) Had the expansion slot for more memory in the form of a flash memory card. 4) Had a more open architecture than iPods. Unfortunately, the user interface and the software were in want of more development and it was not always intuitive to use. I was constantly looking at it and ending up trying multiple ways to get things done before stumbling on the proper sequence. It also does not have nearly the aftermarket of great accessories that the iPod has and these are important if you want to integrate your iPod more deeply into your music life via your car stereo or home stereo. I finally caved in and sold the Sansa and bought the Nano. The Sansa is almost there though and I will bet that the next generation of e series will correct some of these issues and give the iPod some serious competition, which is good for every one amd will help keep Apple honest<G>.