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- nicnac's review
Have a picture of Creative Zen Vision M 30GB MP3 Player?, please send it to us.
Picture courtesy of Rasmus.
| Sound Quality | 9.2/10  |
|---|---|
| Battery Life | 8.5/10 |
| Features | 9.3/10 |
| Value for Money | 7.9/10 |
| Reviewer Rating | 9.2/10 |
| Overall Rating | 8.7/10  |
By nicnac
on 27th Jan 2006
| Time MP3 Player Owned | Less than a Week |
|---|---|
| Sound Quality | 9/10 |
| Battery Life | 9/10 |
| Features | 10/10 |
| Memory | 30Gb |
| Value for money | 10/10 |
| Overall value | 10/10 |
 nicnac's recommendation | |
Sound quality
Battery life
FM radio
Capacity
Size
Operation
My comparison to what I think is really the only other contender for the Creative Zen Vision M MP3 player (January 2006) that I could get my hands on, namely, my mates 60Gb iPod.
It's just a question of priorities. For me it was sound quality then capacity, operation, physical size, battery life, and fashion.
Sound quality...
What ever type of music you like, if you were to listen to it on both players I'm sure you would agree that the iPod is lacking. There is simply more detail when listening to the same tracks on the big Zen. You can play with a graphic equalizer all day on the iPod, but track after track you will find that if it's sound quality you want, the Zen is the one.
Storage...
Yes I know my mate has me on storage capacity, but 30Gb was enough for me. I rip at 320kbs so that's over 200 albums I could put on it (not that I have 200 albums - more like 50 odd CD's and a few episodes of Voyager) with about 8Gb spare.
Operation...
I must say that if I hadn't used a big iPod, then I would probably think the interface on the Zen was more than adequate. Personally I have to agree with my buddy, in that Apple have really excelled in this area. I have had the Zen for a few days now, and I am starting to make less unwanted selections, but it still happens. I used the iPod for a few hours and it was a doddle.
The fact that my Zen was still physically larger than his 60 gig iPod (never mind the skinny 30Gb iPod) was not so good, but then I have a usable FM radio on-board, and should I wish to watch a long movie or some back to back Voyager and then listen to an album or two away from the mains supply, I can and he can't.
Fashion...
I must admit, I'm not really that fussed about it, probably why my mate drives a Merc and I drive an old Saab.
As a recap, the sound on my Zen Vision:M is wider with more detail than the flat sounding iPod (using all eq settings), but I did find the iPod easier to operate.
Fashion or function that is your choice.
-----------------------------------------------
Players tested with
Music
Radiohead - Hail to the Thief, Faithless - Back to Mine, John Martyn - Solid Air all ripped at 320kbs.
Headphones
Stanton DJ PRO 3000 cans and some Sony MDR-EX71 plugs (both supplied headphones are very poor).
PS. I Have had many MP3 players over the years, but still have yet to find one that matches the sound quality of my old Rio 600. This must be a some sort of rogue single album player, 1 AA battery for 12 hours playback (as I said, only one album (@ 192kbs) though), available on eBay for about a fiver...
| Helpful | Unhelpful | Agree | Disagree |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Total Respect: +5
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