Good player when it worked
Strengths:Simple menu, good sound, long battery life, fast uploading, bulk tag editing via software
Weaknesses:No format capability, scrolling too sensitive, poor headphones, annoying "Random" button, reset button hard to press, poor warranty coverage
Posted Nov 7, 2005 - First off I tried to format the player because of the songs initially loaded. There's no way to format the hard drive to my knowledge. I just used the organizer software to delete the tracks off. The menu system is pretty simple and straightforward. Once I chucked the lousy headphones I noticed there's a very good sound. The lows and highs were clearly defined and the volume was sufficient for most tracks. I haven't used the EQ very much. Using the custom EQ is difficult because of the way you have to change the levels using the touch pad. The touch pad is overly sensitive even on the lowest setting. Fine tuning the sound is pretty hard. Don't try it while you're driving! Scrolling thru menu items is way too sensitive. On low sensitivity I can scroll thru about 60 items per second. On high sensitivity I can scroll thru about 250 items per second. Get used to constantly passing the item you want to select. I like the fact they give you a carrying case but unless you put the hold switch on you'll most definitely press a button putting the player in. Usually, it's the dreaded "Random" button. Besides the fact I don't see the point of it on the front of the player, you have to go thru the main menu to switch back to normal play. Most of the songs on my player come from my CDs and I found it pretty easy to transfer the music. When you have around 400 CDs to put on your player you like the process to be as automated as possible. The quickest you can get it done is to download the CD info and drag the CD to the player. An auto-eject or auto-fetch for info would've been nice. Once the music is on the player it's very easy to edit it from the organizer software. You can even select multiple items and change the tag info in bulk. If the letter case is wrong you can't just change it directly because the player thinks it's a duplicate file. I don't have a method to use the player with my stereo but I trust that will perform very well.
UPDATE #1: Suddenly the sofware on my computer wouldn't interact with the player anymore. The software would constantly freeze if I did anything other than look at the player's contents. I uninstalled and reinstalled everything but that didn't help. I killed all of the CT tasks and reopened MediaSource. Finally things were back to normal. I guess all of the software starts to conflict with itself and that's why it kept freezing. I also reset the player once, but I'm not sure if that's what actually fixed my problem.
UPDATE #2: I live in a typically hot climate area and I don't think the player appreciates that. Sometimes I can hear the hard drive click incessantly and the player won't respond. In my car, if I hold it up to the a/c until the back is nice and cold it doesn't have trouble. Because of this odd behavior I've hit the reset button more than a few times. It is way too hard to press. First off, the hole is way too small and secondly it's hard to find the button. I imagine the button was covered by cheap rubber padding and I have already torn it off, making it 10 times harder to press.
UPDATE #3: I'll probably just trash my player now. The majority of the songs will play, but sometimes it will just click and scratch forever. Yes, it's under warranty, but labor is only covered up to three months. I won't send my player in then have to pay $50 to get it repaired. It will be a long time before Creative gets any of my money.
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Rated 
If you don't want n iPOD because everyone has one, ...
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I had a terrible time trying to install the Creati ...
DO NOT BUY CREATIVE
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