Creative Jukebox Zen Xtra 30 GB

Advantages Better than the I-Pod
Disadvantages A bit brick-like

...Well this is my first step outside of the music reviewing, like a fish out of water, like a sausage in a vegetarians diet here I am with a review of my MP3 player. The player is 30GB, holds about 16000 songs (depending on the song quality you have e.g. 96kbps or 320kbps). My own experience of this MP3 player is a long and troubled one. I recieved it for Christmas (thanks to Mum & Dad for that one) and subsequently stuck my entire collection of music on to there. This is where I encountered my first problem, after I had transferred the first 200 songs onto there, a box came up saying that it has encountered a problem, it subsequently closed. That annoyed me as I had to go through the rigmarole of getting all the songs again. That is the only time it has happened so it must have just been a one-off. For the next two months I... Read review

Advantages Cheap and plenty of space
Disadvantages Navigation

...thing I don't like is the scroll bar on the side, it feels a bit cheap compared to the rest of the product and i'd like to see it improved, no doubt they will on future releases. The battery is excellent, lasts upto 14 hours and is changeable if it happens to break, unlike the apple bretheren which would need to be sent off for repair. The Zen itself has a massive 30gb hard drive which should give you months of listening without hearing the same cheesy pop song again for a while (Holds around 8k songs), which can also be doubled as another hard drive should you ever need it. I would highly recommend this product (even if the people on my bus don;t like me singing along ;)).... Read review

Advantages easy to use, nice looking, long battery life, quick transfering files
Disadvantages bulky, crashes sometimes

...The first thing that must be said is that you can transfer your mp3 collection at a tremendous speed,my mp3 and wma collection which exceeds 1800 files was transferred in approximately 25 minutes, much faster than some other players i have seen. The menu is fairly easy to navigate and you can get used to it within a few minutes unless your a total technophobe. The bass boost can go up really high which is great, i could leave the headphones in and they practically worked like speakers! The environment and spatial settings are verrrry nice, and despite being slightly heavier and bulkier than its main competitor (the apple iPod) it exceeds it in other areas, and is cheaper. The metal case feels solid and reassuringly sturdy which is nice, and the fantastic 20GB memory is also impressive .The sound quality and software is what really... Read review