Creative Zen fails. (Creative Zen 2 GB)

Member Name: Glitterybee

Product:	Creative Zen 2 GB
Date:	09/09/09 (14 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Slot for SD memory card, fairly quick computer to player download

Disadvantages: Poorly designed, fiddly, bad sound and frequently freezes

After much nagging and persuasion from my friend about how 'amazing' these are, i finally decided to invest in one. It had to be better than the highly over-rated ipod right? Wrong. Firstly, it was extremely difficult to get used to, it takes a while to find everything - the organisation is horrible. Secondly the sound is somewhat lacking too, you need a really decent pair of earphones to get the best out of it, i always found i needed the volume fairly high and it didn't pick up on certain parts of songs. They also have a rather nasty habit of crashing/freezing, which can get frustrating when it happens frequently. They don't come with a mains charger, just a USB cable to charge it through your computer, which again, isn't great. I'd had a couple of experiences where i'd taken it away for a few days with me but had no access to a computer so i couldn't recharge it. Of course, you can buy a mains charger seperately but it just seems bad that you have to do that. After i'd had it just over 6 months, it was freezing all the time and just wouldn't charge at all. Shortly after it stopped working altogether. Seemingly this isn't uncommon with these. Some of the few good things i found about them is the screen and how clear the pictures & videos are, it really is very detailed. The songs also download onto your device quite quickly, so thats always a good thing. It has some good ideas and features too, but its just not well designed and becomes somewhat fiddly to use and the software is quite frustrating. Nice looking little things, so it's a shame really, just utter rubbish. My advice would be to avoid, spend your money on something else.

Summary: Don't waste your time & money, buy something else.

Processing/Quality:
Reliability:
Ease of use:
Features:
Sound quality:
Download speed: