Micro beats up Mini (Creative Zen Micro 5 GB)

Member Name: shadowhawk

Product:	Creative Zen Micro 5 GB
Date:	16/06/05 (632 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: More Space For Music, Longer Battery

Disadvantages: Not the Apple brand, Extras

Creative Zen Micro

The Creative Zen Micro is a hard drive mp3 player not a flash memory player like the smaller light weight mp3 players. This allows it to hold a lot more music but a hard disc by a spinning metal plate with a pin that reads it that has to stay a hundredth of a cm above the player which does mean it is not the most jog proof player out there. If you want something you want to do excessive continual exercise with go for an iShuffle, not one of these or an iPod unless you want to be switching it back on a few times.

An mp3 player is a device which stores music in a digital format, calling it an mp3 player is not strictly true as they can play most kinds of format which music can be in including the most popular mp3 and wma.

Have a pile of CDs that you love then this may be the device for you just pile them all on there then you can select the tracks you want at the time you want without having to carry around a pile of CDs with you.

All you need is a computer (with a CD drive) and this wonderful set.
The Zen micro comes with removable battery,
USB connection wire, Zen Micro, Stand/Belt Clip, Charger, Installation Disc, Headphones, Instructions.

The removable battery comes in very useful because rechargeable batteries have the reputation of fading over time and this is completely true but due to the fact that you can replace this one you can change it when it gets really old one with a new one.
The battery I find lasts about 8 hours its does claim 12 hours but I don’t think so. There is ways to extend the battery life the biggest one is to select that you have no back light on the screen, which will not allow you to see the display in the dark. Also the louder you play the music the more it drains the battery. But the battery life for this device is still a lot better then the iPod Mini.
The battery is rechargeable which I really like it mean no long term running costs with having to change the battery over, just means you have to remember to recharge it.

The connection between the computer and the player is done through USB which is pretty set standard in my computer now-a-days and should find at least 2 at the back of your computer, unfortunately I have 2 computer and one has 7 and one only has 2 ports one which is taken by a scanner and one by a printer. The solution is to either plug in what you need when you need but the computer is slightly weird about changing devices and drivers, so I have splashed out £8 on a USB hub which divides the USB port into 2 ports so I can have the connection to the computer all the time with no fiddling.

It comes with a plastic case that has changeable backs to make it either a belt clip or to make it a stand, still have not found a use for the stand its not like you can get speaker docks for the Zen Micro. I was very disappointed with the options available with the Zen Micro there is no way to hang it around the neck or fit it on you in as many ways as an iPod.

My Zen Micro does hold 5gb that if I am not mistaken is 1gb more then the iPod Mini so it does hold more music. 5gb of music is about 2000 songs, which you will not fill at all and if you do you will not listen to all of it at anyone time as 2000 songs at 4 minutes each is 8000 minutes of music, which is about 133 hours of music and that is 121 more hours then the battery life clams to be. But just between me and you its great to be able to throw what ever music you have on it and search it all by artist, genre, album or just do a random play all makes sure you do not get bored of the music that you have.

It is hard to talk about the quality of the sound that comes from a Zen Micro, because it will cope amazingly well with all the qualities you can really throw at it, but remember you can set the quality when you take the music of a CD if you wish to have the same sort of quality 128kbps plus I would have to say for a really enjoyable music experience.

The player does come with headphone but we do not rely upon these for one they are bright white, shouting out to thieves mp3 player, also they are poor quality and mine broke after a month literally fell apart. If you wish to have an amazing sound experience splash out on a good set of headphones.

The size is only 3 inches by 2 inches (roughly: 7.5 by 5 cm), this feature is great as it just slides into your pocket and doesn’t really bulge at all I just slip mine in and forget that I have it on me if it was not for the tunes coming through my ears.

The software that comes with it I really like you can use it upload music from your computer to the device and in it you can change and check the title, artist, genre and all that before it goes into the player. I prefer to use Windows Media Player which it is fully equipped for if you have the internet when you insert a disc it should look for all the information of that disc before you “rip” the music of the device so you can “sync” (upload) it to the player. If you do not have the Internet I am afraid to say you will have to do all this yourself. But the software really is easy to use once you have it on your computer just select it in the Creative software of Windows Media Player and upload it to device, which looks fully after itself. Unfortunately I am not sure if the player works on Apple computers at all, it defiantly cannot play iTunes, so you can not get music from Apple but you can get music from any other site if that’s the way you purchase music. You can get a firmware update for your Micro and this tackles my biggest problem for the player which is the battery loses charge when its just switched off and as I travel quite a bit then its switched of for a couple of days at a time.

Unfortunately I have found these not to be the most durable goods as I dropped mine 2 feet onto carpet and it wouldn’t work but I just took it back to the shop and may of forgotten to mention the drop, but they gave me a new one. Top tip always keep your resists somewhere they come in a world of usefulness.

If you have a CD player, or a tape player the digital revolution is so worth it.

Thank you
David Clark (sorry don’t normally write electronic reviews)
(DavidJamesClark@hotmail.com)

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