The Sansa Sandisk E280 8GB player is a great little MP3 player that I have not regretted purchasing once.

First all of the good points:

The interface for the player is user friendly and it is quick and easy to find what you are after. This applies to all aspects of the interface.

The MP3 player itself is good quality and the volume is adequate for most environments. In addition to this the capability to play all of the main audio file formats rather that a proprietary format means that file conversion is not necessary for music and they can just be copied across onto the player.

The video side of the player isn't too bad either for a MP3 player and the video plays well, however the video files will need to be converted into a certain format and size, but the software bundled with the player takes care of this for you. This does however mean that after about 15 minutes of video it has to load the next file in the sequence so make sure the names of the files are sequential (it just gets confusing if chuck makes an appearance on SG1).

The storage capacity on the player is more than adequate for most peoples needs and the transfer file transfer speeds are very good. I attribute this to Sandisk being originally a memory disk company. The player also has the bonus that if you are away from home and suddenly in need of some storage to bring some files back the player can be used on a pc without drivers by changing the USB mode. Additionally being flash memory based there is no jogging of the player.

The battery life seems to be quite good as I can travel from Manchester to Poole (roughly 5-6 hours) and back without having to recharge it. I have also watched video on it for the journey but recharged it before the return journey as I hate running out of music in a jam on the M6.

There are two versions of player that you can buy, one designed for UK use with a radio and one that was designed with a radio for the US that due to UK laws has had the radio chip removed. I bought the UK model and this seems to work well enough, however without an ariel the reception may not be that good in areas with a poor signal.

Now for the sides of the product that are not so good:

From time to time the player may freeze, locking up the interface. This has only occurred to me once and it is easily solved by holding down the power button. Some people have however had more problems.

The other problem is more a cautionary note. If you buy this player i would also strongly advise buying the travel accessory kit (with pouch and screen guard) and installing the screen guard immediately on opening the box as the screen is easy to scratch. The pouch is also a useful addition as this will prevent accidentally turning it off in the pocket (and incedentally keeps the screen guard from coming off.

Overall however i would say the player is well worth the money.