gadget find: goodbye creative, hello ipod!

I had long been a user of Creative because it offers a lot of features as compared to its more popular rival, the iPod, which only functions as an mp3/mp4 player (then).

My first Creative was the Zen Stone Plus which was very handy and stylish since I used to wear it around my neck making it look like a pendant.

For a size that small, I was really amazed that it already has a voice recorder, an FM radio, and stopwatch among its other features. However, it just stopped working one fateful day. I  didn't anticipate its death to be so soon because I only had it for 2 years and it was still playing perfectly a day before that.

Since I really can't bear not listening to music while commuting, I finally decided to get a replacement. I did a lot of research prior to my purchase and found my perfect match in Creative Zen X-Fi:

This baby is packed with lots of features: a video player, photo viewer, voice recorder, FM radio, calendar, SD card slot, speaker and of course, the X-Fi technology which claims to enhance your listening experience. My thoughts on this technology? Well it makes a difference in the sound quality but if your mp3 is a bad copy to begin with, then the only effect you'll have is that it makes the sound louder than usual.

Here's my take on this mp4 player which has been with me for 6 months:

The GOOD:

• Remarkable sound quality. I appreciated the X-Fi Technology more whenever I listened to Chillout/Bar Lounge music since even the most minor of sound details can be heard clearly.
• Size is perfect for watching movie. It's also small enough making it really portable.
• You can expand the memory through its memory card slot. Since I only bought the 8GB version, I bought a 16GB SD card to store my videos and other photos.
• It's plug and play! Unlike the ipod, you won't need iTunes to transfer your music files from your PC to your player.
• Really clear voice recording!
• The loudspeaker was also very useful and the sound quality is not compromised.
  

The BAD:

• It got busted 3 months after using it so I had to return it to Villman to have it repaired. After 1 month of waiting, I finally got a replacement. Then I've lost interest in it so I sold it instead.
• There are some useless buttons.
• If you're playing music/video from an SD card, it will stop when you navigate to other menus.
• You had to convert the video to a certain format before you can play it. The video converter found in the CD was virtually useless so I had to download another media encoder.
• The earphones that came with the unit was substandard since I only got to use it for 3 months. Yikes!

I would have kept the unit if it didn't get busted. But it was also blessing in disguise because it gave me a reason to buy the new iPod 5th Gen!

Finally, Apple has come out with everything that I've been looking for in an mp4 player! It even has a pedometer and video recorder to boot! Now I ain't got a reason not to buy that, eh?

My iPod has been with me for less than a month and until now, I still find it such a hassle to sync my music files through iTunes. Really a bummer since I've been used to Creative's plug and play. But aside from that, my MAJOR gripe is the loudspeaker! Ugh, it really pains my ears that I wanted to throw the thing away! I don't know why it has such bad loudspeaker since the sound quality is good whenever it's attached to earphones or a portable speaker. My PDA or even cellphone speaker sounds better than this! Yikes!

But I super love the Nike+iPod kit. Keeps me motivated to run more! Yey!