Summary:

The Creative Zen Nano Plus MP3 Player (1 gigabyte £ 43.20) comes in 10 colors and is available in 512MB of flash memory to store up to 250 tracks and 1GB of flash memory to store up to 500 tracks.

This is an ultra-portable (pen drive size) ultra-portable MP3 / WMA mobile audio solution packed with features in an attractive package and the smallest in Creative’s range at just 32 grams. This is an excellent product and 10/10!

Check:

Sound quality for MP3 is excellent and even better for WMA encoded tracks, the frequency response is 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz, with a signal-to-noise ratio of 90 dB.

Although it is made of plastic, the build quality is of a high standard with a durable scratch resistant casing. The device is controlled by 3 sensible and reasonably sized buttons: on / off (which also acts as play / pause); Turn up the volume; and lower the volume. The remaining functions are delivered via a scroll wheel that also has a rocker function and acts as the skip and fast forward / reverse controls. All controls can be operated with one hand with just the use of the thumb.

The 3 cm x 1 cm black on green backlit LCD (18 characters) interface is a very intuitive and easy to use display that uses 2 lines of text in which each of the 12 main functions is identified by an icon. The screen orientation can be configured to allow reading in any upward position (in any of 16 languages!).

There are 6 graphic equalizer settings: 5 preset (Rock, Jazz; Classic, Pop, and Normal) and Custom. The custom setting allows manual configuration of a 5-band filter circuit for the tonal characteristics of the mid frequencies.

Tracks can be put into memory individually or in folders like entire albums. There are 12 play modes: play all tracks / single track / single folder / all folders; either in order or at random; and even play once, repeat once, repeat continuously.

The device is powered by a AAA battery that routinely provides approximately 18 hours of playtime, 15 hours microphone, and 9 hours of direct coding. However, the supplied Energizer battery lasted just over 24 hours. I prefer to use a couple of rechargeable batteries together.

The device connects to the computer using a USB cable (serial “A” plug to the Mini-B receptacle on the device) and is recognized as a standard mass storage drive, powered by the computer when connected. There is a rubber cover over the USB port of the device.

Computer drivers provide an extremely easy-to-use drag-and-drop style interface with USB 2.0 support, including DRM copy protected music, allowing you to easily transfer music, even via a Windows 98 USB 1.1 PC.

The driver software is not required for simple storage operations, as it can be used like any other flash device; however, unlike some devices, this one does not have a type A connection, so you must carry the interface cable with you.

For ‘CD quality’ playback * a minimum bit rate of 128 Kbps is required, which is equal to 1 minute of music per megabyte, therefore 1 gigabyte provides 8 hours of CD quality music, which is approximately 200 songs. Encoding at 64 Kbps allows for an advertised capacity of 500 tracks.

* In response to any criticism from those who should know better, I know this is not a true comparison, by ‘CD quality’ in the context of an MP3 player I mean better than a cassette, but not studio quality , of course.

Good material:

1) Built-in 8 kHz, 4-bit condenser microphone recordings in mono wave format.

2) A built-in FM tuner with 32 presets and auto scan function;

3) Internal FM recording and synchro recording, allowing you to connect it to a DAB radio and timed recordings;

4) 96, 128 or 160 Kbps line-in real-time MP3 encoding for direct connection and recording from any audio source with line-in or headphone jack;

5) Simple drag-and-drop music and data files. No computers are required, which also allows the use of non-CD audio sources;

6) 18 hours or more of battery life;

7) Works like an industry standard flash drive, so it can store data files such as photos and presentations;

Bad things:

This is an excellent product and the only negative comments I have are quite perfunctory and it should be noted that we computer science fans seem to have a genetic propensity for pointless trivia.

1) From power on, it takes up to 15 seconds to charge and become operational, depending on capacity;

2) The included headphones are good enough, but not good enough to do the sound quality justice;

3) As a flash based player, it might have been nice to have a direct USB connector; Now that the retractable ones appear, there seems to be no reason not to;

4) The rocker / scroll wheel switch is a bit tricky, too sensitive, and may get stuck;

5) When browsing folders, the first song in the folder is played, instead of offering the opportunity to browse without playing;

6) I have noticed the strange random 0.3 second “jump” during playback; this seems to happen every 6 hours of use;

7) I wish it came with a rechargeable battery that could be charged with the USB cable;

8) The device cannot be connected to a computer to provide power while recording from the microphone or direct encoding;

9a) Folders and tracks are arranged in descending alphabetical order only according to the file names, and the device displays the file name only for one second and then switches to the encoded track title, which could be completely different . This can seem disorienting with large volumes of files organized with actual file names;

9b) While a computer is not required except for the ability to delete files, there is no interface to organize or name the captured files directly which are respectively written to a folder of ‘encoded tracks’ and named EN001 incrementally up to EN999, and in a “recorded files” folder named VOIC001 to VC999;

10) Voice recordings are encoded as WAV files, I would have liked the option to use MP3 encoding;

11) There is a 1.8 second delay when starting and ending direct recording;

12) The device encodes directly at max 160 bkps, I don’t consider this to be a real problem, but users are getting used to battery quality encoding and full PCM WAV output. 🙂

13) Direct encoding requires a non-standard adapter (3.5mm to 2.5mm mono plug to connect the cable).

Box contents

Zen Nano Plus;

Headphones;

AAA battery;

USB 2.0 cable;

Line input cable;

Quick start brochure (multiple languages);

CD installation (multiple languages);

Neck strap;