Creative has had its signature X-Fi technology in the sound blaster series of speakers and sound cards. Now it has decided to move this to it’s range of PMPs, with the Creative Zen X-Fi being one of them. We received the and we see here if it lives up to its name.

The X-Fi has a silver faux metallic back plate. The from of this PMP is piano black with the 2.5 inch screen towards the left, while all other controls are on the right side of the device. The Power and the Lock sliders are located on the back, the top is where you find the microphone and the SD Card slot.

Creative Zen X-Fi

Many PMPs don’t come with the memory expansion slots; but, since this one has only 8GB capacity, the expansion slot is a good idea. One side has the microUSB port and 3.5mm jack and next to that is a small LED light which acts as a battery indicator and along the same side is a reset button. This PMP is also comes with an inbuilt speaker which is located at the bottom.

The button on this device are somewhat unusual and unlike other PMPs, the X-Fi comes with nine buttons, an Options button and a Shortcut button. The later can be customized to give you quick access to a particular menu of your choice. There are additional features and menus that have been added to this player.

The Creative EP-830 earphones are good to use as they fin in the ear, thereby reducing the the level of external noise that is heard. While listening to our test tracks, with the supplied earphone we found that this PMP will be enjoyed by bass lovers as its heavy on the lows; the mids are fine, but the highs need to be cleaner.

Movies need to be converted by the software provided. The viewing angles for the left, right, bottom are great, but the top angle is bad. If you tilt the player towards you, then the appearance of the screen washes out.

Overall, priced at $249, we feel the X-Fi is a good PMP for audio, although the screen is still too tiny to enjoy videos on it, it will do for occasional viewing.

Zebronics has come up with an MP3 solution for wire free music as the Air gear MP3 player is the headset itself.

The Zebronice Air gear is worn behind the neck.These headphones look like Bluetooth headphones, and in fact,are the MP3 player itself.There is no device that needs to be plugged in to play music.The only time you need to connect the headphones to a wire is for charging or transferring music through the mini USB port located on the earphone.All the controls are located on the right earphone.The power on/off and the play and pause buttons are all combined into one button,whereas the volume controls and the next/previous buttons are also combined into two buttons.This is not very easy to use and takes a while to get used to.We faced a frequent problem between switching songs and controlling the volume.

It is very delicate as the plastic neck band that holds the whole device together looks very likely to break if not handled with care.This device will not survive a trip in your bag, if you intend to travel a crowded train or bus during peak hours.

There is no management in transferring music, as you can directly drag and drop the songs you want into the removable disk folder. there is no shuffle or repeat feature available with this player, which means you have to be very selective of the songs you want to listen to, or it will be a cumbersome task to look for that one particular song you feel like hearing.

Priced at $49, it’s not the best of MP3 players. If the neck band was sturdier with a slight improvement in the sound quality, we would recommend it to users who don’t like wires, or to those who like listening to music while they exercise. So until an improved version of this wire free MP3 player comes out, we wouldn’t suggest you buy it.

Altec Lansing inMotion iM600 is an iPod dock that doubles as a radio and speaker for your PC or any other MP3 player. The dock itself is stylish and compact, and is a small rectangular block but can be unfolded on a table. All the iPod models can be docked, including latest ipod touch. You can charge your iPod or synchronize your music as well.

There are controls for volume adjustment at the base of dock and the track switching buttons on the top. The volume control buttons are hard and tacky, whereas the smaller track controlling buttons are very soft and tiny. There dose not seem to be any button for pausing or stopping tracks. Other then that, the dock is simple to use and comes with an inbuilt display on the front, which shows the source of track and volume control. There’s also a compact little remote control, like those found on many of there desktop speakers sets.

The iM600 has good music quality, but it lacks bass in the tracks due to its flat design. It loud though, and there is little or distortion with the volume set to maximum. The SFX button doesn’t really do a whole lot other then making the sound slightly better. The dock comes with an auxiliary connector, which means you can connect any other ipod MP3 player to it, or even your computer for that matter. You also can use it an FM radio, and the antenna comes well tucked in to the back of the dock. One of the biggest plus points of this product is the inbuilt chargeable Liion battery that charges itself when powered on. This dock is then mobile but docking an ipod in a moving vehicle might not be good idea-the base plug could damage itself or the ipod connector from the vibrations.
The Altec Lansing iM600 is priced at $190. It’s a tad costlier then we’d like it to be, but the functionality, flexibility and performance that it offers is hard to come by in such a product, especially in the iPod’s Accessories market.

The View is Sandisk’s attempt at a video oriented PMP and features a slightly larger screen than their mainstream E200 series. It’s also a slightly longer device, and gives up the metal back for a Matt finished black rear that adds a touch of class to an already up-market looking device. The ribbed click wheel also goes in favor of a smooth finish with a smooth moving click wheel. The menu system remains the same, but we found exploration a little better, courtesy the new smooth action wheel. Expansion is avia MicroSD now. should for some reason 16 GB onboard insufficient, and given the fact that the 8 GB MicroSD cards are slowly making their way to the market space, is never going to be a constraint.
All the features we loved on the E200 series are present-FM radio, voice recording, video image viewing-although features like an alarm clock, calender, and the ability to store notes was absent-a pity SanDisk didn’t think of adding anything new. Navigating the menu is simple and the same ease of use has being carried over to the FM radio too. Setting up the channels took very little time. the screen is also a touch below par, especially when compared to the screen on the new Apple iPOD Nano 3G, its logical competitor. Other devices like Cowon’s D2 and Apple’s Touch are miles ahead. Music quality is the other significant parameter, and the View doesn’t disappoint here. Although we noticed good volume levels, the view isn’t as louder as either the D2 or the Nano/Touch duo, nor is it as defined in the highs. In fact, bass doesn’t extend as low as the competition, and while it does pound lightly, it’s not the thump that we’ve seen from the best of the PMPs in our tests.
At $320, the Sansa View is a anything, preferring mediocrity to anyone, with each of the competition mentioned above doing at least something better, while retaining all the same features.

Specifications:
16 GB Flash,MicroSD expandable, 2.4-inch LCD, FM radio, Voice recording, H.264 video playback.

With Apple launching a whole new range of iPods recently, including the iPod Touch, can Creative afford to be far behind? Not one to be caught shuffling around (pun intended), Creative has launched the Zen Stone Plus series. With a player so tiny, we’d expected the Zen Stone to felt flimsy, but surprisingly it didn’t. There’s a small circular blue OLED screen- nothing special- and a play button surrounded by a circular button that houses four controls-track shuffle and volume up / down. There’s a tiny button on the top of the player that has controls for the Menu and play / pause functions.
Available in 2GB only, the Zen Stone features FM radio and supports up to 32 presets, inbuilt audio recording, and stopwatch function-not bad for such a small device. Unlike iPods, there are no drivers required to connect it to your PC-just drag and drop, which is a huge relief. Music quality is a mixed bag with the Stone. Firstly, if you’re even remotely interested in good sound, throw away the bundled earplugs. Once we replaced them with our Creative EP630 headphones, everything was so much clearer. Then we tried the Bose Intra Ear-our reference for PMPs-and things seemed even better. Punchy, tight bass, superb vocal tones, and a decent extended high-end makes the Zen Stone very suitable for rock, pop, jazz and reggae. If you listen to lot of classical music, you’ll need much better headphones to bring out the recessed highs. Bottom-line: the Zen Stone is only limited by its default earplugs-and most PMPs are.
Don’t let this stop you buying it-if you want something tiny, sturdy, and easy to use, the Zen Stone will suit you. If you want good sound, invest in a pair of decent in-ear earplugs.

The shaker is a rather novel concept from sansa, (and after their audiophile-grade Sansa E2xx series), both a disappointment and a delight. One look at it will delight, but after hearing it perform we were a little disappointed despite the fact that it’s supposed to be a fun music player and not a real music player! The shakar is dressed in funky wear-bright blue and white and looks like a salt dispenser, complete with the holes on top (loudspeaker). It features two 3.5 mm jacks. There are two white bands running around the top and bottom of the player. Both twist left and right-the top one controls the volume, the lower skips tracks. There’s a large, receded play/pause button built into the body. Build quality is top class, and a classy aluminium clasp allows it to be belted on.
Sound quality via the 3.5 mm jacks isn’t its forte. Music sounds muted across the spectrum. Highs and lows weren’t defined at all, while the vocals and midrange were barely tolerable for someone really into music. If you aren’t the discerning type, you could give it a try. The loudspeaker sounds much better though, and actually made tunes bearable. When we think shaker all we envision is the average urban kid whose mom and dad don’t want to buy something with a breakable LCD screen. At Rs 1,899, the shaker is good enough to introduce your fresh-in-their-teens kids to the world of PMPs; others might want to give it a pass.

Specifications:
512 MB Flash memory
SD expandable slot
Music formats: AAC, MP3, WAV
Dual 3.5 mm audio jacks
Lanyard with aluminum ring