What do you want to know about the Zen X-Fi?

[EnzoTen]

I have an X-Fi in my hands and would like to share the details. What questions do you have and what are you dying to know about the Zen X-Fi?

Here are my Zen X-Fi Photos.

Details:

• SD Memory is NOT integrated into the main memory.
• Housing is plastic and the face edge is chromed plastic.
• Wi-Fi connects to UPNP network devices flawlessly.
• Build Quality: Overall its well built, better than the Zen.
• You can listen to or download to the device over Wi-Fi (download is VERY slow)
• Keypad is a bit too small for my fingers, not too comfortable. (subjective)
• Inputting text is not like what you would find on a phone. You have to "d-pad" to the onscreen key, then press the center button a number of times in order to select a single letter. There is no "predictive iput".
• No Gtalk, No Yahoo!, No MSN- just creative's chat service. Am I missing something? Looks like it will display your real name for the entire world to see and browse... very bad.
• Cannot listen to music and chat at the same time.
• The battery time for streaming over Wi-Fi is about 3-4 hours. This may improve when they fix the fact that the screen will not shut off while streaming.

Bugs:

• Will not go into sleep mode or shut off the screen while you are browsing the memory card.

[CrowdAds]

[dfkt]

My obvious question would be - how does it sound? Is that X-Fi stuff anything like the quality of BBE?

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by dfkt

My obvious question would be - how does it sound? Is that X-Fi stuff anything like the quality of BBE?

Initial impressions on my Shure Se530's is its another SRS WOW, in other words its the make-your-music-sound-crappy setting. Like SRS WOW and other sound enhancements there were some occasional instances that it opened the sound stage up and made it sound a little better. But most of the time it it seems to separate the instruments but at the same time it distorts and oddly exaggerates them. This being the Crystal setting. The Expand setting is kind of like the add-more-earwax setting. Or in other words it sounds like you threw a towel over your speakers.

I have to do some more playing with this. since it might make non-premium headphones sound better.

But in short, no it doenst compare to BBE.

Also i have to add without the X-Fi sound enhancements turned on from my initial impression its sound very good. I have yet to A/B it to anything else so take that with a grain of salt for now.

[Rocco]

Is the battery life better than the ZEN?

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by Rocco

Is the battery life better than the ZEN?

The Zen X-Fi is rated at 36 hrs audio, 5 video where as the Zen is rated 25/5. I havent tested yet, but you will possibly get a little better out of the Zen X-fi- but this will very since there is wi-fi and x-fi involved.

[BobbyRS]

Some thoughts.....

I wonder (and bet) that the Zen X-Fi doesn't have the actual X-Fi hardware (chip), but is more so software emulating the X-Fi, sort of the same way as the older Sound Blaster Xtreme Audio cards did. So, most likely, the Zen X-Fi is lacking the processing or hardware acceleration that is needed to be done properly. That would also explain how they were able to "get around" the battery/power issue when using the actual X-Fi chip.

The Zen (and most likely the Zen X-Fi) uses the Sigmatel STMP 3700 SoC which already has the Wi-Fi capability built-in, so it makes sense for Creative to now take advantage of this feature that they suppressed in the Zen and use it as a new feature in a new device. I am imagining that this mainly took a major firmware overhaul to incorporate this, as well as for other smaller fine-tuned improvements over the Zen.

Now with that said, if the hardware is basically the same (except for the speaker and some cosmetic changes like the buttons and case design), I wonder if the Zen X-Fi's firmware would work on the regular Zen, assuming you could get it to install. It may be interesting in how it would behave. Especially in terms of if it would enable the emulated X-Fi......

Is the battery life better than the ZEN?

I'm sure the bigger question would be, how is the battery life with Wi-Fi and/or X-Fi turned on.

[no9]

Is the x-fi emulation and slow wi-fi much of an improvement over the zen or is it just a "ZEN Plus with speaker".
Would you sell your 32g Zen to buy the x-fi.
Is there TV out.
I've got a 60g ZVM with a year and change at 40 hrs a week minimum, try that jobs sheep, so i figure about 6 months and I'm in the market. I've used the zen and I like it even with no integration because that way I can seperate my podcasts to the sd and not screw up my random play with hour long shows

[Lawrence]

I'm just waiting for a video =D.. the controls bug me. You know, all those buttons.

[Cipher7]

How is there no yahoo, gtalk, or msn? I thought this was (heavily) advertised?

If applicable, can you compare it to the cowon d2 in terms of sound quality and video playback? Or just compare them in generally... (assuming you owned a d2, if not then lets forget about it haha) I mean if you had to choose now, which one you would permanently keep, which would it be?

Seems like sound quality is meh...

[scytheavatar]

So is this player nothing more than a Zen with useless WiFi features and useless EQ features? Is there any reason to get this over say the Sansa Fuze?

[The DarkSide]

I'm wondering if the X-Fi can drive a full size set of cans better than the Zen could. If the bass boost was cleaned up or it still sounds like it's under water. Good preview Enzo!!!

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by Cipher7

How is there no yahoo, gtalk, or msn? I thought this was (heavily) advertised?

Heavily Rumored.

If applicable, can you compare it to the cowon d2 in terms of sound quality and video playback? Or just compare them in generally... (assuming you owned a d2, if not then lets forget about it haha) I mean if you had to choose now, which one you would permanently keep, which would it be?

The two have very different feature sets, you should decided for yourself- they are both well built products.

Seems like sound quality is meh...

Sound quality is actually quite good, X-Fi sound enhancements are "meh"

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by no9

Is the x-fi emulation and slow wi-fi much of an improvement over the zen or is it just a "ZEN Plus with speaker".
Would you sell your 32g Zen to buy the x-fi.

The only real compelling thing that the X-Fi has over the Zen is the wireless. I do really like the ability to stream/download music from you computer.

Is there TV out.

No

I've used the zen and I like it even with no integration because that way I can seperate my podcasts to the sd and not screw up my random play with hour long shows

This doenst work for a lot of people because you dont have basic features when playing content from the SD card such as: bookmarking, playlists, ect

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by Lawrence

I'm just waiting for a video =D.. the controls bug me. You know, all those buttons.

The insult to injury here is the fact that the buttons are there for chat features and the chat features are useless because one- Its a only a creative chat network, two- inputting text is nothing like a standard number input keypad.

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by scytheavatar

So is this player nothing more than a Zen with useless WiFi features and useless EQ features?

I wouldnt call the Wi-Fi useless, streaming from your computer works very well. but in short i would say that Wi-fi is the only compelling thing over the previous Zen. The EQ works great, its the X-Fi Crylstalize / Expand i personally find useless.

Is there any reason to get this over say the Sansa Fuze?

Sure, like i said with the D2, the Fuze has a very differnt set up features compared to the Zen X-Fi. There are reasons to get the X-Fi over the Fuze and vice versa.

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by nywytboy68

I'm wondering if the X-Fi can drive a full size set of cans better than the Zen could. If the bass boost was cleaned up or it still sounds like it's under water. Good preview Enzo!!!

They both seem to have the same power, so my answer would be that they will not drive bigger phones better.

[The DarkSide]

Originally Posted by EnzoTen

They both seem to have the same power, so my answer would be that they will not drive bigger phones better.

Thank you - case closed!!!

***RATS***

[no9]

So no bookmarking on the sd card no video out thats pretty worthless. Sd card for vids and pics welcome to the year 2000 Thanks for the info. I still want it but it should at least be better than my 4 yr old ZVM. With everything thats crippled on this player its got me eyeing the evil empire touch

[musichound]

Looks like it will display your real name for the entire world to see and browse... very bad.

Are they frigging out of their mind? If this is true I cannot see a lot of people using this.

[EnzoTen]

Originally Posted by musichound

Are they frigging out of their mind? If this is true I cannot see a lot of people using this.

I also have not found a way to listen to music and chat at the same time.