Creative Zen X-Fi

Creative’s previous Zen had the potential to be a great PMP, considering its slim design, large clear display and the button placement for navigation, but it fared quite averagely. Their next-level Zen called the Zen X-Fi comes equipped with Creative’s famous X-Fi engine that should make the audio experience something to look forward to. To cut to the chase, here’s what I think of this upgrade...

Form Factor
The design of the X-Fi is not altogether different from the Zen. The display has the same characteristics – 2.5 inch TFT, 320 x 240 pixel resolution, and 16m colors. The X-Fi also supports memory expansion via MMC/SD cards. The placement of the slot is also on the same side.

The main difference with these two players, aside form the dimensions that differ with a few mm here and there (Zen = 55 x 83 x 11.3mm, X-Fi = 83 x 55 x 12.8mm) is the navigation pad. While the Return and Sub Menu keys (and also the shortcut key and Play/Pause keys) look a bit sleeker and embedded into the design, the nav-pad looks like that of a mini keypad. This is because the X-Fi was originally deigned to come equipped with Wi-Fi capabilities for internal chatting through services like Windows Live.

However, the version launched on this side of the globe doesn’t have Wi-Fi, so I’m wondering what's the point of the keypad, other than providing a way to save your radio stations with their respective names. If the 16GB and 32GB models get here, I guess they would be Wi-Fi compliant.

The navigation is not difficult to figure out. The center key is for selection and all other keys can be used to move up, down, back, and forward. The USB port and 3.5mm earphone socket are in the same place as before, but the power slider switch has been bumped to the rear for some reason. Lack of space? I think not, so go figure. The design does nothing for me.