ZEN X-Fi: more details with a touch of meh

In case you missed it over the weekend, that's Creative's new ZEN X-Fi player with WiFi, instant messaging client, and built-in media streaming. Or so says EpiZENter. Why limit the device to just these capabilities? We're not sure, though we don't have all the details yet. Besides the built-in speaker, SD slot, FM tuner and voice recorder features we're now hearing that the player pictured will include "premium quality headphones" in the box and a battery rated for 36 hours of audio and 5 hours of video -- although it's unclear if that's with WiFi on or off (likely off). It'll also support MP3, WMA, AAC, WAV, and Audible audio as well as WMV, MPEG4-SP, DivX 4/5, Xvid, and MJPEG video formats. Otherwise, it's presumed to be sporting a 2.5-inch display like its existing Zens in 8, 16, and 32GB capacities whenever it might feel fit to pop for retail. Ok Creative, you've got our attention again; not so much for this device as to the mystery of what the "ZEN X-Fi series" might have to offer. Go ahead, impress us... this might be your last chance.

[Zia @ Jun 30th 2008 3:29AM]

I for one am done touching anything Creative until they step up support, for their products.

[ShaunAlfonso @ Jun 30th 2008 6:36PM]

Agreed. While their hardware is usually quite good, they're quite lacking in terms of technical support and firmware upgrades. I had to ship my Zen W to the US for an RMA, even though I live in Canada.

[Zarniwoop @ Jun 30th 2008 3:32AM]

This looks nice, shame Creative don't go in for hard drives any more.

[I LOVE THE CAPS LOCK KEY @ Jun 30th 2008 3:31AM]

Does it contain an actual X-Fi chip or are they just borrowing the brand title?

[Tom Robertson @ Jun 30th 2008 6:41AM]

Good question - I think the X-Fi is the best chip around (for the price). When I bought my Fatal1ty X-Fi chip for my PC, I was astounded with the quality. Would love to have that same experience with a portable music player. May even swap my iPod for this...

[Dan @ Jun 30th 2008 3:31PM]

From what's on EpiZenter, they mentioned X-Fi Crystallizer and Expand filtering, so it would seem that they have some type of X-Fi chip on the player.

[Mike P. @ Jun 30th 2008 3:35AM]

Control setup reminds me of that portable VAIO behemoth of a music player Sony put out a couple years ago...

[Peter D. Lai @ Jun 30th 2008 5:54AM]

Ah, the Sony VAIO Pocket (I still have mine). The difference is that the VAIO Pocket's controls act like a virtual touchscreen with touch-sensitive buttons while it appears that the ZEN X-Fi's controls are just simply buttons.

[Doctor Nick @ Jun 30th 2008 6:38AM]

where's flac and ogg support?

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 3:41AM]

"Go ahead, impress us... this might be your last chance."
The creative vision m and w series were darn good players
There are a lot of players out there that are better than the ipod (touch not included), the reason the ipod does so well isn't the player itself but the software "itunes" that you use with it

[wilcoholic @ Jun 30th 2008 4:15AM]

no its marketing and design. everything else is just crap especially iTunes. Its a resource hog and is just one of the worst software I have ever used.

[Cal @ Jun 30th 2008 5:17AM]

DefPo3t, what did you expect from engadget? If it isn't Apple or completely revolutionary it's meh to them.

Personally I love the idea of a small 16-32GB (don't care so much for 8) PMP with wi-fi capabilities and if this is priced sensibly then my Zen Vision: M just found his successor.

(Yes I know archos pretty much do the same type of thing, but they're overpriced and hard to find here)

[Alex @ Jun 30th 2008 5:22AM]

wilcoholic, No, I beg to differ. Are you saying that WMP is better? It can't even read .wmv files -- which is a Windows format. iTunes isn't a massive drain on power, in fact, I think Word and WMP have crashed my computer more than iTunes has.
Now can we all agree and say that QuickTime is the worst piece of software available? I've never used it on a Mac, but the Windows version sucks eggs. Badly.

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:24AM]

itunes is a resource hog but it does make it simple to manage medai and buy stuff

[John @ Jun 30th 2008 7:31AM]

If you are going to buy music, but from Amazon MP3. $0.99 DRM free downloads that dont contain watermarks (like itunes does,) you can import the songs directly into WMP or itunes, and the selection is huge.

[Steffen Jobbs @ Jun 30th 2008 7:53AM]

How is iTunes a resource hog? Whenever I use iTunes it only takes up about 50MB in memory at most. I've only got about 3,000 mp3s, but I wouldn't call iTunes a memory hog on a 2GB machine. I can understand if you don't like the iTunes works, but it definitely is useful for me and I've never had it crash on me.

If Apple would supply more video codec support for iPods I'd be a lot happier. I had to buy a Turbo.264 to encode files to work on my iPod which is a pain.

This Creative device seems nice enough, but I wonder how long can they stay in business.

[wilcoholic @ Jun 30th 2008 7:57AM]

Alex, actually I dont use WMP either. I use foobar2000 and VLC media player. And floola to put new songs on my ipod.

I highly recommend foobar2000 as your main audio player. The level of customization is just insane. It supports virtually any codec, got tons of features and you just can customize everything. Its extremely lightweight. Foobar2000 is handsdown the best audioplayer on any platform and its in fact one of the main reasons to use Windows.

[gad get @ Jul 1st 2008 2:10AM]

Alex, what are you talking about?! WMP can't open .wmv files, since when? I just opened and played a .wmv file in WMP, to test what I was already 95% certain was a false statement. It was easy. Try it some time.

[Derek Bradley @ Jun 30th 2008 3:58AM]

This is one of my only qualms with engadget. Read that spec list, then the list of the Nano. The X-Fi is far better, but engadget still seems to think anything short of white with shitty software sucks.

[Thomas Ricker @ Jun 30th 2008 4:29AM]

Uh, you're the one comparing this with the WiFi-less nano, not us. Creative's lineup has simply gone stale compared to the competition.

Thomas

[Andrew M @ Jun 30th 2008 4:47AM]

Thomas... I think that's his point. You're ignoring what makes this an interesting player for the sake of saying that it's therefore not interesting. Granted, I'm not sure Nano to full-featured flagship is the fairest comparison, but his point is still valid.

And stale? How can you call it stale when Creative seems to be the only company out there trying to improve sound quality. Which you know, is usually what people would think is INTEGRAL to an audio player. That whole "what is X-Fi?" line in the original post could be answered with a quick look at Creative's site OR the Epizenter post you guys reference. Not knowing what it is (Creative's specialized audio processing- purported to provide enhanced output) is kind of inexcusable for a tech news site.

[Thomas Ricker @ Jun 30th 2008 4:58AM]

Ok, I'll bite. First, I do find it interesting. Otherwise, I wouldn't have given it a breaking news tag yesterday when I posted about it. More importantly, most consumers (read that again, *most* consumers) do not buy into high end audio processing on a DAP for one reason -- these devices are meant to be portable and are thus awash in ambient noise from cars, people, TVs, etc. As such, the added cost to go from acceptable/good to uberphonic is a waste. This isn't true for everybody but it is for most consumers -- Creative's not looking to go niche here, they want total market share.

We've discussed this device internally and just don't see it grabbing gobs of interest. However, as a series, there's potentially something very interesting here indeed.

Thomas

[Andrew @ Jun 30th 2008 5:06AM]

So if this manages to come out at a price point comparable to a similarly-featured player without the improved audio quality would you then consider it to have enough mass appeal? I can understand it might not have the "wow" factor that something like a big touchscreen has, but I think consumers can still understand the value of enhanced audio. Especially for those times that people use these when they're actually at their destination and it could be more noticable.

[BrianB @ Jun 30th 2008 5:26AM]

Let me just say that this is definitely one non-Apple device that I won't mind carrying around in public. I don't know about the rest of you guys but I am extremely impressed by that numeric keypad, which doubles as a D-pad, the WiFi and IM support. Definitely better than the Zune, I'll tell you that.

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:34AM]

Thomas im sorry but your credibility as a writer was lost when you posted that N.E.R.D gizmondo shirt article. Arguing with commentors is childish
You yet your personal preference get in the way with your writing. There is a reason that your posts are often the ones that either get removed or have people complaining about bias.

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:35AM]

Thomas im sorry but your credibility as a writer was lost when you posted that N.E.R.D gizmondo shirt article. Arguing with commentors is childish
You yet your personal preference get in the way with your writing. There is a reason that your posts are often the ones that either get removed or have people complaining about bias.

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:49AM]

just for the record im talking about dap's or things like it your camera posts are quite pleasurable

[Thomas Ricker @ Jun 30th 2008 5:49AM]

DefPo3t, The stuff of legend:

http://www.engadget.com/2008/06/06/pharrell-seeks-nerdvana-with-gizmondo-enzo-tee/

Thomas

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:55AM]

MAGIC I SAY i swear that was deleted me thinks you cheat me : D

[boolean22 @ Jun 30th 2008 3:58AM]

Could that 3x3 button array make the cut for that UI thingy the guys at MS bought a while ago? The one with little thumbnails of pages arranged in a 3x3 grid?

How was it called?
ZenZui?

[A.C.E.R. @ Jun 30th 2008 4:04AM]

Fuck Creative. I've boycotted them for life. I like my ZVM but it's the last Creative product I'll own. Here's hoping the recession kills them.

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:40AM]

would that drive fiscal have anyhting to do with your boycott?

[helloUser @ Jun 30th 2008 5:18AM]

Wow, whats the point of having a blog if youre so extremely apple biased? how is this creative a 'meh' if the ipod nano ranks far worse but gets praised so highly?

[DefPo3t @ Jun 30th 2008 5:39AM]

welcome to Thomas Rickngadet your every day apple rocks everyhting else sucks blog

[BrianB @ Jun 30th 2008 5:20AM]

Creative seems to be struggling with surviving vs releasing multiple products. This one is definitely attractive. Hope this gives Creative profits to be... well, more creative.

[CreepinJesus @ Jun 30th 2008 5:49AM]

When can we expect to see these? Creative have always been far better quality than Apple - mind you, anything that doesn't require iTunes would suit me.

[substance90 @ Jun 30th 2008 6:29AM]

Small display, still no loseless audio (FLAC & APE) and too limited video codec support.
Seems like Creative still cannot decide if it want`s to go for the apple stylish and limited functions approach or a more enthusiast-oriented, like Cowon.

[helloUser @ Jun 30th 2008 10:25AM]

Small display? Is this a joke?

[Danakin @ Jun 30th 2008 8:49AM]

seems decent...as long as the price tag is alright...built-in speaker is nice to have!

[Jake @ Jun 30th 2008 8:49AM]

"Go ahead, impress us... this might be your last chance."

Why? Is Engadget going somewhere? I've been hearing those rumors for years, mind you, but nothing recently...

Err, wait, unless you meant that Creative might be going somewhere? You didn't, right?

Because the former is more likely at this point. Particularly since this seems to have all of the features of the highly praised ZEN + WiFi and IM.

[Greg N. @ Jun 30th 2008 9:25AM]

Fuck Engadget and their gay Apple man-love.

[Good_Bytes @ Jun 30th 2008 11:56AM]

I have a feeling that it won't be Windows 7 compatible, and you would a have to buy the new version....

[tekdroid @ Jun 30th 2008 1:45PM]

Hallo Creative.
http://www.creative.com/products/mp3/
"wide format support"?

WAV support but no FLAC support?
http://flac.sourceforge.net

It would be nice to see Ogg Vorbis in a product released in 2008, too.
Both are royalty-free technically superior (and open source) formats.
Perhaps in a firmware upgrade?

iRiver, Cowon, Meizu, Samsung and others have implemented Ogg Vorbis and/or FLAC in some of their players for some years now. Perhaps it's time to implement it, especially in a 'do-all' type of product like this Zen X-Fi.

[wilcoholic @ Jun 30th 2008 2:40PM]

Dude, just use LAME V0. As if you can hear the difference

Or if you must then WAV is lossless. So I dont see the big deal here.

[tekdroid @ Jul 1st 2008 8:47AM]

WAV is lossless. It also consumes too much space and has no tagging capabilities. MP3 is sub-par.

[Craig @ Jun 30th 2008 3:05PM]

What audience is Creative really trying to target? This thing isn't small enough to really take away from the novel size of the Nano, but it doesn't have enough features to be a serious Touch competitor.

Wi-fi? Old news. Instant messaging? Meh, especially on that clunky 9-button thing. Format support is better than iPod, but still not all that impressive. X-Fi is a neat feature, but I don't think it really makes this thing worth any of its "hype".

[Haterade @ Jun 30th 2008 6:33PM]

"Yeah, I mean, it's better than the iPod Nano feature wise.. but.. it's just not shiny enough.. no.. no.. not impressive at all."

[Mobile Phone Diva @ Jun 30th 2008 5:31PM]

This IS pretty damn impressive if the listed features are correct!

I don't understand the last sentence at all!! What exactly are you looking for to impress you?

[Jhongerkong @ Jun 30th 2008 5:47PM]

"Go ahead, impress us... this might be your last chance."

Wi-Fi

[smiley rojas @ Jun 30th 2008 9:44PM]

looks like a nice player