| The Creative Zen Vision is Creative Labs' newest | | | | made for group viewing, and also the screen as it is |
| addition to their successful line of portable media | | | | highly reflective, which is more of a problem when |
| players. A 30GB video player it plays songs, displays | | | | viewing photographs instead of videos as photos are |
| photos, along with video collections. Creative Labs is | | | | brighter than video. |
| the well-known C.E.S. award-wining family who, in May | | | | Something we haven't touched on yet was the screen |
| of 2006, won the "Red Dot Design Award" for Zen | | | | size of the MP3 players. When deciding between a |
| Vision's superior design quality, lightweight pocket-size, | | | | Creative Zen Vision and the iPod Video, the iPod didn't |
| and innovation from Essen Design Zentrum Nordrhein | | | | change screen size - reason? The iPod is known as |
| Westfalen, in Germany. Also, in November of 2005, it | | | | the leader in music, not in videos. While the iPod screen |
| was the winner of the "100 Best Gadgets of 2005" for | | | | is smaller, it seems to be more visible in multiple angles, |
| the personal video player from Gadget Magazine, | | | | while Creative Zen Vision is better straight on. All in all, |
| Indonesia. | | | | it depends on the overall purpose of why you are |
| The Zen Vision has won awards for many reasons, | | | | buying the MP3 player. |
| with the main one its ability to enjoy 120 hours of | | | | The battery and power life has been a real problem |
| movie screenings, based on 500Kbps MPEG4-SP | | | | with most of the MP3 players, and the Zen Vision |
| formats. It is available in a 30GB model which allows its | | | | seems to be at the peak of increased battery |
| users over 15,000 songs and thousands of photos. The | | | | evolution. It includes the extended life Li-ion battery |
| recorder allows the user to tape their favorite songs | | | | pack, for double playback time, which is removable, |
| live with the FM radio or their favorite talk show, plus | | | | rechargeable, and very lightweight. The users can |
| being able to tape personal memos, lectures, or | | | | enjoy up to 26 hours of music, instead of eight or 13, or |
| discussions. | | | | up to nine hours of video. We cannot look at any MP3 |
| The Vision has the ability to support many video | | | | video without comparing it to the iPod versions. So |
| formats. Some are the AVI, DivXTM 4 & 53, XviD4, | | | | therefore, we shall state the iPod offers 20 hours of |
| MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG4-SP, WMV9 and | | | | battery life to listen to music, and the Zen Vision only |
| Motion-JPEG. With this many choices available for the | | | | offers 13 hours. And whenever one company has |
| consumer, its unsurpassed video performance and | | | | something "better to offer" there is always the other |
| superb photo. Many reviews find it the best-designed | | | | side of the coin for the brand X - so Creative Labs |
| product in the PMP category - one available color, in | | | | has made up for this lack of 7 hours by offering the |
| addition to magnesium black, is the white magnesium | | | | extended battery pack. Apple? The ball is in your field |
| case with a soft pearlescent finish, with a blue backlit | | | | now! |
| controls. The low point seems to be the fact it is not | | | | |