SanDisk Sansa e250. Good Nano alternative?

[Lacene]

Hatebrigade, does your sansa have the latest firmware (## - 12A)? Have you checked to make sure that the mp3's have the track # in the file name, as well as in the ID3 tag?? I determined that a number of albums I downloaded to my e260 did not have the # incorporated, and were not playing in proper order. After updating the tracks & re-downloading, they work fine now...

as far as the ghosting, that's a new one on me. I found that the best way to update the tracks is to just delete the incorrect ones off the sansa, & edit the tracks properly using your ID3 tagging app. (I use Media Monkey), THEN installing the tracks onto the sansa. Unfortunately, there's not a good way to edit the tracks while on the player. But I 've had to delete entire albums of tracks before this way, I've experienced no 'ghost' tracks or duplications.

I'd personaaly use MTP mode while loading my music onto the sansa. If you're using windows XP, you can still drag & drop your files onto the sansa.

the limits for the audio & video fast-forward scanning is an issue, to be sure. Especially for some videos, the sansa has been known to lock up while excessively FF-scanning. I guess I don't listen to a lot of extended live recordings on my DAP's: for music, I usually listen all the way thru. But for long audiobooks, I can see how improved scanning would be welcome.

finally, for the video playback issues, I haven't had any skipping or audio "hiccups": the sansa's video processor seems to have some limitations - with the earlier firmware that was initially released with the sansa, there was some buffering issues, etc. A later firmware upgrade fixed it by segmenting videos into "chapters" of 10 minutes, meaning if you download a 60-minute movie, you'll get 6 smaller files, loaded in sequential order - you cant watch a video for any longer length, without having breaks between the chapters, kind of like commercial breaks, without the commercials. The breaks last only a second, similar to the gaps between separate audio tracks.

You said you didn't have this issue with other videos you converted?? Sounds like that's not the old firmware, could be as you say: a poor bitrate, or perhaps a poor conversion process. You might wish to try to convert the files again - try not to use your PC during this time, or use any media player or other A/V software during the conversion, just walk away from the PC while it's converting. You're probably already doing this, but I thought to mention it just in case. Good luck!

 

[Hatebrigade]

The sansa I purchased has the latest firmware 1.00.12a.

Breakthrough! I'm not sure what I did but Ive done something, I made sure every genre was the same, which for some reason it wasn't. I made sure every track was in order, apparently using 05 instead of 5 is not a good idea.. and well, ultimately im making progress thanks to your suggestions. This thing is rather picky though

I was tempted just to unplug the battery and start over.

Also, yeah I left the computer alone while it was converting the videos. Yet even with nothing else running it seemed pretty cpu intensive. So the problem could lie on my end, however my computer is in no way dated so that seems unlikely. I'll need more time to play around with it, world cup has been keeping me busy

I appreciate the response.

 

[Justblaze44]

I was going to buy the SanDisk Sansa e250 as an alternative for the nano, but i came across the Creative Zen Micro Photo and i am happy i bought it. I highly recommend it.

 

[Lacene]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Justblaze44 I was going to buy the SanDisk Sansa e250 as an alternative for the nano, but i came across the Creative Zen Micro Photo and i am happy i bought it. I highly recommend it.

The micro photo is a great alternative to the nano, for those who do not consider a micro hard drive versus flash to be an issue. You can get the 8GB micro photo for less than the 4GB nano, plus FM, voice, and a better color screen for photo viewing (IMO). The micro photo is also shorter than the nano, but is considerably thicker...."blocky", even.

 

[zip22]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lacene and a better color screen for photo viewing.

wrong

(Top - Zen Micro Photo, Bottom - iPod nano)

Quote:

Originally Posted by austin The resolution isn't published on Creative's website but I would estimate it to be about 120x120 pixels since the density appears to be the same as the iAudio X5, and I can compare the two. Whatever the case, individual pixels are easily visible. For the GUI, the resolution is good enough, but it does affect the apparent quality of pictures (more on that later). The iPod nano's screen blows it away in terms of brightness and detail with a 4:3 aspect ratio, 176 x 132 pixel screen. Also, the nano’s screen can be read without the backlight being on, while the ZMP’s screen is totally black until you touch one of the buttons and it lights up.

http://www.dapreview.net/e107_plugin...?content.232.3

and some more
Quote:

Originally Posted by austin The problem lies with the screen. It does not have the brightness or pixel density needed to make images look crisp and detailed. ... Another issue is that images have a slightly bluish tone, as does the black background of the OLED display. This might be do the blue LED lighting inside the player, used to illuminate the buttons.

you've read and seen all of this before Lacene, yet you insist on mis-informing.

 

[captainzoli]

I've had the Sansa e270 for a few weeks now, and I would recommend it. It has a great screen for pictures as well. It does have a few small issues, but I would say it a fine alternative to the nano.

 

[IpaqMan]

I owned the Sansa E260 for three weeks. I was comparing it to my Nano 4gb and Rio Carbon 5gb. The Sansa has some advantages over the Nano: the video, the FM radio and FM recording, the voice recorder, the scratch resistance, the removable battery, longer battery life, and lower price. The Rio lacks the FM radio and FM recording and video and scratch resistance, but it has slightly longer battery life.

However, when examining some of the Sansa pluses in depth, there are significant issues. The video feature requires about 100mb of video for 10 minutes of video. The small screen limits viewing endurance to short clips. The FM radio is annoying to use since FM presets are in the order entered as opposed to in frequency order. The recording features are limited to uncompressed WAV recording which means over 300mb/600mb per hour.

The minuses include a lack of a sleep timer (limits use at night), a slow startup (over ten seconds), small directional buttons, a lack of a bookmarking feature (important for listening to long podcasts), lack of Audible.com support (lesser Sansa models support Audible), and the volume reverting to mid-level on power on.

Basically, I found that the Sansa needs a lot more development work to get it up to acceptable functionality of the features it provides.

 

[AngieAya]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Taphil /img/forum/go_quote.gif I got a new Sansa e260 (4GB) for $155 total from Office Depot, not counting a $16 rebate. Great price. It came with the latest firmware version installed. However, it was returned two days later... The display was awesome, bright, and vibrant compared to the iPod nano. FM radio sounded clear, reception was good. The metal back is nice. The battery is easy to replace. The front isn't that hard to scratch. There were humming noises at the beginning and end of tracks, I guess from loading songs into memory. Annoying. I almost never turn my iPod nano above 1/3 volume, but the Sansa's max output volume was considerably low. The wheel thing did not turn smoothly, the tension was fairly high. Moreover, sometimes it felt rough like it was caught on something. The wheel is raised so high that it's not easy pressing the buttons. On top of that, they're small. Album art was a hit or miss. Album art shows up in WMP10 or WMP11, but it didn't always appear on the Sansa. I figured out you can just copy Album Art.jpg into each album's folder, but I didn't care to do it for every single album I put on the Sansa. WMP10 and WMP11 beta are awful programs for managing a music library and transferring to a device. I like WMP10 for playing videos, but for music it's too frustrating to use. WMP11 is a step backwards like IE7. It froze once and wouldn't respond, and resetting didn't work, so I had to unscrew the back and take out the battery. The main reason I returned the Sansa was that navigation on the Sansa was horrible. On menus, the scroll wheel and buttons have the same freaking function! Like if you're out at the main menu and you press FF or Down, it just advances to the next item as though you turned the scroll wheel, when instead it should FF to the next song that's playing. If your out at some window, like browsing music, while a song is playing and you press play/pause, the cursor moves instead of pausing the music. Also, there's no way to access the currently playing window so you can FF to the next track or change the volume; you have to wait for it for like 10 secs before it returns to the now playing window automatically. The design makes no sense whatsoever. So I gave up.

There is a setting on there which lets you choose if you want Normal volume or High volume. Yours was probably selected to Normal.

I have the same exact problem right now, and still trying to figure out how to fix it without unscrewing the back.

Actually, pressing the power button once takes you to the currently playing window.

 

[rockin_amigo14]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AngieAya /img/forum/go_quote.gif There is a setting on there which lets you choose if you want Normal volume or High volume. Yours was probably selected to Normal. I have the same exact problem right now, and still trying to figure out how to fix it without unscrewing the back. Actually, pressing the power button once takes you to the currently playing window.

that was your first post, and it was a bump of a year old+ topic

 

[fatcat28037]

I've had an E250 for about 1 1/2 yearsand have had no problems. For those of you have problems or questions visit the link below. There's an entire forum for just the e200 series.

http://www.anythingbutipod.com/

 

[srozzman]

heres another good sansa site... http://www.lodist.com