Creative Zen Stone Plus Review

The newer Creative Zen Stone Plus is an improvement over the Zen Stone and the older Zen Stone Plus. Both the Zen Stone and Zen Stone Plus are good options in the low end category and compete hard with the iPod Shuffle and the Sandisk Sansa Clip. With the recent drop in prices in both of them, Creative has released newer versions of both the Zen Stone and Stone Plus providing slightly better sound quality but much better battery life and come with built in speakers. Actually speaking, the iPod Shuffle comes nowhere when compared to the Zen Stone / Stone Plus or the Sansa Clip. Both offer much more in terms of features and sound quality. The upgrades seem worthy, as there have been some improvements which we will delve in during the review.

Creative Zen Stone Plus Specifications:

• Capacity: 2 GB / 4 GB
• Display: 64 x 64 pixel Blue OLED display
• Size: 55.6 x 35.7 x 17.5 mm
• Weight: 27 gms
• Battery Life: 20 hours Audio playback
• Battery Type: Rechargeable Li-Ion Polymer (Embedded)
• Audio Support: AAC, MP3, WMA, Audible 2, 3 and 4

Other Features: Mass Storage Device (MSC mode), USB 1.1 / 2.0 connectivity, FM Radio with 32 Preset stations, Voice recording

Design and Build Quality:

The new Zen Stone Plus sports basically the same design as the older models but comes with an added speaker now. The body is almost completely built with a rubbery matte surface woth plastic used only in some places like the controls. The build quality is superb and just like the old Zen Stone Plus, this one can take many a hit easily. It is very durable and tough. The newer version is slightly more bulkier than the older ones due to the bigger battery and speakers. The button layout is almost the same as the previous models with no other difference. They are easy to press and have a good feel. Apart from the player controls, it has just the USB data port at one edge and the volume rocker and a headphone jack at other edge. At dimensions of just 55.6 x 35.7 x 17.5 mm, it is a very compact player and should fit in any 4 year old kid’s pocket easily. It also weighs just 27 gms which is super light when taking its features into account. There are almost no qualms on the design and build quality front, except that some people might have preferred a slightly more stylish design. However, we are not complaining.

Display and Interface:

It sports a small blue OLED display with a resolution of 64 x 64 pixels on the front face. It is used just to display basic media player track information, FM radio station information and other player controls. The new Zen Stone Plus has a very minimal interface, very similar to the older Zen Stone / Stone Plus with some performance improvements. The menus now open slightly faster with less delay.

The interface is a lot less buggy than the older iterations and can be navigated through by the player control D Pad on the right. The interface is easy to use and shouldn’t need even a beginner to exercise his brain cells. Most of the controls and interface elements are very logically arranged so you can easily guess where you need to go next. You can also use a dedicated customizable shortcut button to jump to any feature you want with a single click - Music, Radio, Speaker On / Off, Clock etc.

The Zen Stone Plus supports just the MSC (Mass Storage Class) protocol and not the MTP (Media Transfer Protocol) protocol. Thanks to MSC support, it can be used as a mass storage USB device on any computer or OS - Windows XP, Vista / Linux / Max OS X. You can just plug in the device and copy the songs to your device without the need to install any software. It supports the AAC, MP3, WMA, Audible 2, 3 and 4 audio formats. You can convert any of your music to these formats using any third party converter or using the bundled Creative Media Lite software. You can also update your firmware using the mentioned software.

Audio Playback:

The Zen Stone Plus used to be the king when it came to audio quality in the low end range until the Sansa Clip took its crown some time back. Creative does manage to bridge this gap substantially with the new Zen Stone Plus and both the players are now almost equal in terms of sound quality. The Zen Stone Plus has one more thing going for it - its loud speakers. The Zen Stone Plus is one of the best sounding players in this category. It should easily satisfy most people who need a player just for casual music. You can’t get better quality than this atleast with normal earphones. Audiophiles may not like it and may shell out more dough and get a Archos 5 or a Zen X-Fi. It also comes with a basic equaliser which does more bad than it does good. The interface is decent as discussed earlier and performs better than the earlier versions.

Coming to the feature that has been the highlight of this new player, the new Zen Stone Plus sports a small speaker which is surprisingly loud and has good sound quality. It undoubtedly has the best speaker in this range which has a good range and is clearly audible across a big room. The speaker is where Creative has been totally right with the Zen Stone Plus.

Battery Life and Other Features:

The Zen Stone Plus is powered by an embedded rechargeable Li-ion polymer battery which gives a battery life of about 20 hours for continuous audio playback. The battery life is quite good compared to other players its size and should easily last for about 2-3 days depending on the usage. The Zen Stone Plus has a load of other features like FM Radio, Voice Recording, Stop Watch etc. FM reception is nice and has 32 presets to store different stations. The FM sound quality is great. It supports autoscan which doesn’t work quite well. It can also be used for voice recording which is strictly average though. You can also use the built in stopwatch feature in the Zen Stone Plus. You get just the basic accessories bundled with the Zen Stone Plus. It comes with the standard earphones, a skin, a clip, a USB cable and a quick start guide.

Pros:

• Inexpensive and Durable
• Nice Loud Speaker
• Great Battery Life

Cons:

• Minimal Interface
• Poor Equaliser

Final Words:

The Creative Zen Stone Plus is a great buy at just $49 for the 2 GB version and $69 for the 4 GB version. It totally trumps the iPod Shuffle and is a good alternative to the Sansa Clip.

Our Rating: 3.75 / 5.