2. Creative Zen V Plus

If you want something with a little more style, the Creative Zen V Plus adds more features to the basic music player we reviewed recently; these include recording, FM radio and video playback. It's available in a range of colors and in 1 GB, 2 GB and 4 GB sizes. The OLED screen on the Zen V Plus is very vivid and photos look good; we also like the way you can choose a photo as a screen backdrop. It's only 1.5", however, so don't expect to make out any detail.

That screen size is very small for watching video, even when you rotate the screen orientation. And the frame rate is only 12 fps at a resolution of 128x96, which means that your video files will be noticeably jerky. You can play a good range of video formats, including TV shows recorded from a Windows Media Center PC, but you have to convert them to the proprietary DIB format with the Creative Video Converter software. The program is not hard to use, but it's another step to deal with.

The recording and FM radio are both of reasonable quality. All the other features - such as photo viewing, audio playback and Outlook synchronization - are the same as on the Zen V, though obviously the battery life decreases significantly when you watch video or make recordings.

Conclusion

How much you want to do on so small a device? FM radio is certainly useful to give you a change from your music if you can't swap over to a new playlist for a few days; 4 GB or even 8 GB doesn't give you much variety. But other features are less compelling when you actually use them.

These mini players have very small screens for watching video, so you may not want to do it at all. If you do, the MSI P640 is the best choice; it also has the best sound for video or music. You can view e-books, but you'll have to do a lot of scrolling because of the small screen.

The Creative Zen V Plus wins for recordings; honors are tied for listening to the radio. Neither the P640 nor the Creative Zen V Plus is as good as the new iPod Nano at photo viewing, but they have features that the Nano doesn't, no matter how many add-ons you buy.

Of the two, we'd pick the P640 for the capacity and price, even if you only want to listen to music - in that area, it gives even the iPod Nano a run for its money.

Join our discussion on this topic