Sansa Zip Clip MP3 Player Review

Mp3 Players come in many different sizes. Up for review today is the Sansa Clip Zip, which employs a small and simple design. It is simple enough for use by all ages. And even though it is very simple to use, they managed to get a lot of features into a very small drive.

It's features and specs includes:

Easy clip on

Easy Go1.1" full color screen with new graphical user interface and album art display

Voice recording with built-in microphone

Play FM radio stations

AAC Compatible (DRM-free iTunes)

Expanded memory slot

User-friendly interface

Versatility meets affordability

AAC Compatible (DRM-free iTunes), MP3, WMA, secure WMA, Ogg Vorbis, and FLAC. Rhapsody Music trial offer*** (CD & insert)

The Sansa Zip Clip came well packaged and protected. It was placed in a molded plastic enclosure with a clear plastic cover. That way you can see the device through the box. Included items were the player, a small charging cable, earbuds, user manual, and installation software.

The quality of the player seemed good. There was a spring loaded belt clip that appeared sturdy enough. The buttons felt good, and I liked the color LCD display. Fit and finish also appeared good. While a pair of earbuds were provided which is expected, they are also cheap in quality, again as expected. So you would probably want to use them just until you can replace them with a better fitting and sounding pair of earbuds.

Using the device was simple, with different modes for music, audio books, radio, and recordings. Music is for just that. And you are able to look up your music based on album, artist, and genre. It also has a handy mix feature which will do a random shuffle and play songs on your device. You can also do a continuous loop and keep repeating a particular song. Audio books lets you save audio books on your device that you can listen to. The radio section allows you to scroll through the various radio channels in your area, and uses the cable in your earbuds as the antenna. You can also store your favorite stations in memory. It's recording feature allows you to record memos to yourself using the built-in microphone. It also gives you the ability to search through your recordings.

Another really cool feature that I liked, unlike an iPod, is the available memory in the device. Thanks to the build-in card reader, the Sansa Clip Zip has unlimited storage. All you need is additional memory cards. The card reader also includes Sansa's Slot Radio functionality. This makes it compatible with Sansa's prerecorded music cards. These cards come preloaded with over a thousand songs from various genres. There are many different genres, such as 80's & 90's, Classical, Country, Rock, R&B, Oldies, etc. To test this functionality, Sansa also included a VH1 Classic card. This featured Billboard's top hits from the 70's, 80's, and 90's. I loved the 80's and One Hit Wonder categories on the card.

Using the device proved to be very simple. It was easy to navigate trough the menus. I also liked the set-up feature that included an equalizer, so you can better customize the sound towards your liking. Sound quality from the device was also good. The built-in microphone performed as good as expected. It wasn't great, but it was usable. The sound quality was also good for the music section. It was not audiophile quality, but it was sufficiently good. Performance of the tuner was also as good to be expected from a small device. Local stations were pulled in ok. And downloading music was as simple as dragging music to your player thru Windows Media Player.

I enjoyed using the Sansa Clip Zip. It was so simple to use, it really is designed for use by all ages. My eight year old was able to figure it out. And if this is a gift to help get grandma in the digital age, I'm sure she could figure it out as well. And at an MSRP of $49.99, it is a great value. Based on it's quality, features, and performance, it has earned our Value Award. For more info and complete specs, check out their website of http://www.sansa.com/.