all mp3 players

I don't understand how/why someone would blame Creative Labs for the fact that their player experienced damage after being dropped to the floor.

Any device that relies on precision mechanicals can be damaged by a sharp jolt if the force is applied in the right way (this is particularly true if the device is in operation.) This is the nature of these types of devices.

Would they make the same complaint if they dropped their camera or DVD player as well? Accept responsibility for it and move on.

As for myself, the Zen Xtra has been a nice, but incremental, improvement over the original Jukebox Zen (that I still have and use.) The larger display makes navigation & album browsing much easier. The excellent sound quality of the original Zen is still there.

I can't comment on the bundled Creative software because, other than the drivers, I don't use it. Instead I use the Red Chair Notmad Explorer to handle device synchronication because it can automatically transcode/down-sample files from my PC on-the-fly. This is important for my particular circumstances because I've recorded all of my CD's to WMA VBR format @ 240-355KBps. The resulting files sound great on my home system, but they eat up a fair amount of space in return.

One thing that I don't think was an improvement was replacing the original's rotary thumb/navigation wheel with one that swivels up/down. The original was nice in that your could scroll through items in a list more or less as quickly as you could spin the wheel. The new one is an up/down rocker (with fixed travel,) and variable speed, but is much slower than the old scroll wheel. This may seem like a minor quibble, but if you have several hundred albums on your player (remember, this is a 60GB device,) to go through, you start to appreciate things like fast scrolling.

Pros:
1 - The display on the Xtra is well designed & clear.
2 - Transport/navigation ontrols are well placed.
3 - Great sound quality (still.)
4 - Huge storage capacity.
5 - Removable batteries is a handy feature, as is being able to recharge via the USB cable.

Cons:
1 - Lack of an available remote/FM tuner like the Zen (and Jukebox 3) have.
2 - Cheap, bundled ear buds.
3 - 14-hour battery life figure is a bit too optimistic. 7-9 is more like it.
4 - They should'be kept the rotary navigation wheel - IMHO.
5 - New case design completely hides the display so you have to open it to navigate.

Minor quibbles aside, this is a pretty solid player that gets the important stuff right. Now if they can do something about their hideous portable media center design...

Pros: 60 GIGS OF STORAGE!!!!
Great sound quality and useage of EAX
Nice design
free cover and earbuds (come with almost all cd players and mp3 players, but its a freebie)
14 hours of life!

Cons: Flip cover
Earbuds kinda hurt, not soundwise, comfortwise
People think it's crappy because no remote, (LAZY)

Comments: All in all this is a great mp3 player, i like the lcd screen, i use creative sound blaster audigy ex sound card, and to me sound blaster makes the best sound hardware EXCELLENT mp3 player, and if u dont like the software, use the notmad software, search for nomadness.net or sumtin to see how notmad is, drag and drop is in notmad!!!

As of the year 2004 and your looking for a jukebox you can play with I highly recommend this product.Its more attractive than your girlfriend or boyfriend. BIG storage, fast transfer, palm size,amazing suround sound with many different soundmodes,14 hr battery life, and many many many more features.The software it comes with easy and organized.The earbuds it comes with is awesome,fits me perfectly and again it sounds great, best sound quality earbuds produced. At times I transfer about 500 or more mp3's and it takes like 7-12 minutes and I have a SLOW computer.Only thing you should be AWARE of that all recharchable batteries-if charging while being used or over charging or charging when there is plenty left can damage it and it will slim the battery life down in half.One last thing-since the faceplate is deattachable, CREATIVE LABS should design alteranative faceplates.RED,BLUE,GREEN...ANd DOnt Drop it,its like any other baby or jukebox, it can die.