SanDisk Sansa Fuze 4 GB

Product description

The SanDisk Sansa Fuze is a good quality mp3 player with built in FM radio, photo viewer and video playback. It is simiilar in design to an iPod but is a much more affordable player.

The Design

This is quite a small mps player as it measures around 3 inches long by 2 inches wide. It isn't as thin as some though and is around a third of an inch thick. The fact that the width is two thirds of the length gives it a bit of a fat oval look that may out some people off. However, It fits comfortably in your hand and feels more "solid" than some of the thinner, smaller mp3's available. A main design point that stands out is the clickable, scroll wheel. These are appearing on many cheap iPod rip offs and used to be put me off because they made them look cheap and unreliable. This is not the case with the Fuze and the wheel doesn't feel awkward to move. It is smooth and works well, it seems a good move to place it on there, compared to buttons. The available colour choices depend on the memory size. You can get it in black (2GB,4GB), Red, Blue and Pink (All 4GB) and silver (8GB). The screen is about 2 inches and would be good quality if not for the plastic cover that is on the player (more about this in a minute). It isn't a fantastic sized screen but it does the job as this is an mp3 music player which has the added bonus of video and photos rather than the other way around. The screen is placed well on the player and is well protected from scratches or damage. The plastic cover i mentioned covers the whole front and is rather thick. This would solve the main problem of scratches which is the main problem with the iPod. But by solving this problem they have caused another. The plastic causes the screen quality to appear less than it is. This seems to be worse than the problem of light scratches so i'm not too sure why they did it. The back of the player has a metal design similar to the iPod nano. This finishes the Fuze off nicely and makes it a well designed mp3.

Working

The sound quality of the Fuze is good and works very well for the price you pay. It can go quite loud and is still has pretty clear, crisp sound. The video quality is also good and it is a great addition. The access to the video, photo and music files is through a simple and rather dull menu. They are easy to access and you can choose them through different headings such as Albums, Artists and you can also set up a playlist to scroll through. Despite this is seems a bit too plain and there are obvious things that probbly wouldn't be too hard to do but have been left out. For example, the wallpaper. You can have a simple change of colour but nothing else. When it can display and store photos, it would be nice to set one of your favourite snaps as the wallpaper. However, these are little things and the menu isn't something that i spend much attention to. The main points are the sound and picture quality and as these work well, the player works well altogether. There are other extras that are usually ignored such as the built in voice recorder. I've never used a built in voice recorder in anything and i don't know anyone who has. It has a slot for additional memory which can be added to make it up to 12GB, a good few thousand songs. The prices range for this but you can buy it for around £50 which is very good value. The battery life is pretty good as well and lasts for 28 hours of audio and 6 and a half for video. I would reccomend this to anyone looking for a good player and it would also make a wonderful christmas gift.

Thanks for reading
Joe 2008