I recently purchased a 4GB Sansa Clip Zip from Best Buy. I got it in the mail yesterday, I charged it for the mandatory 2-3 hours before I used it. It seemed to be working just fine until a couple of hours ago.
I was listening to it when the power on it suddenly died. I could not get it to turn on, and when I plugged it into the computer, the computer suddenly would not acknowledge it was plugged in and the power on the Sansa would not come on. No matter what I do, I can not get the computer to acknowledge its connected at all, it does not show up at all on the My Computer display. It will not come on at all. I plugged it in to all the USB ports on the computers and its the same problem. I don’t know what to do, I have only had it 24 hours and it just suddenly died. I don’t know what happened, nor what to do about it. Can someone help me please?
The processor of the Sansa also controls the USB interface, so if you hace a Clip that goes blank while playing a music file, it has “frozen”. The player isn’t “dead”, per se, it’s literally “frozen” in execution. Since the device has halted, it won’t respond when plugged in to the USB port. At first glance, it’s easy to assume that the device is dead. No worries!
The soft reset is the solution in this case. Press and hold the power button for about 20 seconds to reset the device. Release the button, and then power it up as usual. Every time the device is powered off normally, it saves the end position (which music file was being played). After resetting, the player will revert to this last played file.
i bought the first clip-zip and after 3 days it crashed. i took it to the store, they sent it to the company for a repair, and after a week they told me that i will get a new one.
the new one crashed on the first day. I know i could ask for a new one every time if I ever want a different colour, all i have to do is bring it back to the store after a freeze.
i don’t expect store owners to know how to fix products that they sell, but the servicemen at the company should at least know to try this method before even taking it apart.
what is Sandisk doing about this issue? I have just encountered this problem yesterday, one day after I got the player. How often does this problem occur? I do not wish to have this problem again, having to constantly reset the MP3 is a deal breaker for me.
I had my Zip going dead at least a dozen times over the last fortnight, I don’t believe it is rare. I think Sansa should fix this issue or I am going no RMA my zip and buy an …Ipod
(a.) The device should shutdown when battery is critically low. ( The device should ‘note’ this auto-shutdown, see below. )
(b.) The device should auto-reset when charging from critically low. ( ie. any power-up, or after charging, if auto-shutdown OR manual power-down NOT used. )
Thanks for the advice everyone, I just bought a Sansa Clip Zip earlier this week, and had already updated the firmware to the latest version. I was listening to it earlier today as the battery was nearing empty, and the screen went black. Plugging it into a USB port didn’t do anything, as described above. I did a soft reset by holding down the power button for 30s, then pressing it agian, and it started right back up. Thanks to all the community members for their help. Hopefully SanDisk will get their act together in the power management department.
The problem is that these devices never really completely shut off; they rest in a low power mode, with the clock oscillator keeping things going, just like a wristwatch. When the battery reaches a critically low state, the device has no choice but to halt, in order to protect the lithium battery.
In other words, if the device “keeps on ticking” after the minimum threshold, it will commit battery “suicide”. In this case, a soft reset (holding the power button depressed for 30 seconds ) will command the device to restart, but it needs a charge.
If the device is plugged in to a power source, it will trickle up slowly. This is usually 30 minutes, at which time the device will awaken and resume higher current rate charging. In normal operation, the Sansa will manage the charge rate automatically. If the battery would completely discharge, it is damaged beyond recovery. This is why there is a minimum voltage threshold.
I think I’m having a similar problem to the one being described here, namely it appears to be non responding. However, when I try a soft reset, it says “Refreshing your media” then it shuts down and becomes non responsive again. I’ve tried doing a soft reset while it’s plugged into my laptop and plugging it in shortly after the soft reset and leaving it on for about an hour…and nothing changed. I still need to do the soft reset and it still goes back to being non-responsive
I think I’m having a similar problem to the one being described here, namely it appears to be non responding. However, when I try a soft reset, it says “Refreshing your media” then it shuts down and becomes non responsive again. I’ve tried doing a soft reset while it’s plugged into my laptop and plugging it in shortly after the soft reset and leaving it on for about an hour…and nothing changed. I still need to do the soft reset and it still goes back to being non-responsive
Any tips?
Starting with the player OFF, plug it into your computer. It should recognize a data connection so it should not start refreshing database cycle. If it does, remove it, turn it off and try again. This time though, press and hold the center Select button while you are plugging it in. This forces MSC mode. If the center button doesn’t work, try the left, or REW button.
Once you are connected to the computer, go into Windows Explorer. There will be 2 new drive letters; one will be the player and the other will be the card slot. Right-click on the player’s icon and select Format… from the context menu. Note this will erase everything you have put onto the player, so you will need to re-load afterwards.
But before you do that though, realize that the most likely reason the player frreezing during the database refresh in the first place is that it is encountering some file or ID3 tag it cannot read or is corrupted. You will have to track this down and fix it before reloading the player, or you’ll be having the same problems again.
There are a number of discussions on this forum regarding this and tips on ID3 tag editing. The Search function can easily bring them up for you.
I bought and returned TWO Clip Zips before finding this post. The first "died’ overnight. The second “died” while the music was playing. So this problem is not infrequent. I see from the forums it happens often with both the Clip Plus and the Clip Zip… What a pain. I had the 8GB Clip Zip with a 32GB memory card. Also after the fact, I found some small print that says the player will take a 32GB card but 16GB max is recommended…! So I was thinking this might have caused the crashing. A SanDisk support person suggested a corrupted file on the memory card. But how do you know which file is corrupted before reloading the re-formatted card? I love the little player, so I’m thinking of trying one more time with either a Clip Plus or Fuze Plus.
if I ever want a different colour, all i have to do is bring it back to the store after a freeze.