The Happy Consumer

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1

Right now it seems like I am one of few people who are actually happy with the Sansa Fuze+. I hate that so much scrutiny has befallen such a perfectly good device. I do realize that the device is not perfect, however, it is not worthy of being mocked and then returned to the store. It is a very good player that has many redeeming qualities. Now I’m no newbie to Sansas, I’ve been a happy consumer of Sandisk’s “Lil Monstas” for years now. I’ve practically owned them all (C200, E280, View, Fuze, Clip, and now Fuze+). Since all the other users here have pointed out the negative aspects of this device I would like to point out what I love about it

  • Album Art: I have been somewhat of an album art junkie ever since the E280. And with the E280, it was so difficult to get the tags to display album art and it was highly frustrating. With the Fuze/View it was easier, however the album art was no where near as big and luscious as most other devices. However on the Fuze+ not only do all my songs display album art but it is just as visually pleasing as with other (higher priced) MP3 players.
  • Gapless Playback: Finally a Sansa has gapless playback, this is something I’ve personally wanted for a while. When I heard this was in the Fuze+ I immediately got excited. Now all of the little “carry over” nuances in albums will translate seamlessly on my Sansa.
  • Overall User Interface: I’m so glad they changed the UI on the Fuze+. The same old boring interface has been used for every Sansa since the first ones with color screens. I’m very glad they decided to switch it up with this one, it is a pleasant change.
  • Customizable background: I haven’t heard many people talking about this feature, but I love this feature. It feels good to have control over the picture that appears in the background. I actually paid a DeviantART artist to make me a very cool background image for my Fuze+ and it came out beautifully. Something I cannot do on any other Sansa. (Sansa Fuze allowed you to change the color of the background…but honestly thats a joke)
  • Bigger screen: Very self explanatory…a 2.4 inch screen, it looks very beautiful. Much better for watching videos
  • More variety in file types for video and photo: ANY LONG TIME SANSA USER HAS TO BE VERY SATISFIED WITH THIS! Do you know how good it feels to just take a WMV and drag and drop it in the video folder of my Sansa…or drop a JPEG in the picture folder? Ever since the E280 all Sansa users have been scratching their heads over how long it takes the SMC to convert videos and photos.But now, its just as easy as dragging and dropping a file.

Besides all these lovely features with the Fuze+, I also feel some issues with the player are over-dramatized on these forums. Mostly, the sluggish touch pad. The only time I experience slow down is going from the album tab to the artist tab. And its only a few seconds. But I barely ever experience this since I like to search my music by Artist. Also the Touch pad isn’t THAT bad, I’ll admit its the weakest point of the player, but its not this big deal breaking issue that most people make it out to be. For example, most people say they always overshoot the artist they are looking for or something like that. Most of the time, if I overshoot my desired selection, its only by one or two selections. Its never an infuriating problem. I have a library of almost 2000 songs, so the player is practically full and I get little to no slow-down with normal menu navigation. 

Anyway, I just wanted to get this off my chest. I’ve been viewing these forums for years and never felt the need to post here. But I feel like I needed to defend this device, and anyone else who loves this device and thinks its a step in the right direction should do the same. If the people from Sandisk get on these forums and see nothing but negative comments about the device then they will give up on it (like they did the View)

2

I agree, the unit is not as “bad” as people paint it.

Touch navigation takes a bit of learning curve and requires us to move our thumbs in a bit more precise manner than we needed with a thumbwheel.  Also, some of us have “fatter” thumbs then others, and the precision of the pad is definitely affected by the size of our digits.

Personally I find much more accurate navigation using my index finger. 

Also, once you “know” about the current lagginess, you can compensate for it.  Not ideal, and definitely it should not be acceptable to a user used to the older lag-free experience on the older products.

There are definite “enhancements” that were implemented in earlier products that should have been included on this one.

Looping Menu Navigation, Folder View, File detail views were all “enhancements” that were user initiated and users on this forum fought hard for.  To Sandisk’s credit, they listened.  When the new platform was planned, these “user initiated” enhancements should have been part of the basic feature set.  Did Sandisk really believe that by going from “scrollwheel” to “swipe” we would now want to swipe down a huge list to listen to a song by Wheezer?

Had they implemented an intermediate alpha numberic menu that allows users to first choose a letter and then see a list of only the items beginning with that letter, then it may be a bit understandable, but they did not do this.

Also the Top Level Navigation structure in previous iterations of their devices has ALWAYS been looped.  So why the change now?

I will keep my Fuze +.  I like it in many ways better than the original Fuze.  The transfer rate of conent to the device alone is worth the price of admission.  Transfer of channels and content into the internal memory is lightning fast.  (SD card transfers are based on the class of card I put in there, and thus totally under my control)

But I think people are more dissapointed because it seems that the development team ignored all the enhancement that makes the original Fuze now nearly perfect (except for the dated look of the menu).

But, I remain optimistic.  Sandisk has been very responsive in the past and I look forward to this trend continuing.  In the meantime, I will live through the early process warts and all and make suggestions.  After all, suggestions made the previous fuze from an almost-ran to a near perfect device.  Here’s hoping the same hold true for the fuze plus.

3

I’ll join in with you.

I’ve had the Fuze+ for a day now and I’ve been playing around with it.

I’m glad that I made the choice to buy this player. It is everything I wanted.

So many people have been here and around the net complaining about various aspects of the player. But I personally have no issues with anything. Touch controls are just right. I see no unacceptable sluggishness. Maybe I’m just not picky enough.

I bought this device for music listening and it has filled it’s intended purpose beautifully for my needs.

This is my first Sandisk player and I have no regrets. :smiley:

4

Sapphire87 wrote:

I’ll join in with you.

 

I see no unacceptable sluggishness. Maybe I’m just not picky enough.

 

The sluggishness usually appears when navigating between the Artists/Albums/Songs sub menus.

 

I have over 4973 songs on the device between the Memory card and the internal memory.  It takes about 5 to 8 seconds after I swap from Albums to songs to bring up the song list.

 

The laginess is definitely there for large libraries. 

 

If you only have a few hundred songs or so, you won’t notice at all.

5

I see.

So it becomes an issue with a bigger library of music in the device.

Yes, I usually just load up all the albums and singles of one artist into the player. And then change to another when I feel like it.

I don’t carry such a huge collection around. Hope it gets fixed for those who need to carry more files with them.

6

@dzapper wrote:

 I hate that so much scrutiny has befallen such a perfectly good device. )

 

Hate is not a good word to use these days!. :slight_smile:

I recall spending many hours designing my own MP3 CD Covers with PS then printing and burning CD’s, followed the same with the Video side of things including interactive menu structures. It finally comes down to how much time one has and is willing to waste. Sadly most of the CDs’ and DVD’s which are now 10 years old don’t play relyably anymore. Hence half the things that make the Fuze+ a great toy for someone that has lots of time, will sadly turn out to be a total waste of time , nevertheless its still a great invention. Hence it too will shortly end up in the accumulated growing pile of useless stuff with memories, just like any collection of vinyl, reel to reel tape, 8 track tape, and cassette tapes has.

Meanwhile, I’ll simply wait for the next temporary solution to come along!

7

I thought it was really good, I’ve had an absolute nightmare with MP3 players this past year (8 or so have been faulty from several different companies) so to have a 32GB one that works for the price is great!
It does take some getting used to and have a couple annoyances but overall I really like it.