Problems with new Sasa Clip+

I bought a Sansa Clip+ from Best Buy yesterday, loaded music on it, listened for around 4 hours, battery showed as full right out of the box.

I was laying in bed reading, and really enjoying the Clip+, then I went to the menu to change albums, and suddenly the screen started scrolling single characters, then part of a long song name, which showed pause at one end and 0:00 at the other. It was not playing any song though.

Turned it off, it wouldn’t come back on, well not as fast as it had earlier, then when it did come on again, after I randomly pressed buttons and pushing power every 10 seconds or so, it immediately started the fast single character scrolling again, then it froze, I think it was on the same song but I can’t positive, finally it wouldn’t turn off and was just frozen.

Found out from Google to hold it down for 15 or more seconds, which I did and that turned it off.

Attached it to my PC, it took longer then it had to open the folder but when it did it seemed to be ok again.

I then disconnected it, played it, and it was ok. 

Reconnected it, deleted the folder that had the song it stuck on, then copied some songs, including the folder I had just deleted, this went ok as well.

Currently I have it on the USB port and the battery is recharging.

Battery still showed almost full when all this happened. For a matter of fact it only had one bar gone on the battery indicator after at least 4, maybe 6, hours of use. I don’t know if that is normal or not.

Read the enclosed guide, but the firmware page it points you to doesn’t exist. (404).

Does the Clip+ currently have a firmware update I should be using?

I don’t know how to check what firmware level is currently on it, though I haven’t tried very hard either.

I am reluctant to update the firmware from the other SanDisk pages as it does not say Clip+.

This is a newly released device so I’m concerned that a firmware update might not be right for it and brick it.

I’m inclined to simply return it to Best Buy, but I thought I’d try here first.

Also if it is a firmware issue I’ll just go through this again. Though I can’t understand why a device that has been out such a short time would use a firmware update that looks as if it was posted some time ago. Again, I’m concerned about identifying the correct firmware, and determining what level of firmware it is currently at.

I’m willing to try another one as I loved it and it will be perfect for the gym.

BUT, my confidence in the device is, understandably I would say, reduced, because it malfunctioned within hours of my purchase.

Any thoughts on this, or other help, will be appreciated.

Well, my opinion is, even brand new mp3 players will act up if loaded with bad or corrupted file/s. 

To check the current firmware loaded, go to Settings>System Settings>Info. The Version would say  “V01.01.03A”. That is your firmware. I’ve seen V01.01.05A to be the latest firmware but no links yet provided for it. Maybe you will have one available if you download the new firmware updater.  I haven’t upgraded yet since so far it works flawless for me.

So far so good. ٩(●̮̮̃•̃)۶٩(-̮̮̃-̃)۶٩(͡๏̮̮̃๏)۶

Thanks for pointing me to the verison, this one has V01.01.05A with around 1GB used up.

I should have included, while I hunted around for info, and wrote up my questions, I was playing the files it seemed, and that was only a guess, to be having a problem with. I started every file by that artist as well using WinAmp, no problems.

I did read a reference to variable length MP3, a heck of a lot of my MP3’s are in that format so I’m hoping the poster didn’t know what they were talking about…

Thanks again.

P.S. I left the Clip+ on my PC’s USB port for thae last 8 hours. When I checked it just now the battery indicator was still moving, which I read on the board is not normal.

I did just notice that this forum has a manual posted that at first glance is a lot more extensive then the little, and uninformative, foldout included with the player. 

I’m going to read the PDF this afternoon, but I’m thinking why take a chance when I can just run it over to BestBuy and get another one.

Your player doesn’t need to be returned.

http://forums.sandisk.com/sansa/board/message?board.id=clipplus&thread.id=293

Thanks for the reply. The issue that had me really concerned was the screen displaying one letter at a time, then a full song name at the bottom, showing only the last letter of the line above it, and then the unit froze.

I returned, and I’ve run the new one to death since, with no recurrence of the problem.

Thanks again for the help,

Larry