Creative delivers a bona-fide iPod challenger with its wonderful Zen Vision:M. This versatile player offers top-notch audio and video reproduction, and its extensive feature list leaves little to be desired.

The 30GB Vision:M comes in black, white, green, pink and blue, so you can choose the color that fits you best. A 60GB version comes in black and white and adds a USB Host function, but this model is only available from select retailers including Amazon and Buy.com.

The face of the Vision:M is dominated by a 2-1/2-inch color LCD screen that can display over 262,000 colors. This blows away the 65,000-color capability of the iPod, and the Vision:M's images appear brighter as well. On the negative side, Creative can't match the wide variety of video content available from Apple, although Creative's ZenCast service is constantly expanding its library. In addition, the Vision:M can get movie and other content downloads from Amazon Unbox, MSN Movies, TiVo To Go, Comedy Central and other services. Video formats supported include AVI, DivX, XviD, MPEG4 and WMV9.

The Vision:M has very intuitive controls. Four flush-mounted control buttons handle most functions, and a vertical touchpad slider works like the pad on a laptop computer. Thin left and right buttons flank the touchpad. The combination of controls work well once you get used to them, but the vertical touchpad makes rapid, accurate navigation difficult. This improves with practice, but it is still hard to be precise. On the other hand, the menu system is easy to use, and a customizable shortcut button lets you quickly engage a particular function.

Music on the Vision:M sounds great. This player supports MP3, WAV, WMA and DRM-WMA files, and it is compatible with most online music subscription services (except iTunes). Creative includes a set of earbuds that sound much better than those included with most other MP3 players. You can create your own custom sound with the five-band equalizer, and there are eight preset equalizer curves. The Vision:M also has a built-in FM tuner with 32 presets, as well as a microphone for voice recordings, two features the iPod lacks.

The Vision:M has a built-in rechargeable battery good for up to 14 hours of music playback or 4 hours of video playback. While this is better than the Toshiba Gigabeat, it lags behind the performance of the iPod. However, this is one of the very few negatives of the impressive Creative Zen Vision:M.

Pros:  Brilliant display, broad format and service compatibility, excellent audio and video performance
Cons:  Relatively short battery life, touchpad control is imprecise, less video content available compared to iPod

Warranty
90 days labor, 1 year parts