Rating: 
Summary: Overall, it's the best player in the market...for now
Review: Before I bought the NOMAD II, I read a lot of reviews from Amazon. I saw there were a few downsides to this product, but I took my chances anyway and I do not regret it at all. I believe this product to be the best mp3 player out in the market now. I admit, I don't know much about mp3 players (this being my first one), but compared to the reviews of the other top selling players, the NOMAD didn't really have much drastic flaws to it. I'm not going to get all technical now, except the fact that NOMAD can support other future formats like WMA, and most of the other top-selling ones do not. OKay...NOMAD has a limited memory of 64MB. Most of the others do too. Yeah, there are some that hold 96MB now, but who knows...wait a few years and it'll probably be a couple Gigabytes...that is, if future formats of music files do not make mp3's obsolete...or if you really want to wait that long for it to come out. When you think about it, it's not really all that bad. Of course, people would like the player to hold infinite amount of music... 64MB is just not enough, I know. I'd love it so much if one Smartmedia card could hold 100 songs compared to 12-15...I also wished CD's and tapes can hold that much at one time, too. Speaking of that, hey...can tapes zip from one track to another? Does it give CD quality sounds like the mp3 players do? Can tapes hold more than 20-30 songs averaging 5 minutes a piece? And CD's? Burn as many mixed song CD's you'd like, but you can only do them once on each CD, that is, if you do not mess it up in the process...and they take a lot of time. Plus, you can't hold that many songs in there either. Basically, you got the same limits as you always had with portable music players with the exception of a lot of extra convenience involved. Believe me, this little gadget is very convenient. It's light as a feather. It won't skip. It won't "eat the tape", wear down the motor, wear down any heads (tape heads),...no need to clean the heads or lenses since there are no moving parts. The mp3 player isn't fragile like CD players. You bump into someone with your CD player in your backpack, there's a pretty good chance your CD player will be...killed. With this unit, you don't need a backpack. Just slip it into your front pocket. Run into anyone you want and I'll guarantee there'll be no damage to your unit...unless the person you ran into beats you up first and punches you in the chest, crushing it. I could go on forever with this but I must point out some other "downsides" to this unit. I read somewhere that the FM radio wasn't that great on this. Works fine for me. I mean if I were in a basement with no windows, surely I'd get bad radio receptions. I'm not saying that the reviewer who wrote the complaint about bad reception lives in a basement...I'm just saying radio signals vary wherever you go or wherever you are. I get good reception where I'm at now, but if I move south of my neighborhood, I get static on my FM radio...as well as my cellular phone. Some reviewer said this unit doesn't have a fast forward or rewind...YEAH IT DOES! Hold the ">>" or "<<" down a bit and let it go. Yeah, yeah, you see? I read the Diamond Rio unit has a problem with battery power. It drains out quick from just transferring songs through the USB. I've been using this NOMAD for days and the battery just keeps going and going and going... Unlike some downsides to other units, this one doesn't require and "encrypted" mp3. Just load it straight up as it is from your PC or MAC. OK, it's time to get a little philosophical...you can't have everything you want in life. What I mean is be thankful for what you got. There's a lot of complaints of little petty things. "It can't hold enough songs", "The batteries make it too heavy", "The headphones don't fit my head", "The buttons are too small", "There's no built-in microwave", "It doesn't have a bottle opener at the end of it"...too much whining about things that aren't so serious. It plays music and is convenient. That's what it was made for and thats what it delivers. Believe me, no matter how perfect another player might be out there right now, the companies who develop these little gadgets are working on another as I speak that is ten times as advanced and tens times as perfect. You could wait around for the next couple years waiting for better player and brag all about it. In the meantime, me and all the other NOMAD owners will be enjoying our music while you sit there and wait. By then you'll be sitting exactly where we are now while another like you is waiting for the next better player to come out after then. I don't mean to offend nobody with this review, really. I'm just saying for those who plan on purchasing an mp3 player, this one will do great. I think its the best one out there for now. And try not to look for what's wrong with it. Concentrate on what is great about it and enjoy your [money's] worth.
Rating: 
Summary: CD's- good
Review: mp3 players are nifty little gadgets, but they still have a little ways to go. i was excited before my screen froze and the battery cover got stuck. it had easy to understand icons and i didn't even need the directions to learn how to use most of the basic operations. but i tried to copy a cd, and to get a decent amount of music on it you degrade the sound quality and it "skips", so to speak, which is quite annoying if you're a big music fan. you also have to have access to a computer whenever you want to put new music on it, which you'll have to do often if you listen to enough music in the course of a day. so, i suggest sticking to cd's till they are bigger memory options available. cd's aren't always the best, but they're about the most convenient right now.
Rating:
Summary: Best on the Market
Review: I received my MP3 player today, and it's working great. I have read numerous reports of players coming broken, or the battery/card cover being hard to take off, but neither has happened to me. It was fast to get working, hardly over 15 minutes, and with the USB connection it takes hardly 20 seconds to download a song. The wire remote is really convieniant, I went biking the same day and it worked great. The 64 MB is enough for me to use, and the radio stations pick up well. The screen is easy to read, and you can change how long it stays lit. This is my first MP3 player, and I'm very happy with the purchase
Rating:
Summary: dont get it
Review: dont get it cuz the regular nomad is better this is why the regular nomad comes with a docking station and if you want one for the nomad 2 u have to pay ... extra ... the nomad has the same memory 64mb it also has raido voice recording and a hold button and it's also cheaper ... do the math you'll see.
Rating:
Summary: Way to go!
Review: After doing all the homework I could dig up on MP3's, my final decision came after reading Amazon's reviews. I'm greatfull I did. The bad news is you must have a good set of earphones to compleatly enjoy this music lovers "good things come in small packages". The good news is the software is good, so is the tech support of you need it. The sound quality is awesome. The radio is an added bonus. It feels good in your hand, and with an extra sound card, your set for the day. Fantastic! If you want to spend the bucks, you wil not be disapointed. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: Nomad II's FM radio/other features
Review: I have the Nomad II and it's great! I don't understand how some people can say the FM radio doesn't work. It does! It just matters where you live. Of course your not always going to get stereo sound from the unit because: 1. Where you live-you might not be in a good spot to get good reception 2. You might be in a building where the walls reduce the transmission of the radio waves. 3. You could have the antenna(headphone cord) bunched up which won't allow good reception. Now the Nomad II is also great because it tells you whether the reception is in stereo or mono. Another great feature of the Nomad II is by holding the Play/Pause button while listening to Music, it will automatically go to the FM radio. Hold the button again and go to the voice recordings. And if you do it again you can go from voice recording to Music. One other feature of the Nomad II is that you can set how long the Backlight stays on. Up to 12 seconds. Or if you need it on for longer than that hold on the menu button for a few seconds and the Backlight will go on...and stay on until you hold on the menu button again.
Rating:
Summary: Tuner better than expected
Review: After reading the reviews posted here, I expected the Nomad II's FM receiver to perform quite poorly. I live in San Francisco, and the performance of other radios (walkmans, clock radios, boomboxes, etc.) has always been quite bad. I found the Nomad II's FM receiver to perform as well if not better than any of the other radios I own, including a Rotel stand-alone component on my home stereo. The only thing I find disappointing in the package has been my inability to control the "titles" of the MP3s as they disply on the Nomad II. A minor quibble, and they might fix this in future software upgrades. You will not be disappointed by the Nomad II.
Rating:
Summary: It's not a home audio system...
Review: But then I didn't buy it for home! I have my cd player in my car and a full blown audio/visual system at home. What I wanted was something that I could play "my" music (symphonic, jazz and "space music") on while I am at work that would provide a high quality and give me the flexibility of programming my selections... and the NOMAD II 64Mb MP3 Player does it all! It's lightweight so you don't even know it's there and it's inline wire remote make it a snap to change the volumne, skip a song or pause when the phone rings... and the headset allows for a great sound quality and still lets you hear what's going on around you (when I used to wear my headphones, I couldn't hear a train coming... or worse... I would talk louder than necessary because I didn't think anyone could hear me). I can answer my speakerphone and if necessary, halt the music with a touch of the remote, and it's even possible to use the phone handset without taking off the NOMAD's headset. The sound quality (taking into consideration the headset and other factors) is fantastic... from a single oboe solo to the finale of the 1812 Overture, the response is terrific. The software that comes with it is perfect for creating MP3 files from your cd's or wave files and a lot easier than some of the software I was having to use to create MP3 files. While not quite as simple as "drag and drop", it took only minutes and I was "ripping" a couple of tracks off of Copeland's 3rd Symphony to add to a few tracks from a Babylon 5 CD. The quality of the recording technique is good enough that a lesser sampling rate (which allows me twice the normal recording time)can be used and still provides a quality of listening enjoyment that is as good as any portable cd/cassette player I've owned. The USB Port makes uploading files a lot quicker and the NOMAD's management software is simple and efficient to use. From ripping open the box, through initial placement of the battery and memory module, loading the software drivers and programs and plugging in the USB cable the first time was a little over 15 minutes and I had loaded my first MP3 (created earlier) and was evaluating the NOMAD's reproduction of the music 5 minutes later. All in all... technically advanced but easy to use... great quality of sound and features... opps!.. did I forget the FM Radio with 32 channels available for preset listening?.. just the thing for hiking, bike riding or snoozing in the hammock on a cool Fall afternoon! And now a word about who made this all possible... Amazon.com! I could go on about how quick and efficient their online ordering is or how I feel comfortable about E-commerce with them... or how their customer service department seems to bend over backwards to please... but then I have come to expect if after the many (over 50+ DVD's, CD's books and movies in the last 6 months) orders I have placed with them. The last time I bought something from one of their competitors it was a capacinno... and even my kids now think of browsing as "something done online at Amazon"! There you have it... two winners!.. Creative Labs and Amazon.com bringing you great sounds NOMADer what your taste in music!..
Rating:
Summary: Easy to Use, Great Quality
Review: The Nomad II is the best mp3 player that I have come across. The radio feature is really convenient, as is the voice recording option. The software is also very easy to use and straightforward. The music is cd-quality, but you don't have to worry about skips with the mp3 format. Downloading, exchanging and deleting music is done with dragging files similar to the Microsoft Explorer format. This mp3 player is up and running after 15 minutes of prep time.
Rating:
Summary: Evaluation of the NOMAD II
Review: The NOMAD II digital mp3 player / voice recorder by Creative Labs is one of the best devices of its kind. It is lightweight, small, has an intuitive interface,and the sound quality is in my opinion very good. Its only rival is perhaps the Rio 500 by Diamond. Other digital recorders / mp3 players tend to have much lower storage capacities and/or pitiful sound quality which makes them practically useless. The NOMAD II comes with a USB connector (unlike earlier versions of the NOMAD the NOMAD II will not work with a parallel port: you will need a USB port on your computer), headsets, an extension cord for the headphones with buttons on it (which is advertized as a "remote control"), an optional 64MB SmartMedia flash memory card (which you must have although it can be purchased separately), a leather case for the NOMAD II, one AA battery, and of course the NOMAD II itself. The software basically consists of the NOMAD II manager and the Creative Digital Audio Center (DAC). Initially there is no operating system on the NOMAD II. You will need to boot into Windows 98 and connect your NOMAD II to the PC to transfer the NOMAD II operating system to the SmartMedia card using the NOMAD II manager. Once this is done you can also transfer any mp3 files to the NOMAD II, play them, and record. The NOMAD II uses two different file formats on its SmartMedia card. One is MPEG layer 3 (.mp3) which is used to play music and the other one is (.nvf) which is what the NOMAD II uses to store voice recordings. It is impossible to transfer .mp3 files from the NOMAD II to the computer so you must back up the .mp3 files on the computer so that when you need more space on the SmartMedia card you can delete the file without losing it. One the other hand you can transfer the .nvf voice files from the NOMAD II to the PC. However you must play the voice files either on the NOMAD II or on PC with Nomad II Manager. It is not possible to convert the voice files to .mp3 so if you want to make a recording and send it to a friend then your friend will not be able to listen to it unless they also have a NOMAD II or the Nomad II manager. That is because the .nvf (which presumably stands for nomad voice file) is a proprietary format presumably developed for the NOMAD only. The other drawback is that the fast forward mechanism found on many tape recorders and mp3 player software on PCs is not available on the NOMAD II. Hence if you have a one hour recording then you cannot jump to the middle of the recording without waiting for one hour first. All I can say here is that these devices are still in their infancy. Other than that the USB connection is fast and the recording as well as mp3 playing quality is excellent (yes CD sound quality is better but who can tell the difference anyway; plus remember: an mp3 player like this will never skip!). And BTW, at the present time you need Windows 98 for the Nomad II Manager which is the only way to transfer files back and forward (although some have suggested that this is also possible with a SmartMedia card reader). The Nomad II Manager currently does not work with Windows NT, MacOS, Linux, or other operating systems. The best features of the NOMAD II are ease of use, excellent sound/recording quality, and large storage capacity. Its worse features are that it is impossible to convert .nvf files to .mp3 files and lack of support for other operating systems.
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