Rating: 
Summary: Runners, take note
Review: Overall, I like this unit. Bear that in mind before reading the rant I am going to go on, regarding one aspect of its design.The belt clip is enough to drive a person crazy. I have had this MP3 player for three weeks now and four times, due to the useless clip, it has fallen off my waistband to the ground. Each time this has happend the unit has frozen: can't even turn it off. If this happens to you, here is what you need to do: take out the battery and reinsert it to 'reboot' the unit. I could have saved myself MUCH aggravation, had I known this was the only fix from the outset. But getting back to the clip: how could the manufacturer overlook such a crucial element to the design of a device intended for high impact activities like running and aerobics? You cannot simply put the Nomad in your pocket, either. That's how mine froze up the first time, presumably from all the bouncing. If you buy this unit you are going to want to have some other means of carrying it securely, such as an armband. Factor that into the cost. If it wasn't for that, I would be delighted with the Nomad. Here are its appealing features: - The first thing to know about this kind of mp3 player is that it is absolutely without moving parts, unlike other appealing players, the iPod. Your music will not skip while doing high performance activities, with the Nomad. This cannot be reliably said of players that have a small disc drive, inside them.
- Excellent included software. I helped my sister get set up with her Rio player and the Real software that came with it was Really user-unfriendly. The Creative 'Play Center' as it's called comes up immediately on your monitor screen when you plug the device into the cable, and the interface could not be simpler to navigate.
- Excellent sound quality.
- 128 MB translates to about 30 songs for me. That's excellent quality mp3s and enough material to get me through my regular runs.
- The headphones are of good quality. It took some getting used to the wraparound style (sort of like wearing tight, backwards glasses), but the sound is very good and their large foamy pads even provide some protection to your ears from those cold winter winds.
- The LCD display is good and I have no trouble reading the text that appears on it. - The voice recorder is a neat extra. Am I ever going to use it? Who knows, but if I ever need one, I won't have to run out and purchase some expensive unit. You can upload the files to your computer for storage, too.
- The controls are intuitive and quick to learn.
- You can have this unit operational within a few minutes of getting it out of the box. Then you can get back to the important business of running with tunes!
Rating: 
Summary: great product, great price
Review: I just got mine yesterday and within minutes had 38 mp3s on it. it only took about 3 seconds to transfer each mp3 to it. the software it comes with is great, and the page says it takes 2 AA batteries but mine only took/came with one and still lasts for 10 hours! the only caveat i found was i dont see how you could record seminars and stuff because you have to talk directly into the mic for it to record it loud enough to hear it play back.. if you uploaded it to your pc and played it full volume it might be good enough though.. I still love it and the headphones are really cool too.. they fit on the back of your head (if you have an adult sized head) and stay in place so it looks less like you're wearing headphones.
Rating:
Summary: Cool unit
Review: Bought this as a Christmas present for my stepson. He had no trouble linking it to his computer and downloading songs. He loves the unit and takes it with him wherever he goes. FYI - He is 17 years old. He has also dropped it a couple of times already (ugh), but the unit just keeps on rocking. Would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for an MP3 player. Also - bought this 128MB unit from Amazon.com for $130 which is about the same priceas a 64MB unit in the stores. The extra MB really helps with storage. I am buying one for myself as soon as I get my tax refund..... :-)
Rating:
Summary: Great MP3
Review: This MP3 is great. The sound is as neet as you can get. The wight is unperseptable, the pocket-size figure makes it easy to handle and carry. This Mp3 is mostly pros (actually i only found one con). You can carry over 40 song with its 128 MB. expandable card, you canrecoprd classes or live messages. The only bad thing about it is that it will take you some time to get the hang on the menu (it would be easier to have a PhD in electronics). Besides that, this rpoduct is great and the price you pay is not half what it is worth.
Rating:
Summary: A good buy
Review: I was forced to buy a new MP3 player when SonicBlue decided not to support XP drivers for their Rave 2100 product line (their customer service is the worst I have ever dealt with)--and since I vowed never to buy another product from Sonic Blue, I bought the Nomad. Im glad I did, it is a great product for the money. Sounds good, easy navigation, and the has enough memory to keep me occupied in most situations. I did notice one issue however: when the headphones are accendentially pulled out of the jack (but not all the way out of the jack), the player tends to completely hang...you need to remove the battery to reset it. Other than that it has been performing flawless.
Rating:
Summary: comments and help with software install
Review: Overall the Nomad is a great line of digital audio players. The IIc version is the more economical of the Creative players, and for the price, it is a great bargain. I myself bought a 32mb version of the same player straight from Creative for 100+ dollars about two years ago. I sure wish I had waited to get this one that has more memory! But all in all, a decent product. I like the fact that it supports WMA files as well, even those encoded with the WM8 codec. As for the software, I misplaced the original CD and thought I was doomed forever. The software from the website said that I would have to have some type of software installed already in order to upgrade to the latest version. However, I just so happened to try my luck at editing the PCenter.ini file contained inside the web download from nomadworld.com and by changing these few lines in it, I was able to get it to install. [Installation.Detect]
Type = OR
SBL = 1 <-- change to 0
PDE = 1 <-- change to 0
PLC = 1 <-- change to 0 Simply change the 1's to 0's and then rerun the install program and it will work. NOTE: Files are unpacked to temporary directory on hard drive. Search for PCenter.ini after the initial install tells you that it must abort b/c nothing required is installed. Hope this helps Nomad owners who have lost the CD!! :) cheers.
Rating:
Summary: not too bad
Review: The NomadIIc isnt the best player on the market but its good for the money. Ive got 128 mb smartmedia in the player and it holds about 4 hours of music (70 songs).
when i got my first one, it didnt work right. it wouldnt turn on, and i think if i would have waited a few hours it would have fixed itself. But i screwed up the player, got rid of the firmware and attempted to reload the firmware. But beware--creative's technical support is HORRIBLE. they don't help you at all. I wound up sending the player back to amazon and got a new one. this one works fine. The program they give you is not the best and is very unstable on windows xp. its very easy to put songs on the player using windows media player. pretty much the only thing you need the creative software for is to put your name in the player and to change the order of the songs. It's really hard to get the ID tags right, usually you can only see the song title with no artist. its just a hassle getting them right. Using the player is pretty simple. you get used to the menus. when you are playing a song you cant look at your other songs. Its either listening or navigating the menus. you can't do both. I dont use voice recording that much, but the microphone isnt too strong. all and all its a pretty good mp3 player. you might want to buy a smartmedia expansion card pretty soon so you dont get tired of your music.
Rating:
Summary: Great sound for a great price
Review: Have owned the Nomad IIc for a month and haven't dropped it yet, so I can't attest to its durability. Top rating from Consumer Reports (for the 64MB version) influenced my buying decision. The "quick setup guide" is not much help, so if you need detailed setup instructions, install the PDF manual from the CD like other users have suggested. Don't bother downloading the manual from the Nomadworld site - it's exactly the same as the one on the CD, only with some annotations. Setup was easy after reading the aforementioned manual - install the software, plug in the player, transfer the files. Have used both the PlayCenter 2 software and the MusicMatch Jukebox Nomad plug-in to transfer files; since I rip CDs using MusicMatch, I prefer using that program, but the two perform identically in terms of letting you know how much memory is left, etc. Be sure to pick up a 128MB SmartMedia card to expand memory capacity (256MB total will hold 50-plus 128 kbps MP3 files). Written documentation for inserting and removing the card is nowhere to be found, but just look at the two little pictures on the back side of the player (where the battery cover is) and the instructions are right there. Actually putting in and taking the card out is a little tricky, especially if you have RSI like me - you may need to take the battery out first! Would give this product five stars if it didn't come with a stingy 90-day warranty and those extremely uncomfortable, ear-pinching "backphones". Use your favorite pair of headphones or earbuds instead. Either way, the sound is awesome for such a small device - after all, Creative is a leader in sound cards - and the player is easy to use once you've gone through the menus and controls a few times. Have it set on a pretty low volume (around 2 or 3) and it's quite loud enough with the Sony earphones I use.
Overall, an excellent product. Just hope it doesn't conk out on the 91st day...
Rating:
Summary: Great First Player
Review: This is my first MP3 player and it's a good one. I use it all the time. Prior to purchasing, I borrowed a friend's Rio (not sure which model or which year, but more than 3 years old). I decided to go with the Nomad because of reviews I have read here and at other reputable websites (specifically, a well-known consumer products review website). With the ... rebate, the price was unbeatable for a 128MB player that expands to 256MB. My documentation explained how to turn it on/off, but I agree with a previous poster that documentation was generally lacking. The software is okay...I had already loaded a music list onto my PC, then to my friend's MP3 player, using Rio's software. The music list transferred with ease, however trying to add new songs and consolidate them into my previously created list was not as easy as it should have been. I was expecting the software to be less complicated. I also found that the new songs I added did not retain their information (title, artist) in the song list on the player, though when the song is playing I can see it. I like the headphones that came with the player, though after a while (45 - 60 minutes), they start to hurt my ears. Adjusting them usually helps. Good quality sound with them. I prefer these headphones to ear buds (don't stay in my ears) and I like that the band goes around the back of my head rather than the top. Another good feature is the auto-shutdown, where the play turns off after a set amount of time, thus conserving the battery. Occasionally, this feature is annoying, as it shuts down too soon. If you had paused the song and it turns off, the player returns to the beginning of the song you had paused. If the battery dies, the player returns to the part of the song playing at the time it died. Nice feature, though I wish the pause/auto-shutdown worked this way as well. I haven't used the Record feature, but this is a bonus in my opinion. Not sure I would agree with 10 hours of playback on 1 battery, but then again, I do use mine a lot and may have lost track of time. Overall, a really good player at a great price.
Rating:
Summary: very nice but could use some fine tuning
Review: I just bought this little unit about a week ago and am so far very impressed. It has great sound, very good storage capacity, and comes to your door a a very reasonable price. I would make just a few changes. First off the construction is very plasticy and it feels as though one good drop and your out 130 bucks. The voice recorder is essentially useless. It's a pain to navigate and the mic's range is about a foot. I would have liked to get the one with an FM radio. The head phones have poor sound and don't fit my head comfortably. You can't check the time without stopping the music, hitting menu then going to the time icon (that's poor design!). The boys at creative piled on the useless features and buttons on this little box. Great, it has a clock but to see it takes a cascade of user input. Things I did like include the additional storage slot. With 256mb I could cram about 55-60 songs at 128-160kbps. The software is very smooth and easy to use. The usb interface transfers quickly and as a bonus...doesn't crash my machine. So now I wear a watch to check the time, encased the unit in bubble wrap so it won't break, and attached a decent pair of head phones and.... now I'm happy.
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